therefore-it-was

[therefore-it-was]

HEATHERS MIDDLE SCHOOL AU This AU came to me randomly, so it's basically Heathers the musical mixed in with the movie with them in middle school. Chandler and Veronica get paired up in a project in English and Veronica finishes the work quickly and accurately scoring them both A+'s and Chandler gets impressed thinking they could use someone like this in their group, she invites Veronica to the Heathers. Martha wasn't invited to the party, and the party actually takes place at McDonald's Play Place, and they're basically being dumbasses in there until later on Veronica and Heather Chandler sneak out to buy alcohol from another store with Chandler's fake ID she somehow got, and even though the worker there sees that they look like children, they don't give a crap and give them the alcohol anyway, but since Veronica has never really done anything like this, she gets nervous and blurts out that they're still children, and they get kicked out. Chandler gets angry and yells at Veronica, and Veronica throws up on her shoe from the Amont of sodas Shes had, and Chandler goes on her rant about how she'll ruin Veronica's reputation and that no one will want to sit with her. Veronica goes home angrily and writes in her diary. But then her mom calls her to say that her friend came over, the friend being JD. They go hang out and have fun, and then they start going out. Chandler doesn't tell anyone the next day at school because she actually likes Veronica. (platonically or romantically, you'll never know) anyways uhhh thats all i've thought about so skibidi!!!

[therefore-it-was]

Well folks I've been sitting on this little script for ages and finally decided to just go ahead and publish it. What does it do?

you can enter any ao3 link - for example, to your bookmarks or an author's works page - and automatically download all the works and series that are linked from that page in the format of your choice. if there are multiple pages, the script will page through results for you until there are no more fics to download

you can check your fanfic-savin' folder for unfinished fics and automatically update them if there are new chapters. you can also check for new fics in series!

if you're a dinosaur who uses Pinboard, you can back up all the Pinboard bookmarks you have that link to ao3

don't worry about crashing ao3 with this! this baby takes forever to run, guaranteed. anyway ao3 won't let me download stuff too fast even if I wanted to so it's quite safe

I've been working on this for about two years and it's finally in a state where it does everything I want and isn't breaking every two seconds, so I thought it was time to share! I hope y'all get some use out of it.

note: this is a standalone desktop app that DOES NOT DO ANYTHING aside from automate clicking on buttons on the ao3 website. Everything this script does, can be done by hand using ao3's regular features. It is just a utility to facilitate personal backups for offline reading - there's no website or server, I have no access to or indeed interest in the fics other people download using this. No plagiarism is happening here, please don't come after me.

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2024 update

This is now a fairly mature project that I've been maintaining for quite a while (3 years?? omg), so let's do an FAQ

Question 1: Wait, a python script? That's scary! I don't know anything about running python scripts!

Answer: You don't need to! When I published this program I knew that there would be people who would want to use it that did not know anything about running python scripts. To that end I have provided extremely detailed instructions (accessible at the link above), which have been fine-tuned over the last three years to make them as absolutely easy to follow as possible. Not only do you not need to know anything about python scripts to use this program, you don't even need to know anything about computers at all. Try it and see! ;)

Question 2: I already use Calibre and FanFicFare to download fanfics - isn't this the same thing?

Answer: Nope! In fact, one of the reasons I created ao3downloader is that I tried FanFicFare and found it unsuited to my needs.

- FanFicFare requires a lot of configuration to work well. I wanted something that would get out of my way and just do what I needed it to do with as little prompting as possible. ao3downloader has sensible default behavior that will do what most people want it to do without too much pre-work.

- FanFicFare doesn't handle multi-page downloads very well - you need to enter the link to each page of results individually. What if I want to download dozens, or even hundreds of pages of fanfic? (Honesly, even two pages is too tedious for me...) I want to download all of the results I'm interested in, not just one page at a time. ao3downloader can download up to five thousand pages of fanfiction in one go if you're willing to let it run for that long... and that limit is only because 5,000 is the maximum amount of pages that ao3 itself will show you in a search result.

- FanFicFare doesn't handle ao3's rate limit very well - you need to babysit it and fine-tune the amount of time it pauses between downloads. I want the downloading process to handle itself, so I can completely ignore it until it's finished. ao3downloader will automatically pause when it hits the rate limit, and automatically resume when the rate limit expires. You can also quit ao3downloader entirely, and it will do its best to resume at the same point you left off when you turn it on again.

- FanFicFare uses its own download format, which doesn't match the files I download from ao3 directly - I want them to be consistent. ao3downloader downloads fics using the native download buttons from ao3, so it's exactly the same file as if you downloaded them manually.

- FanFicFare has an option to check incomplete fics for updates, but it relies on you telling it which fics in your library are incomplete. I don't want to have to keep track of that. ao3downloader can scan your existing files for incomplete fics and identify them for you, then check ao3 for updates and only re-download the ones that have new chapters. (It can also scan for incomplete series, and do the same thing!)

Question 2a: That's all great, but I need Calibre's organizational features.

Answer: Me too! That's why I import all the fics I download using ao3downloader into my Calibre library after I'm done downloading them.

Question 2b: That's all great, but I prefer FanFicFare's download format and I don't want the native ao3 one.

Answer: ao3downloader has a special option for this which instead of downloading actual files, will simply harvest a list of links to give to FanFicFare. You won't get ao3downloader's rate limit handling or automatic update functionality, but you will get to avoid entering individual page links! If you choose, you can also include detailed fic metadata in the links download (such as title, author, summary, tags, etc) which will be saved in spreadsheet format.

Question 3: Do I need to enter my ao3 login information? What happens when I enter my login information into this program?

Answer: You only need to enter your login information if you want to use ao3downloader to download archive-locked fics, or to download a page that is only accessible when you are logged in (such as your history or subscriptions). Hopefully the reason behind this requirement is obvious. If you don't need those things, you can simply skip the login prompt and the program will work fine! That said, if you do log in, here's what will happen. 1) ao3downloader will save your login information to a file so you don't have to enter it every time. (If you don't want your login information to be saved, you can turn this behavior off using the included .ini file - just open up the file named settings.ini and read the instructions inside to configure it.) 2) then, ao3downloader will use your login information to log itself in to ao3... aaaand that's it. It's not stored or sent anywhere other than your own computer and archiveofourown.org. In fact, there is absolutely no tracking or spyware in ao3downloader of any kind - I don't even know how many people have downloaded it, let alone what you type into it. And that's the way I like it!

Question 4: I thought of a feature that doesn't exist yet that would be really cool! Can you add it?

Answer: Very possibly! Feel free to contact me via one of the options listed in the readme (that's the page linked above) if you have a feature request.

Question 5: Do I have to pay you?

Answer: Never.

Question 6: But I really want to pay you... do you have a ko-fi?

Answer: Yes. It's on the github page in the sidebar.

Question 7: Does it work on mobile?

Answer: No. :( but watch this space... there may be certain things on the horizon. we'll see!

[therefore-it-was]

when the ao3 author is funny in the chapter notes and i get lowkey parasocial

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white rabbit candy I love you white rabbit candr

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I’ve seen lots of heather/mean girls crossovers due to barrett’s roles in both shows and more recently a bunch of addams family (specifically the show wednesday)/beetlejuice crossovers because of jenna ortega’s roles in both but I have yet to see a heathers/beetlejuice crossover and I feel like it would be literally so fire.

somewhat suicidal girls with shitty men in their life both played by winona ryder?? hell fucking yeah!

[therefore-it-was]

[therefore-it-was]

everyone in the heathers movie was in love with veronica and that's my thesis

[therefore-it-was]

best believe I will do ANYTHING for a heathers 2025 off bway bootleg..

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shirt my friend got me for my birthday + rewatching heathers!! the world is healing, I love life

[therefore-it-was]

was thinking abt athletic monika so obvs i had to draw her

[therefore-it-was]

the whole "lipstick on a pig" thing makes no sense because the second we gave a pig access to makeup she became god's cuntiest soldier

[therefore-it-was]

I’m really sorry! I’m not going to try and say that it wasn’t a joke about eating disorders because it was and I did find it funny

I struggle with bulimia and have suffered from physical health issues because of it so I feel like I can joke about it and I really didn’t mean for it to be interpreted that way. I love duke literally so much and heavily relate and see myself in her, so I found it appropriate to joke about her disorder. although I don’t agree with you on the ‘she’s a good person part,’ I do agree that sometimes the fandom takes the bulimic jokes way to far and it really pisses me off sometimes

do we see the vision chat

[therefore-it-was]

Winona Ryder As Verónica Sawyer In

HEATHERS (1988)

[therefore-it-was]

Costume appreciation series: Heathers (1988) dir Michael Lehmann

Costume Design by Rudy Dillon

[therefore-it-was]

I honestly deserve an award for resisting the urge to correct everyone's grammar over text

Especially when you're pissing me off, when we're fighting, or when you're attacking me 💀💀

That being said

Please read the information below taught by yours truly before you have the audacity to text me 💗✨️ [this is me using gentle parenting tactics and going through words that you little dumbasses keep getting wrong]

Hear: listen

A lesson about homophones for my homophobes 💗 [that was a play on words, if you also didn't know that]

I could not hear what you had just said.

Here: at, in or to this position (close to you)

I wish you were here.

Their / theirs: possessive pronouns. 'Their' might also function as a possessive adjective.

I returned their books.

The house is theirs.

There / there's: at, in, or to that position (farther from you)

* There's is a contraction. It combines there + is.

There he is!

There's the pen you were looking for.

They're: contraction combining they + are

They're coming to my house on Sunday.

Accept: allow or consent to receive something

I will accept the invitation.

Some people cannot accept that they are wrong.

Except: excluding

I like all colours except red.

*Except is commonly misspelt as 'expect'. Expect is when you assume that something will happen or you think that it is likely to happen.

For example: I expect you to be here on time.

Your: is used when something is associated with the person YOU are talking to

This is your sock.

Yours: possessive pronoun

This ruler is yours.

You're: contraction combining you + are

'You're insanely freaking insufferable,' I say, whenever I think about the person I'm writing this for.

Honestly, I haven't picked up any other errors regarding homophones, so until next time 🫡

[therefore-it-was]

I'm giving you a little kiss on the forehead and then I'm putting you in a blender

LET ME OUT BRUH

[therefore-it-was]

everyone leave your favorite war criminal in the tags