#they don't pay for access to big collections of anything

[duckbunny]

fucking tired of you all doing free libby advertising. my local library network has access to three books via libby. not three books I'm interested in. three books total.

[klawsfangs]

What a relationship with Klaus Mikaelson would include:

-Ok so obviously Klaus is really protective given his many enemies and he would literally do anything to keep you safe.

-Sometimes that can be exhausting since him beeing overprotective will probably end up with him not wanting you to go anywhere without him.

-that also includes : You want to go to a party with your friends? Cool klaus surprisingly has time too. You want to go to a concert of your favorite artist? How nice klaus also really likes the artist and yes he would love to go to this concert with you. You wanna go out to the bakery to get a cake? ,,don't stress yourself love, I will pick it up for you"

-so be prepared that he will pretty much follow you everywhere or makes sure that you don't even leave the house.

-even tho after some time it can start to get annoying you know that he only does that because he loves you sm and is scared to be without you

-let's discuss that "scared" topic a bit more. Klaus isn't really one to show his emotions and feelings. So when he opens up to you, you can be certain that you really are important to him.

-Once you gained his trust, which will be a hard and long way, he will literally talk to you all the time. His enemies tried to do that. His siblings annoyed him with that. He killed that person because of that.

-you will soon learn that he talkes about it sm because he wants to be understood. He wouldn't want you to be afraid of him or mad because of the things he does. He wants you to know his reasoning behind his actions so that you won't leave him.

-but if he does soemthing that really upsets you oh lord he would stop at nothing to earn your forgiveness. From your favorite flowers till a big vacation to your favorite country.

-we all know that klaus is soemone with MUCH pride so he isn't soemone that would normally beg. But if he really messed up then he would even get on his knees for you for sure. After all this man is completely wiped for you.

-He would do just about anything if you asked him too. Backstage tickets for your fav event? This new restaurant that just opend? This island that you really wanna travel to? Please he's klaus freaking mikaelson, he already booked and bought all of that for you.

-which brings us to our next topic. Gifts. Now this man knows how to give gifts. He know all your desires and wishes even tho you might never told him. One sparkling in your eyes when you look at soemthing? Well he knows what to give you to Christmas then.

-he has access to things and clothes you could only dream of. 1000 years of collection pays off. He will always have just the perfect present for you at hand. And he will always be happy to spoil you with them.

-When it comes to spoiling he really knows no end. Just this little things like your favorite flowers or the new book that you wanted will be daily received by you from him. But it can also be much bigger things like the car you always dreamed of. And if you want to go shopping well he his money is yours so don't even think about using your own money.

-how ever even tho all this things sound nice, there are some things that will also be unavoidable when you date nik.

-you will for sure get kidnapped by his enemies from time to time. Yes klaus will always get you back and protect you but still that can leave damage on you. You're in danger of getting anxiety, trust issues, panic attacks and other unpleasant things. After all kidnapping is not soemthing you just forget about, especially not when it happens often and not just once.

-You will get dragged into the Mikaelson family drama. No way around that🤷‍♀️ So believe me when I tell you it will never get bored with them. You will get involved in fights that aren't yours and you will not be able to get out of all of that easily.

-klaus however always tells you that he can send you away till the fight is over or that you will stay at the compound the whole time. He would never be disappointed or mad at you if you choose to not fight. He will always be there for you to comfort you and protect you when you need him and he will never drag you to things you don't want.

-in general he would never be disappointed in you. You broke his car? ,,it's okay my love I'm not mad, I will just buy me a new one" You accidentally failed the task he gave you?,, no need to be angry with yourself sweetheart, we will just do it together tomorrow" God you could even lose the damn white oak stake and he still wouldn't be really angry at you. Sure he would be a bit tensed and mad but he would never let that out on you.

- klaus is also surprisingly willing to cuddle with you. He will always want to make sure that you are warm, safe and comfortable. And where is a better place for that than in his arms?

-it doesn't matter if he's spooning you, if you lay your head on his chest or if you are fully on top of him as long as he can hold you in some way. Soemtimes if he had a bad day or soemthing he would even be the one coming to you for cuddles and not you coming to him. But psst don't tell anyone🤫

-In general klaus is really needy when if comes to your touch and attention. He can't stand when you even look at someone else. Poor boy wants to feel loved cause he never felt that before.

-he will always have a hand on you. Either its him holding your hand. Or his hand is on your tight. Or he will also often put his hand on the small of you back or around your hips.

-and if someone even dares to touch you or look at you the wrong way. Oh God stand that person by. He will probably be dead by night.

-all and all klaus is a really protective boyfriend who would stop a nothing for you. He will always shower you with love and be there for you when you need him the most.

-You are his light just as much as he is yours.

I will probably gonna do another part for the more nasty stuff😉

Goodnight everyone🤍

[amybizarre]

More Headcanons for the Cottagecore AU

Like II Siad, I already posted this on Wattpad and AO3, which is why I can post these so quickly one after the other, lol..

(Cottagecore! Julie sketch for your enjoyment ^^ + more content under the cut)

Wally

Wally is an artist through and through. It's one of his special interests that he burns for with never ending passion. It's hard to buy art supplies in and around their village, so Wally taught himself how to make them from scratch! Brushes and paint are easy enough. Making a canvas is a bit more difficult though and he doesn't always have all materials. Thankfully this isn't a big problem with his creativity! Anything can be a canvas! From stones, to wood, to plates, to clothes, anything! If his neighbors want anything to look more beautiful, Wally is the first one to turn to! His other special interest is you of course! And his other neighbors!^^

Howdy HCs!

1) He is a big floof! With an even bigger heart!^^

2) His green fur has lots of little darker spots and speckles, that look a lot like freckles! They cover his back and shoulders, including his upper arms.

3) Because of his fur and the hard work he does every day, he rarely wears a shirt during the warm seasons. Overalls and a straw hat will have to do.

4) He cares very much for the other neighbors. As the only farmer in the valley, he views it as his top priority to keep everyone fed.

5) If he hears about any of his neighbors having a shortage of supplies or trouble to pay for what they need, Howdy will be the first to give it to them. For free!

6) He will vehemently refuse payment in this situation.

7) People who help him on his farm, will often go home with their arms full of goods and gifts at the end of the day.

8) As a caterpillar food is his greatest joy! Especially sweet little treats to sweeten the day every now and then!

Poppy HCs!

1) Poppy's house is a giant, old tree stump!

2) The top of it, or better, the roof, is accessible of course and functions as a terrace.

3) Poppy loves to drink tea up there!

4) She also invites neighbors over for cake and tea pretty often.

5) She's a kind and gentle momma bird. <3

6) Poppy loves to teach her neighbors everything about cooking, baking, herbs and everything else she collects or does in the forest! All they need to do is ask!

7) Sometimes she will accidentally call her conversation partner "child" or "my child". Simply because of her motherly attitude. The others don't mind and happily embrace the nicknames.

8) Another reason Poppy views the other neighbors as children is, because she's the oldest one in the village!

9) A bit more spooky: Poppy can sense and sometimes even see spirits!

10) She wouldn't call herself a medium though. Poppy prefers the term light witch.

Julie HCs!

1) Julie regularly accompanies Poppy on her walks.

2) Yes, she can still talk to plants! ^^

3) She looooves flowery dresses and these big fancy hats with a wide rimb and ribbons or flower ornaments.

4) Julie has a giant greenhouse, where she grows the flowers for the village.

5) In her greenhouse is also a spot to sit down at a small table and share tea or gossip.

6) Her and Frank often meet in front of the community center to tend to the flowers there. When they do, they share the latest news and gossip and just can't stop talking!

7) Julie and Frankie are besties! ^^

8) To get him out of his study more often, she usually insists to take him along on walks through the valley. They are looong walks that sometimes even take the whole day.

9) Unfortunately her sense of direction isn't the greatest though and they get lost frequently. :(

Frank HCs!

1) Frankie sadly does not have a lot of stamina and tires from physical activities quickly. :,)

2) While the ground floor of the community center is open for anyone, the top floor is not, because it's where Frank lives!

3) The top floor is basically an attic, but he made it a cozy place.

4) His study is a very messy, chaotic space. It feels pretty stuffed with how many shelves, books, tables filled with papers and storage boxes are in there.

5) According to Frank however there is supposed to be order to the chaos. Welp, you know what they say: Only a genius reigns over the chaos-

6) If you ask him about his notes about a subject, he'll go up there and find them for you in a heartbeat!

7) Frank has crazy photographic memory. Thanks to that he's always able to bring Julie and himself back home whenever they get lost. It's also useful for remembering where stuff is.

8) Frankie mostly studies anything entomology! Yep, still a bug enthusiast.

9) He studies insects mostly for the fun of it. But it is his dream to publish a scientific paper one day.

10) Light academia vibes for his clothing style, baby!

Eddie HCs!

1) Instead of his usual post hat he's wearing a vintage newsboy cap.

2) Eddie has a few of those in different colors. Those being brown, grey, grey and white checkered, olive and a dull blue! Looks like he's got the start of a collection going. ;)

3) He gets spooked easily.

4) He's actively trying to get over his fear of bugs, so he can spend more time with Frank.

5) Whenever he's helping Howdy on his farm, he makes sure to give the baby animals extra pets.

6) His favorites are the chickens and calves.

7) The animals really seem to love him and would become protective of him if neccessary.

8) With plants on the other hand... He's not that lucky. Eddie does not have a green thumb. And whenever he stands under a fruit tree for example, a fruit always ends up falling onto his head. It's comical how this event is practically guaranteed to happen.

Sally HCs!

1) Her styleof music is very calm and serene. There's a sense of longing in her songs that's hard to describe. It's not clear what exactly she's longing for.

2) Sally has a beautiful singing voice, that easily captures her audience.

3) She doesn't mind starting duets with her neighbors. In fact, she encourages them!

4) Sally believes that everyone has a good singing voice. You just need to find it! ^^

5) Her guitar broke at one point. She managed to fix it and now the neck of the instrument is replaced by a birch branch.

6) Sometimes she will host a small poetry competition for the village. The task usually is to write a short poem about a set theme.

7) She likes to collect the poems after each competition and turn them into small booklets, which she gives to the library so everyone can read them anytime.

8) When she's not strumming away on her instruments she is often found lounging around in one of her favorite spots, engulfed in poetry books from well-known authors.

Barnaby HCs!

1) When Sally hosts her poetry competitions, Barnaby likes to open the event with a comedic skit!

2) For some reason his poems also always turn into jokes at the end. It slightly upsets Sally, that he's not taking her competitions seriously.

3) He just can't help it though. It's in his blood!

4) Him and Howdy are great buddies, who regularly crack up to each other's jokes.

5) No matter what his neighbors need help with, any job that requires a handy man, inside or outside of the house, he's always ready to help. And happy to do so as well!

6) When he's taking time off of his odd jobs, Barnaby can often be found hanging out with Wally, accompanying him on his artsy escapades. Be it on the search for more ingredients for art supplies or a new scenic view to paint; or even if it's just to help Wally carry his easel; the blue doggo will be right there with him!

HCs for YOU! ^^

1) You're a doctor in this AU! Fresh out of medical school too-

2) You moved into their village, because they didn't have a doc yet. You may not own a clinic, but your small little cottage provides more than enough space.

3) Speaking of your cottage, it's a charming, rustic little building with a thatched roof. It is hugged by vines and surrounded by your herb garden.

4) On your first morning in the village, Wally knocked on your door to introduce himself. You invited him for tea in your garden, which he happily agreed to.

5) It was a foggy and cool morning though, and the little fella was not wearing a jacket. When you saw him shiver in his chair, you wasted no time and put your cardigan around his shoulders.

6) When you did, his pupils dilated in joy.

7) Welp, and that's how you lost your cardigan forever-

Facts about the setting!

1) The village lies within a vast valley. Blue mountains surround it all around, exept for a small passageway between them.

2) Aside from the village, the valley is filled with ongoing flower fields, grassy hills, a clear river running through them and a comparatively dark forest.

3) Spring is probably the most beautiful time of year, when most of nature is blooming and coming back to life. The temperatures are at a comfortable level, were a cozy jacket is more than enough to keep you warm. It does get a little windy still though.

4) It doesn't get too hot during summer. But it does get warm enough to take a dip in the river. The occasional breeze will reliably move the clouds away from the sun.

5) Autumn is a quite stormy season, with its typical golden days sprinkled into the mix. It's raining a lot more often during this season. All flora takes on a golden and orange hues in this season.

6) There's typically a lot of snow fall during the winter, with the eventual blizzard rolling by. It's the season of lit fireplaces and hot cocoa. Of fuzzy sweaters, thick coats, big shawls and beanies. Especially because the mountain air becomes bitter cold during winter.

7) The valley has many, many breathtaking views to offer. They're Wally's favorite motifs to paint! He just wants to capture the beauty of his home and of his neighbors sharing this lovely home with him.

That's all I have for now. (Still a whole lot, probably-) If you want to know anything else about this AU ort he characters, feel free to ask! ^^

[bugswarm]

I know this is tumblr and we generally don't care about Reddit much but hear me out

So, there is an issue over on reddit that is happening. They are trying to go publicly traded soon and so they are making a bunch of changes and its really screwing a lot of people over and causing issues. The current issue at hand though, is that they want to try to monetize more and took a page out of Elon Musk's book with Twitter and decided to make it so their API (ill explain in a second) cost money to use.

Now, if you don't know what an API is, basically its the door you use to access the servers. Every time you want to get to a new page you have to go through the door. If you go through it on their website or official app, its free because they collect your data and sell it to advertisers and feed you targeted ads between posts. But if you use a 3rd party app it costs that 3rd party app money. A lot of big power users on reddit use 3rd party apps to access reddit and up until now its been free.

The bug main 3rd party apps anticipated this change and had been discussing with reddit's admins about it for months. They had been told the price would be reasonable. A few days ago it came out that the prices would be in the millions per year. These 3rd party apps make maybe in the 10s of thousands a year at most generally speaking if they make anything at all. And by and large are considered to be the best possible experience you can have on reddit on a mobile device. (The mobile website constantly pushes you to use the app and forced you to use the app to view nsfw posts, the official app has a lot of problems and is missing large parts of the functionality from the regular desktop website and the iOS and Android versions of the app are very different from one another. Oh and both are known for being almost completely inaccessible disability-wise as things like screenreaders barely work on the app for whatever reason if at all. The 3rd party apps different between each other but most have the majority of the functionality and then some added on top of that.)

In addition to the proposed price changes, there is apparently also a plan to make it so any post or subreddit marked as NSFW is not viewable on 3rd party apps at all even if you were to pay the insanely high API prices. So the only way to see a lot of the NSFW content on a mobile device, would be to use the barely functional official app (since the mobile website punts you to the apps for NSFW posts already). Its not quite a tumblr-style porn ban but its the next worst thing.

A fuckton of subreddits are banding together to do a blackout protest for a few days/until the coming changes get reversed starting on the 12th. Its questionable on if it will do anything or if it was planned from the beginning in a Door-in-your-Face attempt.

I know this doesn't really affect Tumblr on its own but the more major sites that start fucking over their users like this, the worst the internet gets as a whole.

[boss-poss]

I've kinda gotten interested in the pokemon gun slavery game since I learned it was actually a base building survival type deal but $30 seems like a lot to pay to watch someone piss on an established franchise. I'd bite for 15, maybe even 20 for a completed game, but I just feel like I'm getting hustled for the current price. It's funny watching nintendo take knee to the balls after decades of stagnant slop but I won't be overcharged for event, sorry. It's a project made out of spite and designed to fire a few shots in the air to scare a company but it isn't really anything else. I think I'll just wait for like a year and catch it on a sale.

Otherwise I would like to see more contenders in the creature collection ring. I can't go back and play old pokemon games because the level of difficulty is nonexistent I've realized as time has gone on that the combat system is really fucking basic and broken. Give me an actual attempt at making an even semi-original competitor with a decently balanced combat system and some challenge and I'd happily throw money at it, full price even.

I've said for years that the hard part about standing against pokemon isn't about making something better than the original IP, it's about putting in a consistent level of effort and continuing to do so while trying to make a fun video game. Literally just do anything besides rushing out half-baked entries designed to siphon money from recognition and nostalgia. Literally any effort at all it seems.

Palworld, when viewed on it's own, looks like a modded unity game with someone's OCs added in and it still makes the official pokemon releases of the last 5 years look like absolute shit out of a butt. Scarlet and Violet in particular look like cheap copies in comparison and it really sells it to me that pokemon kind of needs to die. When the big name IP is so absolutely dunked on by an early access indie project it shows that the only real staying power it has is monopoly.

Pokemon exists as it does today only really because adults with money get addicted to nostalgia and Nintendo is an extremely litigious company. How many pokemon fan games have met their axe? How many developers have avoided even trying to make a similar game because featuring things even tangentially like a pokemon is just begging for a cease and desist from the hip? There should be multiple fan projects that consist of all regions and pokemon wrapped up together in one package but there aren't because the plumber's heel finds them every time. The greedy giant jealously guards his golden goose.

I don't think I'll even probably buy palworld, in fact I think no one will remember it this time next year, but we do need more games like it. Nintendo won't take this sitting down and if the developers can somehow avoid getting C&D'd into the dirt, I really hope that more people try to make the pokemon game they want, not just eat at the trough and be grateful for anything. If you want good and entertaining pocket monsters you need to say so by being the change you want to see in the world. Realize that collectible creatures aren't exclusive to pokemon and Nintendo's control of that genre only extends so far. They know this and that's why they act so aggressively to keep that the truth.

In fact, if I was a holder of the digimon (or the monster rancher) IP I'd be getting some talks going at least. Players are hungry on a lean diet and they've just gotten a taste of a thicker, more nutritious gruel. How quickly and happily they would run to people serving even cafeteria food? Bring something truly delicious and you could boot the king off his throne.

[wesleyaccola]

Habits (1.7k words)

One of the many things he finds interesting in this new found not-friendship they develop is how quickly they fall into small habits.

He always buys the popcorn and puts too much butter "My fingers are always greasy after, Humphrey. You're disgusting."

"No one is forcing you to eat the thing, Waldorf."

They always seem to find their way to his loft after every movie, engrossed in discussion and he swears he's never seem Blair Waldorf walk the streets of Wiliamsburg so freely.

He's not even sure she notices it.

xxx

If movie night happens to be at the loft (in which they never schedule but ends up being religiously on Thursdays) they always order pizza and she's tasked with the toppings. He notices he's eating a lot more of gourmet lately, or whatever the hell gourmet is. He's not sure, but he'll be dead before he asks her.

It tastes phenomenal.

xxx

They get the habit of always telling the truth.

"You shouldn't let Chuck Bass define what your life should be, Blair."

"And you shouldn't let Serena Van Der Woodsen snap her fingers and you're there with your tail wagging."

Her tone is sharper than his, but he starts to notice is not meant to hurt anymore. It borders on exasperation, actually.

As if she knew he could do better.

He was certain that she could. What he didn't know still was when he started caring about her happiness so much.

xxx

He writes and she reads.

It doesn't even begin as a request, once he gets his groove back and golden hair no longer clouds his thoughts and judgment, his mind grants him access to deeper things once more.

The first he sends on an e-mail at 2AM, needing to at least have her receive it as soon as he had finished it. He was surprised when the reply came at 2:30AM.

"You still ramble way too much Humphrey, but this is passable. It's thoughtful and insightful. But you did not hear that from me. What was the inspiration for this?"

In the back of his mind he feels like he knows he got it after a road trip and a reality check inside his father's car ("You're a writer! When was the last time you wrote something?").

He doesn't tell her that.

He replies that it's natural talent and Dan practically imagines the scoff that comes out as soon as she reads it.

She doesn't reply that night.

He won.

xxx

He has two tickets for a Fellini marathon on a Saturday afternoon at the Walter Reade. 'La Strada', 'Nights of Cabiria' and 'La Dolce Vita' are on queue.

On Thursday night she says yes, agrees to pay for the popcorn this time. He says that it doesn't even begin to cover for the money he had spent on her ticket or all the times he bought the popcorn before. He doesn't realize the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as he types this. She ignores him.

On Saturday morning he wakes up with a text "Something came up. Can't make it. Sorry."

The smile from two days prior turns into a frown. He says "yeah, no problem." But something nags at him in the back of his head. He doesn't go to the screenings but he keeps her ticket. The nagging turns to concern after it's Tuesday and he hasn't heard anything from her in three days.

He makes a decision.

Dan arrives at the penthouse in the early evening, Dorota gives him a pointed look and he heads upstairs.

"What are you doing here?" Her tone doesn't bite. It's soft, low. She's behind her covers, silk velvet robe covering her shoulders and arms. Dan looks at her and has no idea that this would be the last time he would not say anything about Blair's red, swollen eyes. He sighs. Three days of this, at least.

They need to change that.

"I've come bearing gifts."

He lifts his arms up, one bag in each hand.

"Good ones?" She asks.

He chuckles "If you don't go to Fellini, Fellini comes to you."

Dan approaches her bed, notices how her big brown eyes follow his steps. He puts the bags down, pulls out three DVDs from one of them. His personal collection, containing the movies they were gonna watch it on Saturday. They could easily watch them on Netflix, but it's not nearly as special.

Her smile begins to reach her eyes, and Dan breathes again. He also pulls out a copy of the current issue of the' 'New Yorker', his latest piece published. He leaves it at her nightstand, doesn't say anything else.

From the other bag there's macaronis of at least five different colors. He shakes his head and tries to hide his grin when her eyes light up. He takes out one last item "Mind if I use your microwave?" He shows the popcorn to her and she makes a point to roll her eyes "If you must."

Dan goes downstairs and Dorota helps him fetch a large enough bowl for two to eat it from. He doesn't want to dwell too much in what he thinks it's an appreciative expression from Dorota when she says "Have nice night, Mr. Humphrey."

Once he's back in her bedroom, Blair has already put Nights of Cabiria on and was back in bed, remote in one hand and macaroni in the other.

"What time did you leave Brooklyn? Isn't traffic supposed to be hellish at this hour?" Blair questions, takes a bite of her sweet, but Dan can see her sniffing the popcorn. He takes off his shoes and scoots next to her, over the covers.

"I took the subway."

"Ew."

Dan laughs "Just play the movie, Waldorf."

Their shoulders touch and Dan briefly ponders how much this is a far cry from the Blair-imposed two seat rule from a few months prior.

He doesn't mind it.

The opening credits aren't even over yet and she's already reaching for the popcorn, eyes on the screen. He leans the bowl to her side a bit.

"Dorota didn't have butter, sorry."

"You should be relieved. I'm sure your writer's earnings are still not enough to pay for these sheets if you were to ever grease them, Humphrey. You'd probably have to sell that loft of yours. Popcorn is fine this way."

He catches the habit of just shaking his head and laugh silently to himself at these types of antics now.

xxx

Dan is not sure when it starts, but he hears a light whimper by his side when Cabiria pleads to the Virgin Mary for a better life, surrounded by devouts and her non-believers friends.

He looks down and something tugs inside when he sees tears quietly streaking down her face. It's a ridiculous statement that he has known since he first saw her, before she even knew he existed, but Blair is beautiful.

There hasn't been a moment since then he has wavered on that thought. Even when they hated each other, schemed together and against one another, or when Blair "exiled" his sister, that sentiment was still there.

Blair is beautiful.

Now, at her most vulnerable, Dan finds her enchanting. Seeing a mask fall and break as if it made of porcelain, right beside him, brings up conflicting thoughts. For one he's glad she seems comfortable enough to lean against him and continue to let the tears fall; it could be just about the movie.

He finds it hard to believe that last part.

On the other hand, he wants to make this stop. Her hurt to cease. He dares touch her hand as Giulietta Massina explodes with charisma on screen "Hey."

He feels her stiffen under his touch, her skin cold. She doesn't look up at him "Wanna talk about it?"

"No."

She answers but doesn't make a move to remove his hand from hers. He chooses to leave it there. The movie ends and he gets up to change it. Once he returns she takes the initiative and leans against his shoulder.

Dan swallows, focus on the screen in front.

By the time the third movie ends, there's no discussion of plot or Fellini's cultural relevance in the 50's and today.

They sleep.

xxx

It's about 3AM when he wakes, neck cranked in a position not fit for a human body. The lights are still on, as is the TV.

Blair is curled to the other side, duvet up to her eyes.

Dan really needs to pee.

He reaches the joint bathroom and does his business, eyes still heavy with sleep. Upon his return he moves the bags and the bowl from the bed to a nearby table, turns off the TV and lights. Only a small lamp by Blair's side remains on, dim.

He spends a few minutes by the side of the bed, overthinking his next step. He could easily pass through the bathroom and sleep on Serena's room, but he remembers Blair mentioning that it's kept closed if Serena is not there.

As much as Blair loves calling him a pauper and/or labrador, he doesn't find it enticing the prospect of sleeping on the floor. Her bed is big enough. Big enough to fit at least three Blairs, he rationalizes. So it fits at least one of him.

He slides on top of the duvet, rests his head on a pillow and closes his eyes. Seconds later there's a shift on the bed and the weight of an arm across his stomach, as Blair turns and snuggles closer, head near his torso.

Dan forgets how to breathe for a moment.

The minutes pass and his attention are on Blair's light motions as she sleeps, the tiny twitches of her eyes, a low snore.

He hopes she's not having nightmares.

When he starts to drift off as well, he feels the smell of coconut shampoo and when he's gone, he dreams of palm trees, long brown hair and doe eyes.

xxx

[crehador]

hi! sorry to bother but i had a question about the hypmic lives? i recently got back into the fandom after several years and i wanted to know if there was a general set amount of time we have to wait before the dvds for the lives are for sale? and if its possible to buy any of the previous ones?

hii first of all welcome back to the pit fandom!

you are in the right place with this question bc i definitely know a thing or two about this <- guy who owns multiple copies of every live lol (except the solo lives bc oh god that was expensive)

this'll get long so answer goes under the cut

to start: i am a strong supporter of pirating media you cannot feasibly access otherwise, so don't hesitate to do that. i can't tell you where to actually find the lives online bc i personally do enjoy collecting the physical copies of the lives and throwing my money at the franchise, so i have no idea. but i'm sure they're all out there somewhere if you want to look!

if you are interested in buying them, they'll usually be out within a year of the actual lives taking place. 9th live just released a few weeks back, and 9th live took place nearly a year before that, so sometimes it can be a pretty long wait

10th live may be a somewhat special case because it's the first time we've had multi-angle cameras for the livestream, and i don't know how or if they'll include those on the dvds? i've heard each day is like a 3hr live as well so i'm sure it'll be a big (and pricey) thing even if they don't do anything with the multi-angle camera stuff

in short: i would expect 10th live dvds to be out in about a year, and i would personally guess that they'll cost in the neighborhood of 20k yen at least

(zero out was 16,830 yen on amiami, same price for dvd and bluray, and it seems to me like 10th live is an even bigger live... so i'm expecting it to be more expensive)

if you want to watch 10th live through an official avenue and don't want to wait, it is currently still available for streaming on abema. you can pay for the stream and watch it as many times as you want until the 14th (so there's only a few days left of that) but you'll need a vpn for it to be available in your area (unless you happen to live in japan)

as for the previous lives!

9th live is actually still available on amiami, where i usually get my lives. neither the bluray nor dvd is sold out yet, so you can pick it up that way (but again they are 16,830 yen each)

for older lives, you can generally find them on proxy sites (again, that's only assuming you don't live in japan)

personally i use fromjapan as my proxy. i don't think it's necessarily better than other proxies out there, but it's the one officially affiliated with hypster, which is what i'm mostly buying from lol, so it was just more convenient for me to set up an account there

you can typically find listings for the older lives for quite cheap, sometimes you can even find big lots containing all or most of the lives (usually some cds as well) for a really good price

they also sometimes pop up on mandarake, but won't necessarily be cheapest there

although the prices can be really low (like less than 2k for some lives; for example i just did a quick search and see a copy of six shots for literally only 1,150 yen) keep in mind that there will be shipping! so factor that into your budget as well

one tip on searching, do your searches in japanese (for example search for "ヒプノシスマイク" instead of "hypnosis mic") because sometimes a lot of things don't show up when you search in english. that's the case on fromjapan at least, not sure about other proxies

another tip is do not buy from sites like otaku republic... or whatever it's called, i don't really remember. basically even with expensive overseas shipping, proxies are still so much cheaper, in my experience, than these other sites that mark up prices to absurd rates. like i'll see these english sites selling a doujin for 10,000 yen that you could get for literally 500 yen elsewhere, it's absurd

but ahem yeah tl;dr

10th live dvds should be out in about a year

10th live stream can still be purchased on abema for viewing until the 14th

9th live still available on amiami (possibly elsewhere as well)

older lives best bought through a proxy (fromjapan or whichever you prefer)

keep international shipping in mind if you do not live in japan!

1st live does not exist btw*

2nd and 3rd live are bundled together on one dvd

*like there is no published dvd of it, some footage has been released as part of anniversary celebrations though i'm not sure if that's still available... i'm sure it's somewhere!

[elhoimleafar]

Hey Witch! Bear with me on this!

I'm honestly glad to be hosting for a 2nd time OUR SORCERY HOUR virtual event this Year ✨ Thanks to Lara, Diana & Jon always.

For those interested on Dream's Magic, I have a great (modesty aside but is really good 💅🏼) pre-recorded workshop exclusive for this event, to which the attendees will have access during and after the event. So I can focus entirely on helping the team with schedule and everything else.

Our Sorcery Hour offer to the attendees 10+ Workshops from different presenters and recordings are available immediately after.

Tickets are just $40, and yes, all presenters are compensated for their valuable time.*

👉🏼 https://elhoimleafar.com/oursorceryhour/ ✨

*And yes, just like you I find really incredible that in 2024 we still needing to say this 🙄 But yes, in Our Sorcery Hour each presenter is compensated for their valuable time, effort, and dedication.

I totally understand when events focused on BIPOC or LGBTQIA topics need presenters to donate their time and classes. I'm totally into that and find it fair and right cause everybody wants to enjoy the rights without carrying the responsibilities. And these kinds of events usually don't have the budget to make it possible, so yes, donating your time to the cause is a moral duty.

But we have anyway a big problem in the metaphysical community (which moves a lot of money) where most of the events still asking presenters to teach for free. While some events clearly offer a big deal space and organization which clearly requires more money than a virtual event. We still having "events" which are just focused on making money while the presenters do an amazing donation of their time to promote, practice, travel, teach, and are not compensated in any possible way for anything of this.

I still remember how frustrating and disappointing it was in 2020 while I was donating my time and effort preparing classes for a dozen different virtual events, while recovering from Covid, while mourning also my Grandma, while dealing with a broken migration system in the USA during Trump Times 🙄 was a lot! and was also getting publicly bullied by a miserable (but famous, like all miserable people) witch shop owner cause I was presenting in another event organized by someone he dislikes 🙄

I literally was feeling like "Sorry, but I have too much in my plate right now and caring about this goes beyond my payroll".

Can we collectively just please STOP bullying people for presenting at the few events that still paying the presenters for their time?

At OUR SORCERY HOUR each Presenter receive a fair compensation for their time, while also a space in our virtual program, which past year received over 200 downloads in just hours. And all their links, books, and products are promoted during the event.

Witches like you who buy the tickets are the ones who make this possible ❤️

TY!

Tickets Available Here: https://elhoimleafar.com/oursorceryhour/ ✨

[ac-liveblogs]

While the Xianzhou arc was pretty messy I wouldn't consider it's the start of a linear decline in quality but rather a pretty big bump in the road that got the whole car shaking. They used the Xianzhou arc mostly for set up. DanHengs and Blades complicated relationship, Luocha and Jinglius plan to get rid of the Abundance for good, the history of the high cloud quintet etc...I think they just wanted to establish too much, setting up conflict is imo always harder than making it pay off... this and the fact that the writers were paired with the headwriter that also did INAZUMA it was bound to crash unfortunately...Belobog wasn't a masterpiece, there are things that could've been improved on, but I'd say it's a solid 7 out of 10 ...it's something you at least can get enjoyment out of. The story heavy events (which actually stay accessible for new players thank god) are up to par with that quality and I was even able to enjoy a quest about debt collection who would've thought. I'd actually say you can still enjoy the Xianzhou story a lot more conceptually than Liyue...I think people have forgotten how bad Liyue was because people didn't expect anything from Genshins story yet (and then Inazuma started to set expectations for genshins main story and yeah...) it was just running errands and than boom bossfight with childe and then Osial...Everyone shits on Inazuma because it crashed and burned but nobody remembers Liyue aside from the grand finale because of how boring the entite questline was

I agree that Liyue was a shitshow. For my part, I missed most of what was happening because... as you say, I didn't expect anything from Genshin yet, and also at that point you needed to grind out your level cap just to hit different parts of the quest so I ended up stretching the whole thing over a week or so. Whenever something didn't add up I'd think "oh they must've explained that before, I just forgot/skimmed it"

Not anymore!!!

Inazuma pisses me off the most... or maybe it did before I was forced to sit through Meropide... but Liyue is unarguably a disaster on every level.

I think with regards to Star Rail, I'm gonna wait a bit longer and see how things shake out. I don't trust HYV's writing, but Star Rail unfortunately has the kind of setting I like.

[saruin]

I'm a skyrim modder. I looove love the game, it's broken as hell, old as fuck and was barely a quarter of how great morowind and oblivion were.

I have ADHD so it takes me weeks to make my mods. There is an entire category of mods dedicated to fixing glitches and broken stuff. Some people change up my mods and repost them without credit.

But you know what? I ❤️❤️LOVE the skyrim community so much regardless of that. There are so many silly and cool mods, made by people who love the game and the community just as much as I do.

People have made expansion-sized mods that add 26 hours of gameplay, or followers with their own paid voice actors, new quests, quest awareness, that can interact with other mod followers (because we're a community that loves to work together!), people who update their mods years after retiring because they have so much love for the community and for the game.

We ask kindly for donations, but mostly for big projects. The one who did the 26+ hours one did it for his portfolio too. When Steam asked us, "do you want to make people pay you for access to some of your mods, as a means to give back for the work you did?" we all collectively said NO. (except that one modder who charged money for a mod that added a single apple to the game. Yes it was a joke)

I make mods in my free time because it's fun! I like contributing to one of my favourite game franchises, no matter how broken it is. And the reactions of people, who say they love my mods, that is all the payment I need.

If I don't feel like making mods anymore, I just don't! But can patreon paywallers and early access makers do that?

They turned a community-giving hobby into a form of contractual employment. It's no longer because you love the game, or the community, but because you are contractually obligated to provide content you are paid to make. You start to lose inspiration, the quality goes down but your prices still stay high. It's a cycle you can't come out of unless you put a stop to your biggest source of income.

If I ever make sims cc, I would do it because there are things i want in my game that i cannot find, and if it is good enough, i would want to release it to others so that they may enjoy it too. Modding is ultimately about love, and I have conflicting opinions on how much i love the sims community, but fantastic, brilliant and kind modders like you, who make such good content with so much heart and genuine passion, that it reminds me that i can always have love for a community, no matter how many bad eggs are there.

Modders who are hardworking, and who are passionate about modding and being community -driven, are going to be the wave of a new era of sims modding. You might not be as big and famous as other modders who are like-minded, but your love of your fans make you just as important.

thanks for coming to my ted talk, i'm super emotional bc of my meds and i tend to uh. ramble on forever

Omg anon, this made me so emotional too. <333

First off I want to completely agree with the first part. The skyrim community knows and understands how janky of a game Skyrim is but they love and support it anyway. Their community is so big and welcoming, I haven't had a single negative interaction with any one since I joined my first facebook group quite a few years ago. Sure you have the occasional complaint of booby mods but that's pretty much to be expected at this point.

Skyrim modders do SO much for their community without complaint because they love what they do and they want to bring a better experience to people. Skyrim is 11 years old and it's community is as active as it was day one with bigger and greater mods being released every day. it blows my mind sometimes, just seeing how much one person or even an small group of people can change a game.

When I first began making sims 4 mods I didn't have much of an opinion about anything in the community. I was fresh out of IMVU developing and after years of failing to make meaningful connections there, I had no idea how to approach anyone in this community. I guess that's why I floundered around for so long on TSR, I had no real purpose other than my creativity. But once TSR's rules began challenging and restricting the things I made I quickly started to look for alternative sites to upload my cc. I was apprehensive about tumblr at first because I didn't know how the community would accept me. Would I be this anonymous creator that only a few people downloaded stuff from or could I truly branch out and spread my wings like I wanted to?? I'm happy to say that I've met some truly amazing people hear and even though I've never met them/don't know what they look like/ never even heard their voice, they feel like real friends. Better friends than most I've had in my life tbh.

So when I decided to really set down roots in this community I had to make a very important decision, one I had been on the fence about since the very first time I saw someone's content locked behind a patreon paywall. How would I conduct myself? Would I ever paywall any of my creations? Am I doing this for the money? Am I willing to reblog and support those who do these things? It took me a long time to decide because quite frankly I'm not in a financially stable place right now. I live at home, have a crappy job and have to rely on others in my family for support. Getting exclusive revenue would help, but at the end of the day I realized: I love creating art more than anything in the world and keeping any of it from anyone for any amount of time would destroy me. Sometimes I get so excited about the things I create I release it early because I want people to enjoy it too.

If you go to my patreon about me page it says: "Mostly I'm here to bring something unique to your game, something I liked and said "Hey, maybe a bunch of other people will like it too". Because that's what I do. I make things for me and share them with other people. I don't even play on pc, all of my saves are on my xbone. I create because I love it and I will only support those that feel the same.

I see these other creators churning out content for their patreon every month and I think that could never be me. I don't follow very many creators because the majority of their content looks the same. Excuse me if anyone thinks I'm being rude, judgmental or harsh but it's the truth. All these early access packs, makup sets, mesh edits, hairstyles, etc. that I've seen are like carbon copies of one another. It frustrates me because I want to support more creators but a lot of them (especially the bigger ones) aren't worth it in my opinion.

[the-hittite]

It's him.

The Scourge of Boston.

The Overboss of the Raiders.

The Scout from Team Fortress Two.

Gameplay notes under the cut.

Alternate start mod required if at all possible to avoid creating a nightmarish timeline in which Scout has procreated.

Strength 1. We live and die by Scouts tiny baby noodle arms. Once I got the Strength bobblehead I could start putting points into Big Leagues.

Perception can be anything. The only perk you really need is Rifleman and you can get the bobblehead basically immediately. You can maybe put points into it for things like Refractor but I never ended up doing that.

Endurance is tricky. To really drive home the fragile Scout theme you want low health, but Endurance also determines how long you can sprint. Personally I went for 7 END because lack of armor on a close range build was already a challenge and I desperately wanted Adamantium Skeleton and Rad Resistance.

Charisma 1. Self Explanatory.

Intelligence 1. Self Explanatory.

Agility 10. Self Explanatory and perks like Moving Target and Action Boy are must haves.

Luck at least 5 for Idiot Savant. You probably want it higher for Better Criticals and Critical Banker. They're incredible with a double barrel shotgun.

Clothing and hats/helmets can be worn as long as they fit the aesthetic or match an existing cosmetic (army helmet, scribe hat, etc.) Armor pieces can only be added if they apply the Sprinter's legendary effect. Damage resistance perks are acceptable since they function basically the same as MVM resistance upgrades.

Medical emergencies can be dealt with by paying a doctor or sleeping it off. In the heat of combat your only options are to either run off to find a first aid kit and immediately consume the entire contents whether you need all of them or not (preferably right before a burning Medic can get it) or by downing a Nuka Cola variant. Radiation and broken limbs are your worst enemy. It's probably a good idea to do Nuka World before the Glowing Sea since Nuka Grape is your only way to remove rads in the field.

Double Barrel Shotgun as a main. Deliverer as a secondary. Any bat as melee. For most of the game I had a pretty decent flow to combat where I'd charge up a crit with my pistol and run in close to delete things with my Force-a-Nature. Sawn Off barrel and Calibrated receiver quadruples your critical damage, and that's before perks. I literally one shot Swan just to see if I could. Deliverer ended up being my most used weapon because it's just plain good all around. The bats didn't get that much use until I finally put points into Blitz, then they got crazy fast.

With this stat spread you have access to absolutely no crafting perks, but you can still make basic upgrades or scavenge them off of other weapons. Staying in the Railroad's good graces lets you buy upgrades for Deliverer. There's a guaranteed bladed rocket bat in the Pack's area of Nuka World.

Stretch goals beyond just beating the game:

Leave Preston on read and peace out of Concord after grabbing the Perception bobblehead. Leave power armor, miniguns and settlement building to Heavy and Engineer.

Use the "sarcastic" option at every opportunity. If people don't regret initiating conversation with you, you're playing Scout wrong.

Collect every unique bat.

Complete all baseball related quests.

Capture the control point in Diamond City for the BLU team.

Buy the Home Plate.

Complete all of Nuka World and become Lord Bonk of Soda Mountain.

Institute ending just because I hate them and I can't think of a worse fate than giving Scout complete control.

[talenlee]

Seeing some gm advice I'm reminded of a campaign I had where I got to play a bard.

Back in 3e, which this was, I didn't get to play charismatic characters often - because I didn't play characters very often, and I was usually building towards doing something busted with the character building limits. But this time, I had made my boy, he was basically Sexy Anime Ed Elric But Secretly Armin Tanzarian, and he was a cool dude whose big thing was obligatory 3e combat broknenness, but really his big thing was astronomical bluff and diplomacy checks.

Now I've complained about this in the past, but back in the day, 3e made diplomacy a skill you could absurd numbers on, and then made it so the outcome of those numbers had to be completely narrative breaking for any sensible GM. I was a level 9 character who could quite reasonably convince a total stranger who was there to kill me that they were my best friend, and have them act on it. Diplomacy was dumb. And this was a half-elf, an underpowered heritage option, that meant that in exchange for Getting Nothing out of the character building process, I had access to a sort of short-sharp-shock calming effect that could let me force the diplomacy check.

I literally never used that ability in the entire campaign. I came close to using it, once, but the GM saw me preparing to do it, and just had the non human animals that were nearby just leave. I had to rely on backup of Just Being Really Good At Fighting.

In the course of this campaign we were hunting down a big bad business boss who was collecting our old allies and bringing the band back together to pilot a cool interplanar skyship because those are cool. And, intent on playing with the idea of my bard as being socially very dangerous, I had the bright idea of, in the course of these raids, doing things that made the boss' insurance pay out. My bard destroyed debt records, saved valuables from the fires we started and kept them hidden on-site, and made absolutely sure every site was marked as our work.

Eventually, the DM asks me what I'm doing, and I explain that I'm trying to make the boss convinced that we were something he had organised, that this was his idea and it was all an elaborate ruse. I was attempting to gaslight the villain of our campaign and I put a lot of work into it.

Anyway, DM said it wouldn't work and we just had a big fight at the end.

I was tempted to tell you an ending about how it SHOULD have gone, and then maybe tacked on an Everyone Clapped kinda ending. But nah, the DM heard my requests, saw what I was doing and just let me go on it, before resolving that sure, he knew what I was aiming for and trying, but he couldn't do anything with it so nothing came of it.

I'm not even mad about it, I don't think badly of that DM. He's a beloved friend, someone I would help move bodies. I feel like if I'd handed this to other people, now, they'd probably think that is cool as hell? Or we'd have more of a negotiation on it? But the thing that keeps coming up in my mind is that this is an instance where I, without realising it, was being failed by the system.

The system was telling me 'I can have these things.' But the thing is, like... having those things would be really stupid? Those things clearly could not work in the kind of campaign the rest of the game was built around? And when I tried to strike out in my own direction with it, the system had nothing to accommodate that, or even accommodate something similar.

Anyway what I'm saying is 4th ed D&D is the best D&D

[audio-luddite]

I did a browse of Tumblr "Audiophile".

OK weird.

Much of the stuff is photos of old stuff from brochures and magazines (like paper OMG). I guess some people kept all that stuff. Grandpa was a hoarder of audio mags? I see lovely ads for crap product. It was crap 60 years ago and still is today (like the BOSE 901). There are some bits showing good stuff but not much. And there are the confused people who don't understand obsession with vacuum tubes and LP records.

There are links to very artistic audio themed soft-core porn. Some are adds for console stereos draped with girls in lingerie. A good stereo will bring the girls in for sure. At least that was thought in the 60s? And there are people posing as golden ears. Some experts might be expert, but you gotta pay the bills no matter the crap information they put out. Number ten in this guy's top ten turntable list is pure crap now and forever.

I have even seen totally phony photo-shopped systems that I know could never exist. You know a turntable has to be at least a bit more than 12" across to fit an LP which is 12 inches in diameter. So that picture just don't scale right.

I guess in summary it is not much fun to look at that tag as there is so much dross.

If you are an audiophile then you probably know good from bad or want to. If you are just interested or new to this then there is a problem. There is a hell of a lot of misinformation conspiracy and noise.

First problem is the term audiophile. It means literally you love sound. The presumption is you appreciate the quality of sound. That is different than liking music in general, or some specific type of music. That would be a musicophile. All it takes is adding -phile to the end of a word.

So if you like music as opposed to just the sound of steam locomotives passing by and care for good clean sound then you are bumping up against this other -phile thing. Do not be intimidated. I assure you that listening to a favorite artist with all the sounds fully resolved and blasting away in your home is a good thing.

It is strange to me that people will spend a small fortune on a sound system for their car and far less in their home. Though I suppose if you live in an apartment loud music will make no friends, but being a big bass thumper in traffic is OK and even expected. Hey if you love that sound well sorry to tell you... yup audiophile.

Now to cost. There can be a lot of money spent. Some people will spend six figures restoring a car from when they were young. It is a hobby where it is possible to spend gobs of money. And there are many people, and companies who will help you spend your money.

You can spend much less and get good results. My equipment has only two relatively new things in it. One Phono Cartridge, and one vacuum tube. All the rest of the electronics are decades old. My speakers are a few years old but I built those as I know best. The cost has been interesting. By selling off older even collectable stuff I have spent effectively no money over the past 7 or 8 years. Yes I bought that stuff once long ago, but economically it was sunk money.

I have the advantage of experience and know the good stuff from the less good. I know what brands to look for. I also know which products have cults around them that blur the flaws. I call myself a "cheap audiophile" as I will not spend more than low four figures on anything. The most expensive thing I ever bought was under 2k bucks. Most was far less than that.

One of the links the tag search brought up was guy who did not understand why anyone would buy Vinyl Records. The equipment is expensive and the media is less available than digital streams. There was one reply about the tangible nature of an album and actually owning a thing rather than just being allowed to access it. I will go further.

I have avoided high end streaming because of cost and complexity. To get good sound out of numbers you need several lumps and most are expensive. You need a computer or a server that is logged into a provider like "tidal" or "qobuz" or "apple music". Then you need a device that can store the bits on a drive either an SSD or even a spinning magnetic disc to avoid drop outs that can be the music server, but not the computer. Then you need a DAC to convert the particular stream to analog sound which is finally fed into your audio system proper. Aside from the subscription (I have apple music) you need three lumps that each cost more than a good turntable if you want audiophile sound.

In order to add a high end streaming line to my system would cost more than the replacement cost of my system as it is right now. So I have a low end solution. I plug my Iphone into my CD player with a nice-ish DAC in it. It is OK sound. But I swear if I play an LP of the same music after hearing it off my iphone to CD quality there is no comparison the LP is better.

And yes when it comes to vacuum tubes I vacillate. They are expensive and wear out. They sound nice. They have more distortion and artifacts than solid state, but it is nice sounding distortion. A big part of this hobby skews preferences to nice sounding distortion. Vacuum tubes and moving coil phono cartridges are prime examples.

My most recent experience was going from a full vacuum tube preamplifer to a hybrid with only one tube. The sound was rich and deep and involving before. Yummy like a good sticky baklava dripping with honey. Now it is detailed and frankly palpable. I can hear a singer part their lips before a phrase. You have to hear that to appreciate it.

I have been recently been tempted with two vacuum tube unicorn amplifiers for a very good price for that type of device. That price is double what a competitive solid state amplifier would be. And like I say at the local pub after my fourth beer, I want another but I don't need another. I am seriously tempted. I have a nascent love for the sound I know is in them. They have a voice and it is good. Actually this is a key aspect of the hobby. It is an emotional response to something. It is irrational.

Welcome to the irrational!

[anueutsuhos-touhou-profiles]

The Kappa:

Kappa are incredibly famous youkai that look sort of like turtle people. They're notorious for drowning people and sucking out their souls... out of their butts. Souls extracted in this way take the form of white orbs called shirikodama. Besides butt souls, they're also famous for eating cucumbers. In fact, they love cucumber so much, that if they're about to attack you and you give them one, they'll completely abandon killing you to eat the cucumber instead.

These stories are thought to be based on the way that real-life drowned corpses' anuses can flare out as they become logged with water.

In Touhou Project, the kappa are an inventive, industrious group who live at the Genbu Ravine in Youkai Mountain. The ravine has been mechanized extensively to the point of looking completely different from anywhere else in Gensokyo, which is largely locked into medieval technology.

The kappa are also proud merchants, and they're usually seen anytime a something interesting happens with concessions stands, ready to sell food and merchandise to anyone willing to pay. They're very good at it, and Reimu has even begun to admire their business skills. They're even courageous enough to sell their wares in the Human Village without any sort of disguise; and people buy it! It helps they've presented themselves as friends of humans in recent times... ignoring that whole... ass soul thing.

As far as problems with them go, the kappa have a pretty short attention span, and generally can't collaborate well on large projects for very long before getting bored and abandoning it. They're also completely shameless conmen. They'll even turn someone's funeral into a tourist attraction. Not one they planned, they'll just suddenly sell merchandise and add a paywall to a funeral already in progress.

That said, they rarely actually harm humans, since they'd rather not wipe out their preferred customers. In regards to the shirikodama, apparently the soul orbs are salty and they are necessary because kappa collectively suffer from a sodium deficiency. They feel they wouldn't need to acquire them if they had access to the ocean, but Gensokyo is completely landlocked.

And if anything else, all the Kappa care deeply for each other. While they may be  unscrupulous capitalists to everyone outside them, they're pretty much one big labor union as well. If, say, one of them dies, they will arrange a very wholehearted, passionate funeral and every kappa weeps.

Back when the oni ruled Youkai Mountain, there was a strict hierarchy of Youkai where Kappa were at the bottom, Tengu at the middle, and Oni at the top. Now, the Kappa and Tengu don't really appear to outrank one another, but they don't like each other much. Since the Moriya Shrine moved in, the Kappa and them have collaborated on various projects, with various levels of success.

And yes, they still love cucumbers. They've even written cookbooks on them!

[spahhzy]

Of Moonbases, Grimm Queens, Thrill Parks and Gradschemes prt 2. : The Big Bang!

This was complete bullshit!

"I WIN!"

Complete bullshit!

"THE POWER! THE POWER! I CAN CONTROL THEM ALL! I WILL DESTROY YOU ALL...but not before we finish the game!"

-

Let's take a few steps back shall we?

Ruby and Co had ran around the moonbase collecting various instruments to power up the 'Focusing Stone and Golden Rod' in order to insert it into the pyramid device.

Why they were powering these things Ruby wouldn't tell them, so they followed the orders of their 'leader' to stop Salem from destroying all of Remnant.

Finally after a multitude of steps they at last were able to begin the final steps.

Ruby: Alright! Everything is going according to plan! Now time to charge up the Casimir Mechanism...carry the one and...hey! What's happening!

The big computer was going all haywire!

Ruby: Scanning for haxorz!

Ozma: Access denied Ruby!

Ruby: ....well we'll this is a surprise...Ozma how did yiu get into the computer?

Ozma: I know what your plan is Ruby and I WON'T let that happen.

Ruby: You headmaster are in no position to do ANYTHING because well...your dead and the little hellspawn is next!

Ozma: Stop this madness Ruby! If Jaune was here now what would he say!?

Ruby: Your Salem is the root cause for all this madness! Not I! You should have never taught Jaune that accursed technique! Now your Salem will have to pay the price for your foolishness...AGAIN!

Ozma: Please she is just a child now, she doesn't even know what she is doing!

Ruby: That's just too bad.

Ruby moved her finger to the delete button before mockingly waving at the screen.

Ruby: annnnd delete...goodbye Ozma!

Charging complete!

Ruby: Oh boy oh boy oh boy this is gonna be such fun!

She turned towards the rest of the group who had finished killing the grimm in that area.

Ruby: Come along all we can finally 'save the world!'

The gang traveled back to where the pyramid device.

Ruby: Quickly! Power up the machine!

And so began the charging process as they were killing grimm and filling up the essence canisters, Salem spoke in echoing demonic rage.

Salem: YOU WILL NEVER SUCCEED IN THIS RUBY!

Ruby: ignore her mad ramblings!

Salem: THE BLACKNESS WILL SWALLOW YOUR PRIDE, SOMETHING FAR MORE TERRIBLE THEN YOU LIES HERE!

Still the group kept killing and filling up the life essence canisters and Salem could do nothing to stop it.

Salem: RUBY YOU WILL TREMBLE IN FEAR I'LL SLICE YOU APART AND EXPOSE YOUR ROTTEN INNARDS SO YOU WILL BE JUDGED FOR WHAT YOU HAVE BECOME!

Yang: Sheesh Rubes she really really doesn't like you!

Ruby: It hurts me sooooo much hearing her wish for my death.

Weiss: How about we don't piss off the evil child grimm queen anymore yeah?

Nora: Just keep a smashing a fill up the machine come on Renny wooohooo!

Ren: I hope this all works out.

Blake: you and me both.

Salem: YOUR TEARS WILL TASTE SO SWEET WHEN YOU BEG FOR YOUR MISERABLE LIFE!

Grimm essence kept filling the canister, they were half way full.

Salem: YOU DID THIS! I WILL HAVE NO MERCY ON YOU FOR YOUR ARROGANCE!

Ruby: almost there everyone just keep going!

Salem: I WILL DESTROY ALL THOSE WHO HELPED YOU RUBY!

Yang: Your just mad that we're about to save the world again!

Weiss: Yes, let's just keep antagonizing a omnipotent being it's okay nothing bad will happen!

Yang: You need to lighten up Weiss! Ruby us about to save the day right Rubes!

Said Ruby was currently laughing manicaly and muttering about 'how long she had been waiting for this moment' and how 'she would finally get those damned voices to shut up'!

Yang: ...

Weiss: ...

Blake: we can question our leaders sanity later with some fish for now let's save the world!

Nora: Wooohooo pancake party!

Ren: I'll make some pancakes with the fish I guess with a side of tea too.

Salem: REMNANTS DESTRUCTION WILL LIE IN YOUR HANDS RUBY! YOU'RE SOFT!

Ding! All canisters are full!

Yang: Great now what do we do!

Yang looked back to the group who just shrugged

Ruby: hahahahaha finally the moment is at hand!

Ruby inserted the two artifacts into the slots at the bottom of the machine and before anyone could do anything the pyramid device began to whine.

Salem: No! Ozma please! Make her stop!

Ruby: ahahaha! Time to pay Salem!

Suddenly two lights came from both Salem and Ruby's body one red and one blue before the two lights swapped bodies, blue into Ruby and Red into Salem.

-

Now on to the present-

Weiss: what did that dolt do!?

Blake: how should I know just get Ruby off the ground now!

Yang rushed over to pick up her sister who was slowly getting up from the floor.

Yang: Ruby! Ruby are you alright...what the hell happened?

Ruby said nothing just groaned a bit before lifting her head and opened her eyes, Yang and the rest of the group gasped in surprise gone were silver eyes replaced with bright blue ones.

Ruby(Salem): I'm not Ruby you fools...

Yang: What do you mean of course your Ruby!

Ruby: in body yes but of souls? No.

Weiss: Then where is Ruby?

Ruby(Salem) pointed to the now Salem(Ruby) who quickly went back into the pyramid as the artifacts suddenly turned into dust.

Suddenly morw Grimm began to appear but this time with a slight change, now longer was it the menacing red color eyes but now they were ominous silver.

Yang: What the fuck did my sister do? Why are you in her body!?

Ruby(Salem): I did nothing!

Ren: Outside of trying to kill us.

Ruby(Salem) just glared at Ren for a few minutes but pouted soon after.

Ren: Did you just try to kill me with a glare?

Ruby(Salem): Yes! And usually it would work when I have Grimm to control but now...your sister...your leader is in control of them now.

Yang: How could this have happened where were the signs!

Weiss: oh I don't know...maybe she leaving for five years after Jaunes death was a start?

Blake: The crazy laughter, the insane ramblings she does when she thinks she is alone?

Ren: Not to mention all sick glee she gets when she fights the grimm?

Yang: Okay there were signs but we could have easily knocked it down to idk schizophrenia or something?

Ruby(Salem): It doesn't matter now just fight!

And fight the grimm they did and the battle raged on and on fighting on the moonbase.

Yang: Sucks to be the one on the receiving end of battling the horde huh Salem?

Ruby(Salem): it's not fair! I used to summon grimm and torment people! I don't like it!

Blake: Gee at least your honest...

Weiss: guys I don't know about you all but I'm running low on dust and my aura is getting to the red...

Ren: same...

Nora: just fill me up with syrup and I'm good to go Renny.

Ren: ...that means she's almost on E too.

Suddenly static began to fill the intercom system.

Ozma:hello if you are hearing this recording it means unfortunately Ruby has entered the device...

Ruby(salem): Ozma?

Everyone just kept fighting as they began listening to the intercom play out.

Ozma: If you free me, I will help you minimize the damage she will inevitably cause...

The gang minus Yang, who was currently having the fluent 'How could my sister be evil' phase, had no other choice but to follow instructions.

Ozma: Good proceed to the observation deck and follow these commands.

They made their way to the observation deck where they had a clear good view of their home planet.

Yang: ya know I never got a chance to appreciate how beautiful Remnant looked from space.

Nora: boy I love our planet such a lovely place.

Ozma: Now is not the time to admire, we must work hard if we are to really 'save the world' completed these 3 tasks it will help set up the coordinates.

Blake: Coordinates for what?

Ozma: you will know in due time! Quick! Go go!

After yet another series of steps to stop Ruby they all gathered back at the observation deck where four big rockets now stood.

Weiss: where did you get rockets from?

Ozma: call it an insurance policy that I'm using, these were built and kept from ruby in case a day like this ever came.

Ozma: now that I am free from the base computer system I can damage Ruby's link to Remnant.

Blake: How will you do that?

Silence was the only answer the group got.

Ozma: activating launch protocol!

WBYNR: What!?

Ozma: 5...4...3...2...1 launch!

Suddenly the 4 rockets engines roared beforw long the rockets were lifting off the ground.

Everyone watched as the rockets left the moon before heading straight towards...

Yang: uh are they supposed to be going towards our planet?

Ozma: 30 seconds to impact!

Weiss: What is going on!?

Blake: Where ever those rockets hit will cause extreme damage how is this stopping Ruby!?

Ren and Nora said nothing as they stared at the rockets flying off.

Suddenly one by one the rockets began to impact Remnant the force and size of the rockets and the explosion had begun to fracture the once pretty blue planet cracks and part of Remnants inner core were now exposed the shockwave of the explosion reaching the moon as Ozma began to laugh ominously.

Everyone just looked on in horror at what they had just done non-being able to speak.

Well not everyone...

Yang: Seriously? All that work and all we did was blow up Remnant?...what the fuck.

No one said nothing as they looked back at each other un certain as to what to do now unknowing that in the far reaches of space a certain God of Light was face palming very hard.

Well it would seem he would need to step in and give some more...nudges it would seem.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

i just wanna say thank you sooo much for all the stuff you save to google drive and mega like at this point youve probably saved quite a lot of media from being lost for good

Thank you for that, I appreciate it! I don't think I'm personally preserving anything that would be gone otherwise; this is all stuff that I found from other parts of the internet, rather than taking the recordings myself. But it's true that internet is getting scrubbed more by the day, noticeably more now than even a couple of years ago, and I'm more careful than I used to be about keeping everything. I used to be quicker to delete stuff when I was done watching it; now I'll just transfer it to an external hard drive because I don't know if I'll be able to find it again.

In case this is helpful to anyone who happens to see this post, here are the main things I've uploaded:

- A post I made about a year ago with all the stuff I'd uploaded to Google Drive as of then, including my big folder that I paid money for so I could host a whole bunch of my collection

------That big folder is paid up through February 2023, I think I'll pay to renew it when the time comes but I'm never sure what'll happen so if you want anything on there you should download it.

------Ignore the episodes of The Last Leg from seasons 1-11 in that post, that's my collection as it existed last year, with a lot of episodes missing and a lot of episodes that were there in bad quality. Seasons 12 and later were fine in the original collection, but for seasons 1-11, my new and improved collection is now at:

- The Last Leg seasons 1-11, in a Mega account that'll expire on September 5, 2022, and probably won't be renewed after that

- My collection of things that feature Sean Lock and Jon Richardson, including all of 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown and all of the Sean Lock-era 8 Out of 10 Cats, in a Mega account that'll expire on September 5, 2022, and probably won't be renewed after that

- My collection of things by Andy Zaltzman and John Oliver

I am happy to pay for media if there's an easy way for me to pay money that directly supports the artist and the other people who were involved in making it, and in exchange for that money I get a copy of that media that is mine to keep and can't be taken down by the whims of a streaming company. But as long as that is not widely available, I will keep doing things this way and am happy to help other people out with that too because no one loses anything when more people have access to media that they couldn't have found otherwise.

The list from that post of what's in my main Britcom folder is actually a bit inaccurate now, because I took down James Acaster's Cold Lasagne I Hate Myself Show since it's up on Vimeo now. But other than that it should all still be there.

Anyway, thank you for the message, I appreciate it a lot! I hope you have a great time with all the shows on there and have a lovely week!