Hm. I am like... actively getting severely distressed and worked up about this assignment and I think the reason why is Significantly deeper than just "there aren't enough instructions". Like so much deeper I almost don't even wanna post about it. We live in a society bottom text

I understand the technical reasons* why it happens but I hate that a lot of times the trans flag emoji shows up as 🏳️ ⚧️.

FIX YOUR UNICODE + EMOJI SUPPORT, EVERYWHERE.

It's often even inconsistent within a single site. Like it'll show up properly in usernames, but then break in page titles.

*Flags are a nightmare in unicode because they can't just encode specific flags or even specific countries, so there's a whole thing where flags are not codepoints, but instead there's a special Flag Alphabet and you make flags by encoding country names (accordin g to ISO 3166-1 Alpha-2, of course) with the Flag Alphabet. So, like, instead of there being a codepoint for the american flag, you just write [Regional Indicator Symbol Letter U][Regional Indicator Symbol Letter S], or "🇺🇸", which should show up as an american flag. It doesn't seem to work here for Reasons.

Anyway, since Trans People aren't a country (YET), they decided to do something different: It's a ZWJ emoji!

Zero Width Joiners are a trick used in a bunch of places in emojispace to do variants. It's a used to glue multiple symbols together to make new emoji without needing to define new code points, with a hopefully sensible fallback. So like, when there's a symbol for, like, "postal worker", you can get a "female postworker" emoji by doing [female emoji][ZWJ][postal worker]" and the rendering engine is supposed to apply a gender-specific variant of the emoji for this.

So to make the trans flag, they used a generic flag 🏳️ [U-1F3F3 WAVING WHITE FLAG] , then an emoji selector (which just says "render this as emoji"), then a ZWJ, then the preexisting trans symbol ⚧️ [U-26A7 MALE WITH STROKE AND MALE AND FEMALE SIGN], then another emoji selector. So it's actually five characters, and your browser is trying very hard to render it as one. or two, depending.

I JUST WANT IT TO WORK. I know why it doesn't, and unicode is hard, but still. I want trans flags everywhere and everyday and in everything I type. my keyboard should have a trans flag button. in fact, why haven't I made that yet? time to order a custom keycap and get to programming.

I really miss being able to TALK about blorbos and characters. Like, you know, sharing your headcanons and ideas with other fans on this site and if someone didn't share your special point of view on a specific detail, you were able to discuss it without fear of repercussions. Maybe being given the chance to explain where a certain hc came from and listen to why another person might see things differently. Maybe even learn something new and broaden your horizon?

Now it feels like certain people act like the character police and if a random hc of yours doesn't align with their opinion 500 %, you are basically accused of committing treason by the whole group surrounding those people.

Obviously I am not talking about opinions that convey racism or homophobia or transphobia or ableism or other horrible things. But if you get cancelled over a question like 'What's your blorbo's favourite type of underpants?', there's just something really, really wrong.

This is a Public Service Annoucement for the community at large! Unfortunally you have been diagnosed with the rare but dangerous terminal disease know as TABIT/B (TIRF-Adjacent Baeddelist Internalized Transphobia/Bigotry). Fortunally there is available a long but efective curative threatment; To get long deep and moist daily sessions of oral by a kind and caring tboys followed before and after by edging and aftercare respectively!

we've all seen this ask by now, it's been sent to transfems all over this site, but i'm just answering it to point out a few things:

1. i'm a small blog with 82 followers as of right now, even my previous blog was relatively small. (and i don't think i'm notorious enough to be recognised as my previous blog anyway.) 2. on top of that, i've rarely ever expressed any kind of particularly "radical" ideas about transmisogyny or transmasc's role in it. most posts i've made being critical of TME queer people's bullshit have been fairly recent, and have not gotten much traction. 3. i'm not even in the good graces of any of the big popular transfem accounts that are usually labelled as "baeddels" on here, because i'm the "wrong" kind of transfem (pro para, multigender/nonbinary, bi lesbian, etc.) so the only blogs i'm really associated with are other weird fringe freaks like me

all this to say i think it's pretty clear this isn't even supposed to be targeted sexual harassment against towards specific transfems with certain opinions, the intended target is transfems as a whole regardless of our reach or viewpoint. it sends a clear message: "shut up and know your place as a sex object, tranny". sadly this is not an uncommon attitude towards transfems on this site (or in queer spaces in general) but this is a special case of The TMEs putting in the extra effort to make sure to remind all of us how they think about us. (except for the very few TME people i've seen speak out against it of course.)

Ok so this post was meant to be for a specific bright fan (so im not trying to call out all bright fans or all bright fictives/systems) , but since they have me blocked me since its upload and since they have made it clear that they don't actually care about the victims of bright, I'm making this post anyway.

So, one bright fan on here has decided to make a callout post not only villainizing DJKaktus, but also @daisybellejpeg, you know just the person that is helping make shaw who is a VICTIM OF ADMINBRIGHT S*XUAL AB*SE AND HAS BEEN TRUAMATIZED BY HIS CREATIONS. They claim that Daisybelle is anti-DID/systems and also trying commit Jewish eraser. So since I am very pissed off at the moment, I'm just wanted clear up stuff about that this and leave a little note to people like this fan (also sorry daisy if I put any words in your mouth or act "white knightly", I just feel some else saying something show that their isn't personal bias) :

So for starters, DAISYBELLE IS NOT ANTI-DID/SYSTEMS. They have mentioned multiple times that they acknowledge that they bright systems/fictives are a special situation.

Plus, Daisy in general is always going to be slightly antagonistic towards bright, them being a direct victim of Adminbright, but so far Daisy (imo) has done a good job being clam about handling people who still hold on to bright (at least better than I have). The only thing they have stated that will not tolerate is people giving shit to them about how they create shaw, as its become a healing tool for them.

Now the Bright fan that made that post had decided to include two screenshots "proving" that Daisy is anti-DID/system and a Jewish yet completely left out context points.

For the first one, they completely left out the beginning part of conversations and completely doesn't point how the person daisy is responding to has no idea what they are talking about and the fact that person ten starts to act in a sort a jerkish explaining after daisy saying the initial description.

This, to me, feels very patronizing thing to say especially, and so no surprise Daisy proceeds to go off on them about being patronized. For some reason, though, bright fan tried to twist this into daisy erasing the Jewish rep. This, however, is not only not what they said, as all Daisy said was "you deadass don’t know this since we haven’t even decided on a race", (although I should mention daisy is pushing for shaw to be Mexican American), but even if Shaw isn't Jewish, its probably because they don't want any more connections to bright outside of the number, not because they want erase Jewish people.

As for the second screenshots, while I will admit that daisy was a bit harsh to the user (as they were system stating people to stop using bright and they did make a joke about the way worded on twitter), Daisy, as mentioned before sees Shaw a healing device and people telling others to stop using it doesn't really do anything change. Plus Daisy ends up explaining their point of view in the comments.

Now their is technically one more set of screenshots that try to prove that Daisy does not understand how DID works, but as I mentioned in the beginning, they have said they aren't a expert on DID and that it is a complex situation. At most they have urged people they use the interfaces on sites block tags that causes problems.

That is about all for me laying out the facts, however one more note for the bright fan that made that callout post and for people like the bright fan: can you fucking not villainize the victims of the Duckman. Like, its one thing to go after Kaktus, but its whole another to go after a victim of Bright, one that has a entire fucking document showing the trauma they endured and still haven't fully healed from it, thus clearly having a continued negative stigmatism. Not only does this make you all look like complete dickheads completely inconsiderate about the victims of adminbright, but also paints of bright fans and system/fictives in a negative light along with you. You could of block the shaw tag. You could have used the interface to ignore all the people that cause your mental state problems. Hell, you could of found or make a character that served as a transition from bright, like Dr. Myriad. But instead you decided to attack a already hurt person and doubling down on usage of the character.

Also, P.S., if that origional poster isn't a fictive/system and was simply using other peoples mental disorders as a way to villainize Daisy, then they can go fuck themselves.

yknow the whole hetch (really weird name honestly) betraying ranboo. like. originally i assumed the person sending out "rogue frequencies" and the bypass of their system was done by hetch and that the person in the keynote vidoe (not the showfall media, the other one) was hetch. and like. it still could be but. why would they go to all that trouble? and according to the second special announcement they quite literally had to modify the interactive elements.

so. what was the point? it certainly wasnt meant to make hetch more convincing to ranboo as he saw NONE of it. was it meant to make hetch more convincing to the audience? but why would they need to do that? the audience cannot interfere with the social experiments as long as showfall doesnt let them do so. was it to put on a better show? and let me remind you, hetch almost INSTANTLY got the audience suspicious as soon as he needed to make up an excuse as to why ranboo couldnt leave.

and those notes under the posters. hetch didnt mention them. hetch doesnt claim responsibility for any of that stuff so im like.

actually, lets review the info we've seen about these mysterious person trying to interfere with showfalls plans and if anything seems to contradict them being hetch, or implies it.

specifically, let's go over the special keynote first

so, this person, they, as implied, are either 1. sending out a signal, or following one ("Where is this signal going?") but by their later line, when they finally like. actually connect instead of just glitching the screen and words they say ("Is this working?") seems to imply number 1 is whats happening.

afterwards they state that they dont have much time, and dont know what's going on, which feels like a contrast to hetch pretending to know a lot about whats going on, and the inner workings of showfall (he does acttually know i know im just saying with how he acts with ranboo) . and the next thing..

"I don't know what you are"

which feels.. hetch acts familiar with the audience. he knows about them and presumably knows what we are. its also quite literally on the on the site, that while showfall is adjusting to this new domain, they do seemingly know what they're doing here. and let me specifically highlight the specific phrasing. they say they dont know what we are. not who we are. what. which is like. a whole different level of unfamiliarity.

they then go on to say that it already found him (over ranboo's missing posters.) and says it got everyone but them. now this has several lore implications if you think this person is being honest but we're going to focus on how this seems to imply they're a part of the group , unlike hetch who refers to sneeg as "your friend" not our. which since sneeg is quite literally called the taken and is probably one of the people in the "everyone", so thereotically. sneeg shouldnt just be ranboos friend in that case.

they then declare that they have to save them and stop this.

so tldr of that whole reviewing the special keynote, several things that this person says, are discrepancies when compared with how hetch acts which could imply there is actually someone working against showfall entertainment.

another note, when that person connects with us, instead of it just glitching and such, it just. pauses the video until theyre done.

ANYWAYS

this makes the whole hetch plot thing feel like. theres an actual motivation for doing so. which it could just be entertainment yes but . there are now the possibilities its also to: conceal this persons activities. if its just another part of the show it makes showfall seem more unchallengable. and two. if ranboo manages to remember what happened LAST time, he will be far more inclined to not trust this person if they ever try and contact him.

so. that was my rant hope you liked it.

S5E7 "Hybrid Creatures" thoughts

That's it. Those are my thoughts.

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Kinda...

I'm kinda used to the writers putting Nadja in situations and see what it sticks, but (un)holy shit its so obvious that they don't know what to do with her character. What we do in the shadows learn how to write women challenge.

I don't know if the Guide even appeared. My stream stopped a couple times and I have to refresh so maybe I missed her (if not see previous point because it also applies to her).

LOVED Nadja's kitty hair buns, love to see that at least the hair and costume department still cares about her.

The line about burning the school made me roll my eyes, not only because that story doesn't make sense with what we learned about her childhood, but also because I can FEEL when tv shows throw lines with the specific expectations of them being gifed, become memes, etc.

I know it's stupid to discuss about the ethics of Laszlo's experiments on the dick and balls show but in this episode I was all 😬😬😬 about it. Like, I don't give a shit if it was done with comedy purposes, animal experimentation is one of the subjects I will never find remotely funny or make jokes with, specially if we start thinking... How much consent Guillermo gave for Laszlo to straight up play with his DNA in this way? He has nothing to say about it except for a confused frown or looking panicky at the sight of the creatures?? More important, if Nandor did this exact same thing the past season and created the hybrids with a Djinn wish or whatever, how would the fandom have reacted??? (spoiler: waaay more angered than when everybody's fave Laszlo does it).

The work of puppetry and digital effects was good as always, nothing bad to say about the team behind the cameras that puts all their hard work and craft on this, sadly, mid storyline.

Despite how little I care about mAd ScIenTiSt Lazslo plot, the moment when Guillermo believes he won't help him anymore was truly heartbreaking just by looking at his face. You can see he really has all his hopes in Laszlo finding a 'cure'.

I wish the whole thing about Guillermo being incapable of killing the hybrids hit me harder (as if we didn't saw him luring innocent teenagers so they can get killed in the literal pilot).

Sorry but that lady character didn't work for me and the "Helen the Magic Johnson" joke was unfunny and kinda old :/ i wonder if half of the wwdits fandom even got the reference (also lmao shameless product placement, you can tell they needed the money to pay for the cgi used on the creatures).

Colin was like his season 1 self. I bet the wwdits reddit ate up that shit.

See also: Laszlo calling Guillermo 'Gizmo' again. Hated it.

Colin becoming the stereotypical 'cool' white liberal teacher was hilarious specially when he said the cliché "history is written by the oppressors" line because that's where the parody becomes too obvious. This is the guy whose dna results on s1 were "100% white" after all. AND YET some people here are still celebrating and repeating it as this 'so true bestie 😔✊' moment without realizing the show's laughing at you, not with you. But hey, this is the we don't get satire even if it bites on our ass site. Imagine fans celebrating when Kendall Succession shouted "fuck the patriarchy!" in front of the paparazzi for being a #feminist. That's how wooosh the moment went over some of y'alls heads.

Nandor and Colin at the museum felt a little tackled on, but at least Nandor annoyance at his personal items being displayed was fun.

And Colin being friendly (dare I say…sweet?) with him at the end again gave me a happy smile. I'll never guessed this season was all about the Colin and Nandor (Condor??) era but I'm all for it.

Biggest Mild laugh of the night: Nandor mannequin having male and female lovers on the display, the dude is wearing Calvin Kleins!

I can't say much about Guillermo leaving the hybrids at the senior home because it's a overused ending for wwdits at this point. Seriously, when this show doesn't know how to end an episode they always do the same shit: Leave the characters that are a problem in a different place. It happened with: Topher at the zombie sweatshop, Jim the vampire as the volleyball coach in Tucson, familiar Benji in a different city/state (forgot where), The Baron and the Sire in the countryside, Derek working at Sean's MLM, Freddie!Marwa in the Uk. They have done this ending 👏🏼lots 👏🏼 of 👏🏼 times👏🏼already!!

Having a wank?! The setup and payoff for this joke really worked.

Next episode seems interesting.

Anyway, I am once again asking for the Djinn...

new blog post: ICFA: the last two days

new blog post on https://mizkit.com/icfa-the-last-two-days/

ICFA: the last two days

Let’s see. Friday I had a 10:30am thing, which I know because I couldn’t have breakfast with the family. Oh, yes, it turned out to be what Geoffrey Landis said might have been the most fun he’d ever had at an ICFA panel! laughs

It was a panel with myself and Kate JohnsTon, moderated by Novella, and Kate read an incredibly funny piece from the point of view of a genetically engineered modern T-Rex who was very, very horny, followed by two more very funny pieces, after which I read from my Pride & Prejudice pastiche, Magic & Manners, which was not nearly as funny and yet led, ultimately, to what arguably became the theme for the panel, which was…ejaculation. o.o

(See, in Austen, people don’t ‘burst out’ with words when they speak enthusiastically. Sometimes they exclaim, but very often they ejaculate, and given the whole horny T-Rex part of the panel… yes, well, it was very funny and poor Novella was just sort of sitting there with a hand over her face while Kate and I howled with laughter. It was AMAZING.)

Seriously, though, it was a great panel; the audience had good questions, the whole thing was obviously incredibly silly, and we had a truly wonderful time. Kate and I felt like kindred spirits immediately, and just, my god, yeah, it was really fun. I’m sure I could come up with more details (actually, the Magic & Manners stuff led into a pretty good, if brief, conversation about decolonization of fantasy), and I know we made Kate read more of her T-Rex book (which is actually a post-apocalyptic story based in a lot of science, and I’m really looking forward to it), but yeah, overall, it was great.

I think we went straight to lunch after that, where Mame and his wife, Woppa Diallo, who was the other guest scholar but was unable to attend in person, gave plenary speeches that ended with me having an entire LIST of non-fiction books to read; Mame (suffering, as he was, from imposter syndrome) kept saying he hadn’t even realized he WAS a scholar, but my god, the man is incredibly well-read, well-spoken, and insightful. We should all ‘not be scholars’ like he is. He and Woppa both spoke about ‘whimsy’ in African cultures, which was so interesting I may break it out into a short blog post of its own, and just…yeah, it was great.

Friday afternoon all the GoHs had a student caucus thingy that we went to in order to be available to answer questions specifically from students. Mostly there weren’t students in attendence, but the moderator (Andrew, from yesterday’s post) was great, and we ended up having a really good discussion, some great audience questions, and hopefully some insightful stuff was said. (Mary did end up asking me if I’d considered the possibility that I’d been a shaman in a previous incarnation, so, you know, things went a lot of places in that conversation!)

Ellen (Kushner, yes yes I’m definitely name dropping) invited me out to dinner on Friday with herself and Delia, and a couple of other people, including Kate of the T-Rex story, MaryAnne Mohanraj, who ofc I knew OF (we own one of her cookbooks, in fact!) but whom I’d never actually met, and a charming man named Will whose last name I’ve forgotten but whose reading I’d enjoyed earlier in the conference. Ellen apparently has a thing about finding good places to eat that aren’t right on the conference site, and we ended up going out for an Uzbek/Turkish meal that was almost impossibly delicious. We were partway through ordering when it became clear we were going to order half the menu, and the guy taking our order said, more or less “ok but you’ve got to order the to’y osh, it’s the house special,” and upon being reassured that we intended to, we just hadn’t gotten there yet, was satisfied. :D It was a wonderful, funny, delightful evening with absurd amounts of truly delicious food, and I’m extremely grateful for it. wibbly smile

Saaaaaaturday…oh, I hung out with MaryAnne Mohanraj in the morning for a bit, and…at some point? I had another panel? I think? With the other GoHs? And it was–well, for one thing, we were asked to read, which literally none of us expected, but Mame had his award-winning short story on his phone and Mary had a copy of one of her books of poetry with her AND she had a copy of URBAN SHAMAN!!! that she plopped in front of me to sign and, as it turned out, read from. :D And after that it was a Q&A that ranged from use of time in our various pieces (AGAIN, some really INTERESTING STUFF about African perceptions of time in storytelling that could probably use a post of their own) to copaganda, which as I’ve become aware, my stuff is rife with.

I went for a little walk after that and came back into the hotel to sit down and play Pokemon in the lobby, and after a few minutes Mame came by from a walk of his own and sat and we chatted, and then MaryAnne dropped by just as he had to leave, and then just as she was leaving, someone else she knew stopped by, so I was introduced, and as SHE was leaving, someone SHE knew stopped by–it was great, I felt like I was holding court. :D

I met–ah, man, I met so many cool people. I was sitting with the head of the conference’s fairy tale division at dinner one night, and at the banquet reception on Saturday she introduced me to her fairy tale ladies, who included a real genuine fan of mine (the woman who had asked about the copaganda, which was such a good question, honestly), so we had a lovely conversation and then they invited me to be in their annual picture. Obviously I said yes, and my fan, who is short but happened to be standing right next to me, when I said, “Should the shorter people go in front?” said, “I am short but I am not going anywhere. I am never moving from this spot ever in my whole life,” which was pretty cute. laughs She kept saying she was trying REALLY HARD not to completely fall apart, and she didn’t, and she was adorable and sweet and I loved her. :)

The dinner and awards ceremony were lovely–I, as were the other GoHs, was given an honorary award from the BIPOC committee, which made me extremely emotional–and post-dinner we all went out to the pool for an after-party, where I went with the express goal of “I’ll say good night and goodbye and that’s it,” and which took longer than the 90 minutes I’d expected it to (quite a lot longer, actually), but was a wonderful way to end the conference.

I could honestly write more and more and more about it all, but post-con writeups are taking up my “ok I have no brain to write fiction with” time, and I think by tomorrow I’ll be back to Able To Write, so I probably can’t spend the rest of my life waxing lyrical about the conference. :)

Me, Mary & Mame (picture by Mame): We had a great time. :)

My (Late) Take on the Hatchery Situation

The reason FR users seem to hold so much malice towards hatcheries isn’t that they specifically hate G2+ lairs, newer users, people whose don’t keep their dragons unbred, or the concept of breeding dragons and putting their kids on the AH. It’s because a vocal contingent of the userbase truly believes all dragons, with the exception of G1 imps or XXX/XXY G1s, should be sold for fodder price.

The logic goes like this: because a person who wants a dragon in general, any dragon will do, can usually pay less than 10kt on the AH and own one instantly, every dragon is worth fodder price unless it has something insanely special about it that justifies a higher price tag. “It’s pretty and it took me a long breeding project/expensive regening project to make the parents” isn’t a justification. “It’s an XYZ G1 but its colors compliment each other very well” isn’t a justification. Unless a dragon is the peak of prestige - and they don’t even really like that and will talk down on the owners of XXY, XYY, or XXX G1s who they feel price “too high” - it should be worth 10kt at most and chucked into the fodder bin.

It’s not that these people uniquely dislike hatchery owners. They dislike anyone who has a specific dragon and wants to get a non-fodder price for that dragon. Beautiful matchy XYZ from your hatchery whose colors compliment each other well and go with the established theme? Nope, there are thousands of XYZ spirals on site; yours isn’t special. Primal G1 whose eyes match its colors? Anyone can buy a primal vial, so that natural primal doesn’t add any value at all, not even a few measly gems - nevermind that the dragon being born already primal saves the future owner 500g should they want a primal G1. Even a nice XXY G1 should have its price shaved down a couple hundred gems every day it doesn’t sell, because really, you’re overestimating the amount that anyone wants it.

What these people resent, to be clear, is the idea of anyone making money off of selling any dragon. They believe dragons are a drop in a bucket, the AH is a buyer’s market, and you should act like you know you’re indebted to the buyers by making everything you sell as cheap for them as you can manage. If you don’t do that, you’re not just bad at business; you’re entitled.

I strongly disagree with that logic, to be clear, and here’s why.

If you want a dragon, just any dragon, the colors and genes don’t matter one bit, then yes, you can easily pick one up for a mere handful of gems at any time from anyone. This is why the fodder floor is the fodder floor in the first place (as opposed to the perma floor) - the people for whom any dragon will do are usually exalters. When it comes to fodder, then, FR truly is a buyer’s market. There are so many fodder dragons available that no one has to buy yours unless you match the lowest price, so you better get matching.

But people buying permas usually want at least some specific criteria met, whether that’s a favored color scheme, favorite genes, eyes that match, etc. Sometimes those specifications - collecting pink snappers! - are so broad you might easily find too many dragons to fit your lair at the fodder floor. But sometimes they’re more specific. Sometimes there may only be a few G1s of the colors you want on site, or there may only be one person actively breeding dragons in the color scheme you need for your project. In these situations, the scale tips more towards the sellers - often not entirely, not to the point where they could charge anything, but they get more sway, because they now have something specific that buyers need., and the buyers can’t just find someone else to name a better price

If I’m truly the only person breeding XXYs of a specific color on the whole site, I can set whatever price I want. Now, I should be reasonable - nobody will spend thousands of gems for a G2+, and unless the combination is particularly stunning and popular, anything past 100g is pushing it. But if I decide I believe my hatchlings are worth 50g, then prospective buyers must pay 50g or they’ll have to breed an identical dragon themselves, often costing themselves more in the process. And just like “I could buy fodder for 6kt right now, so I won’t pay 10kt for yours” is a completely fair take and a natural consequence of the way the FR economy is set up, “I’m opening a hatchery and I’m charging 100kt a pop for these rare imps and anybody who wants them will have to accept my price” is completely fair and in line with the natural give and take of FR’s economy.

This gets people heated, because they think they should be able to waltz into anyone’s sales tab and buy any dragon in there for pennies. But anyone who thinks about the economy for ten seconds realizes it won’t work this way every time, and it isn’t logical to expect it to.

FYI: There is an equivalent of this phenomenon that happens with just about any selling of in-game goods (I’m not talking about art, stop forcing the art discourse, all of you!) for more than table scraps. There are people who hate coli grinding that get angry that players who put the time and effort into grinding in the harder venues won’t sell hibden task familiars for cheap, for example. People who get angry that the owners of retired items raise their prices over time to reflect their increasing rarity. A lot of players have a perhaps subconscious but nonetheless very nasty “Money for me, not for thee” mentality. “I should be able to charge what I want for the game assets I own, but you should make it easy for me to buy yours.”

best concert/festival experience? actually, you can talk about multiple concerts, i like hearing about them

these asks have literally become my daily treat at this point. going to give you my top 3 experiences >:)

1. The 1975 @ Finsbury Park

I mean I feel like this is the very obvious answer considering, y’know, my entire blog, but this event was just so emotional for me that it has to be my number one. everything ran (relatively) perfect for me and my friend and I was so anxious the weeks leading up to it I genuinely thought I was going to sell my ticket — I’d never been to a gig in London on my own before (let alone be in London on my own) and was so worried about travel and safety. I’m so glad I didn’t. the memories I have from that night have been engraved in my brain forever. the crowd that was around me were amazing, my view was amazing, the food and merch (albeit extortionate) were amazing, and the boys were just the best you could possibly ask for. seeing japanese house as well was a major plus. they played some of my favourite songs that I hadn’t heard live before (love me, people, ballad) that the pain of getting out of the park was worth the experience. I’ve had such bad post concert blues from it (cured now that I know the next time I’m going to be seeing them will be at reading!!!) and that was all because of how much the event meant to me. bawled my eyes out!

2. Alter Bridge w/ Halestorm & Mammoth WVH @ Resorts World Arena

this gig will always be so special to me because this was the second gig that I’d been too that wasn’t the closest city to me and was the second gig I ever properly queued for (the first on both occasions being olivia rodrigo). I think I queued for a total of 6 hours (my longest to date) and was number 15 in the whole queue. I hadn’t gone for the headliners (alter bridge), I’d gone specifically to see halestorm and the goddess that is lzzy hale. this was also the gig that introduced me to mammoth wvh who have now become one of my all time favs (very lucky to have seen them again in wembley supporting mötley crüe). this gig was also the first setlist and pick I’d gotten at the gig (I have a matty healy pick, but didn’t get it from the gig itself) — setlist from mammoth’s bassist ronnie ficarro, and a halestorm pick from the woman in-front of me on the barricade who heard me screaming my heart out and gave it to me because she was just there to see alter bridge. I had also had a massive culture shock to how big the arena actually was, and one of the women who I made friends with was an ex firefighter and taught me what to do during a crowd crush! an experience I’ll definitely never forget (also convinced lzzy looked at me at least twice).

3. Isle Of Wight Festival 2023

this was my first proper festival (just a day ticket though) and it honestly was such a good experience we’re planning on doing the whole weekend next year. my friend is a very, very talented photographer who was photographing one of the tents at the festival, so it was amazing being able to hang out with him as we live quite far away from each other. the best act we saw were 110% onerepublic who were just an absolute joy to watch, an amazing performance, and funnily enough an arctic monkeys tribute band at the end of the night when we were all high on adrenaline dancing our hearts out! I will also mentioned the sugababes because I enjoyed them a lot more than I actually thought I would. once again extortionate (but you can’t really do much about that) but the scran was banging and not once did we feel uncomfortable whilst we were on the site the entire time — getting back was also nice and easy! the only downside was having to say goodbye, which is obviously never easy, but we’re hopefully seeing each other again soon and I can’t wait :)

How to know what kind of Witch you are:

You don’t.

When it comes to "types of Witches", this concept ultimately developed in the 2010's surrounding NeoPagan forms of Witchcraft. In these forms of magic it's now common to seemingly "specialize", eventually, in certain areas of magical interest; to "niche down" magically, so to speak.

Because of this, you'll find people calling themselves everything from "Storm Witches", to "Techno Witches", "Death Witches", and "Green Witches", and so on; hundreds of these "types" of Witches now exist- including cute little infographics to go along in order to show you everything from their aesthetics to the tools of their craft. And now, on top of it, new Witches are often directed to figure out which one they are.

Unfortunately for anyone sucked into this, it's all nonsense. These “types of Witches” or “types of Witchcraft” don't actually exist in the first place- nor is there anything that legitimately distinguishes a person as a Witch; you can't just "find out what kind of Witch you are". Not like that anyways.

The reality is that there are only normal Human Beings with normal special interests who happen to practice Witchcraft. And those special interests eventually happen to impact their Witchcraft- just as our interests ultimately impact every other aspect of their lives.

This terminology didn't develop out of thin air, however. So where did it come from? The long short of it is that we created it out of a legitimate need in the 2010's, and with an explicit purpose in mind; an intent to communicate something very specific to those around us.

To understand this, you have to first understand that when we initially developed terms like “Storm Witch” and “Death Witch” and “Urban Witch” in the early 2010′s? It was an era when information about Witchcraft was still semi-difficult to actually access for the vast majority of us at the time.

You largely couldn’t find books outside of chain bookstores- and those just weren’t available in most cities; most people didn't know they could get books on the topic through the public Library, or that the Inter-Library Loan System existed (and honestly most still don’t anyways); Metaphysical shops that may have carried them were (and largely still are) fairly rare outside of large cities; E-readers and websites like Amazon were still up-and-coming, then, and people were still very iffy on selling their products digitally (especially books- and especially because there was a huge debate around the validity of “reading” if it was done electronically).

The internet existed, however, and that’s where most of us got our information; Yahoo!Groups and Yahoo!Chats. Various forums. LiveJournal communities. GeoCities and AngelFire websites that were were individually made and hosted- but there weren't many, and most were low quality; it was a wild west of self-hosted nonsense ... But it was our nonsense- and for many of us, it was the only access we had to learning about Witchcraft of any form.

Until suddenly ... It wasn’t ... Until suddenly in the 2010's many of those website hosts started shutting down their services for good, with very little warning, and with no backups.

This caused most of us to start loosing sites that'd been our main resources for decades. And when those sites started going, for a while information on Witchcraft suddenly became even harder for people to find ... Not because of some great conspiracy to wipe it out, or anything like that. But simply because of a massive shift in how we viewed information technology as a whole. Witchcraft and other alternative religions, as a topic, just happened to get caught on the wrong end of the crossfire.

A lot of people scrambled very quickly at that point to make what they knew available elsewhere as quickly as possible, in order to fill the gaps that were being left while everything adjusted to what was ultimately a rather sudden and completely unexpected change in information dissemination and technology; in some places what this meant was that everyone was suddenly sharing any amount of information they had- whether it was good, or bad (and boy, was most of it pretty bad). And nearly every one of them- especially on sites like Tumblr- immediately became viewed a sort of pseudo-teacher in lieu of access to traditional teachers and old previously trusted sources that we'd once had access to.

In other words: If you shared any kind of information at all about Witchcraft, you got asked questions left and right, near constantly ... Basic questions ... Advanced questions ... Anything that anyone needed to know, you were expected to field them regardless of your particular personal interests or expertise; you were expected to be a human encyclopedia and walking training resource available at the drop of a hat (or the click of an "ask" link)- and sometimes the entitlement and demands were absolutely surreal.

But the problem in this specific case we’re talking about re: “Storm witch” and terms like it, however ... Is what I said above: That people have special interests. Because they are people. And not every person is interested in the same things.

No one studies everything. We all study what we’re interested in regardless of what traditions we’re a part of. And so after a while, those of us being forced into positions of resource, education, and leadership needed some kind of developed shorthand in order to communicate what we actually knew about to those asking us questions- particularly so that people would stop asking us about the stuff we didn’t know about.

I know because I sat at the forefront of it as one of the very first “Big Name Pagans” on Tumblr to ever earn that “title” (which I hate) by actively writing resources and even coining some of these terms and writing some of the very first resource sets for these new terms in the first place; to this day you can still find my “Tentative Steps” series on Tumblr- or my “[x] In Folklore and Magic” series, many of my old spells, etc; you can probably still find asks I wrote for the PaganStudyGroupPage when I co-ran it (and even outright ran it for a while), and so on. 

None of them are good by today’s standards. But they were needed, then, sadly. Because frankly it was annoying to constantly be asked (and expected to know) everything about anything- even about a bunch of things you had absolutely no interest in. Especially when people got (sometimes violently) rude and hateful with you whenever you didn’t know or even refused to answer a question. Which is a behavior that became more and more common as time went on, before the big community crash finally around the 2015 era.

Shorthand terminology for things like Greencraft, Hedgecraft, and adjacent magics kind of already existed to a small extent by that time. And so we expanded on the language that we already had available, in order to convey similar ideas on a much broader spectrum than had previously been done before within the community. And it worked. It caught on, and it helped ... It helped tremendously, actually. And for a while, it was great!

Until suddenly it wasn't ... Until suddenly the internet took a good thing and does what it always does: Twisted it into something horrid; a thin, shitty shadow of itself that had nothing to do with its original intent. Turned it into a commodity. Something else they could market and use to make people feel like shit about themselves with.

But these terms were never meant to be boxes for people to shove themselves into, or concepts and models to which to conform … They were never meant to be things people intentionally sought out in order to identify as- or worse: Shitty aesthetics meant to define one’s craft and how it looks ... They were only ever meant to describe what kind of knowledge we already had, after years of already studying.

So no. You don’t find "what kind of Witch you are” … You’re just a Witch, plain and simple. Everything else boils down to you being a normal human being whose expressed interests naturally impact your craft- just like every other area of your life. And that’s really all there is to it.

This is both an opinion piece and a historical piece. If you found this helpful or interesting, please consider Tipping or Leaving a Ko-Fi (being Disabled, even $1 helps); you can see my other "Original Content" here.

This account is run by a Dual Faith «(Converting) Masorti Jew + Traditional NeoWiccan» & «Ancestral Folk Magic Practitioner» with 20+ years of experience as a practicing Pagan and Witch. If that bothers you, don't interact.

When it comes to Pokémon plushies, I've always been a huge fan. They're fun to collect and often come in really soft and high quality fabric, making the experience of owning one even better. However, a certain plushie that's always piqued my interest would be the Banpresto crying Manaphy plushie.

I saw this plushie whilst looking at Manaphy merchandise a while ago, and it really caught my eye. Something about the plushie radiated a bit of mystery and nostalgia to me. At first I didn't really think much of it; I just scrolled past and went about my day. But as time went on I wanted to know more about it. Where it came from, etc. But as I tried to do "research," I noticed that it was rather obscure; sure there was evidence that it existed, but there were only a few pictures (one seen above) of it and I couldn't find much information. I saw one for sale on a foreign selling website, which made me even more curious as to how much people even owned one. The plushie had a "partially lost media" vibe to it, and I was itching to find out these things:

• Where did it come from?

• Where was it released?

And,

• How many people have it/how rare is it?

So I took to Tumblr and managed to find a post of someone talking about the plushie (@santapaws) and commented on their post expressing my interest. I just left the comment there in general not expecting an answer, but OP actually responded and sent me a message! Apparently they owned the plushie as well and even provided some pictures.

They bought it off a Thai eBay listing after searching for it for years and currently had it in their possession and sent me a few links on a Japanese auction site where it was on sale.

This kicked off my drive to further investigate. After a while of digging around and paying close attention to where I searched, I found a little "wiki page" of it on Flickr:

• The origin of the plushie originated in Japan (obviously) around 2006 (most likely, as that was when Temple Of The Sea came out and marketing for it was high). Apparently it came from a "UFO Catcher" set.

But, what is a UFO Catcher?

A UFO Catcher is basically a Japanese claw machine often found around Tokyo arcades that contain plushies of a variety of different characters, but the prizes often change, so they become out of production very quickly. With that being said, this Mana plushie was most likely one of many that could be won as a prize from a UFO Catcher around that time. These were special because they could not be purchased in stores nor centers, just specifically available at an arcade.

And apparently there was another Manaphy that could be won at a UFO Catcher as well! This one is more content.

And here's another from 2007!

And here's another one....

Another holding May's hat...

And here's a whole lotta them with Piplup making a cameo!

However, out of all, the crying Manaphy seems to be the most uncommon, retracing my words back to the beginning of it being rare (on top of it being available for a limited time so long ago!). I'm not too sure how many are in this "set," and just like the crying Mana, there could be more undocumented ones.

• Now, my final point, how many people own them? It's hard to say. OP of the post, two for sale, and another blogger that have them only tally up to four (unless you or someone you know have one lying around!). As I've mentioned before, these were limited and produced over 15 years ago, so it's hard to say how many saw the light of day. And when it comes to the crying Mana plushie, there could be very little that exist.

• What are my overall thoughts?

Well, for my first post on this site ever it's rather a mouthful, but I wanted to express how intresting I find this. I love miscellaneous merchandise! There's a bit of mystery and obscurity about it that fascinates me. How this plushie was so close to becoming lost if those photos/auctions weren't posted on the internet. Although it's just a plush, I would like it to get more spotlight. The fact that few have it and not much is known about it is what makes it intresting.

That's my rambling wrapped up. If you have any words of your own don't be shy to comment. Chances are I won't bite.

This isn’t really an ask, and you might not even see this, but I just wanted to say thanks again for providing me with a link to find the MBTI test - for some reason I only found informative articles online or tests that I had to pay for. Also, result’s in: ENFJ…which is fair enough, I guess🤣

It’s fairly accurate, but I believe people change, grow and evolve their entire lives and I still do think there are more than just 16 personality types given there are nearly 8 billion people in the world, but it was an entertaining and interesting way of assessing myself. I just think that there’s no way we can only fit into 16 personality types and that’s it - and I know that’s not the point and it might get confusing to provide more. At the end of the day, it was a fun little experiment. Didn’t match with anyone, but - even though it’s not a big deal - JM did get the same result when the members took the test in 2017 and 2021. I’m still taking it all with a grain of salt, but it was fun😊

I also just wanted to tell you that I love your blog so much and wanted to tip my hat to how well you’ve put it together. I’ve only been ARMY since late June of last year (I missed Muster by, like, a week😭) and blogs like yours have really helped to educate me on all things Bangtan. It’s been specially helpful given that this is my first ‘comeback’ - which, is it usual to be this emotional about it? I haven’t been part of the BTS-ARMY family for a whole year and yet they have truly touched me, they have helped me through a really difficult time in my life, and I’m so happy for them and so proud of them and I’m thrilled to be part of this family that is ARMY. The impact they’ve had on me in such a short amount of time is like nothing I’ve ever experienced before as a fan of all things music and art. I can’t begin tell you how excited I am for Festa, for Muster and for the release of ’Proof’. Both Tumblr and Twitter have, surprisingly, offered pretty helpful tips and guides on all things related to comebacks. Generally though, Tumblr has been more helpful when it comes to the connection between the members - which, to me, is one of the most special and unique things about BTS apart from their art and their love for ARMY. Pretty early on, I noticed how JM and JK were with each other (I hadn’t even joined the BTS side of social media yet since this happened around July or maybe August of last year and so I hadn’t joined Weverse or really used Twitter - the content that I had seen was mostly on YouTube and it was footage from V LIVE/BV/ITS and Bangtan Bombs) and they really caught my eye. Their dynamic and their interactions just felt really special and intimate. It wasn’t until, I think, October or November that I really started to find these blogs which, it’s strange to say, but Tumblr, overall, really is my safe haven when it comes to the relationships between the members, because Twitter is a mess in that aspect. I love Twitter, and for the most part I have fun there. My typical day to day on Twitter is pretty chill, but it can be so toxic and vile when it comes the members’ interactions, specifically JM & JK’s and V & JK’s, with each other and the way that JM is treated by many on that site, so I tend to jump ship from Twitter and come here when that happens. I really am not giving any antis, obsessive shippers or fake OT7 accounts any excuses here, because some of them are truly miserable human beings, but I do believe that they’re all envious of JM. They’re bitter that they’re never gonna be as wonderful as he is - as talented, or hard-working or beloved as he is. Because, at the end of the day, that’s the reality - JM is so loved around the world, but specially at home and particularly by his 6 members. For that reason, and more, your blog is definitely one of my favourites and one of my go-tos so, thank you. Thank you for creating a space that is safe and fun and warm. A space where there isn’t full of malicious speculation or baseless assumptions; where we can just love all the members, but especially, enjoy and support the beautiful connection that JM and JK have. I also want you to know that I so respect how you handle all the haters and antis on here and how you stand up for yourself and others. You rock. Thank you for everything. Lots of love💕😊

This made me cry. Thank you so much for all your kind words. I have had an insanely emotional afternoon/evening. I've been crying on and off all day and this just really hit me for some reason right now. Thank you sincerely. I'm okay, I promise. Just a lot stuff being talked about and happening in my personal life.

And thank you so much too for sharing your story with us! Your first comeback is always so special and its amazing that yours is such an incredible anthology album like Proof! I'm thrilled for you! 💜💜 and I'm happy I could help with finding that link for you!

Thanks again. I hope you have an amazing rest of your day 💜💜💜

Happy WBW from @magic-is-something-we-create!!

I've just been out and about camping, so I'm wondering what traveling looks like in the world of the magic university!!

Where do people tend to stay overnight on long journeys? Is camping a viable option, or are there monsters or other dangers that make it unsavory? Are there spells like D&D's Yeoman's Tiny Hut, or is magic any help with travel at all? And, finally, are there any (national/state) parks or reserves near the university??

I hope you have a lovely day!!

Welcome back from your camping trip and happy wbw @magic-is-something-we-create !! I'm sorry in advance for the size of this response.

I explored this question a lot in TOOD and in TWEfA tbh. ASMLP has the least amount of traveling in it which is,,,, weird lol

Obviously the true answer is "where and when". TOOD for example is a few hundred before ASMLP, and back then there were no cars. They were just discovering elevators! So mostly, there were communal carts, walking, boat fare, and griffin riding.

Then we zoom ahead to TWEfA, where's there's a good amount of steam technology. Trains have a transportative element to them now. Griffins have been relegated to hobbyists/rich people Ala horses in our world. There are early forms of cars (Think like. Ford Model Ts and whatnot) but mostly relegated to the rich and powerful (which is why the Scholars got access to them, due to their political influence)

And now we find ourselves in the land of ASMLP. We're more advanced at this point. We have telephones and magic everywhere and all that shit. Cars are becoming more common but still for more wealthy demographics. Communal carts have changed to trains or busses. Griffins are getting pretty rare at this point. A more limited form of transportation, ESPECIALLY for the college in ASMLP, is a trolley cart system. The college is situated on a mesa, so they take trolleys to and from the campus to visit the surrounding cities and for the summer and such. There's trolleys that connect the Master's campus to the Bachelor's (they're part of a larger campus but separated). In general, too, there are Conjuration casters who have elected to specialize in transportation and thus power sites of teleportation. The glyphs for teleportation can get rather complex, however, and can often go wrong, so there are designated teleportation sites that will get you,,, close enough to where you want to go. Think the travel systems in MMOs versus fast travel. Also due to the mechanics, this method can be a bit costly.

Speaking of teleportation, like in MMOs it's typically "place A can go to place B or C" versus connecting to multiple points. However, each country has a hub city with connections to every other hub city, so you zap to whatever country you're aiming for and kinda fine tune it from there.

As for camping and resting, similar story. It used to be a whole lot more safer for people to just. Camp in the woods during their journey. Before the events of TWEfA, monsters were largely unknown and relegated to being around Idune and other similar sights of corruption. Afterwards, however, and especially by ASMLP, monsters are a larger issue. The world's population has also increased, meaning there are more spots of civilization and more places to rest, but it's highly advised you not camp in the wilderness unless you're near such a city or are certain you can handle monsters on your own.

And as for Magic, there are spells for housing and whatnot but they tend to be temporary and will not protect you from monsters unless you make your glyphs super complicated. Because, as I've kind of hinted at, while there are base kinds of spells (fireball, teleport, etc) you have to fine-tune every spell you make for the exact purpose you're aiming for it to accomplish (so create a ball of Fire versus create a ball of fire that will inflict harm and can be thrown)... the language gets very specific. Hence why teleporting magic can be such a bitch, cause you have to essentially string a glyph that says "transport me from this exact spot to this other exact spot and keep me intact while doing so" like. It's a language all its own, as I've mentioned in a couple of previous wbws.

Finally, national parks. The answer is "yes but also no". There are a couple of sites, but the funding for such preservation and defense has since been relegated other places. It's more akin to having a military base than it is like. Having park rangers. There are areas that have been preserved, but they've BEEN preserved by planting members of anti-monster coalitions there, and as numbers dwindle or grow, so too does these sites. Some have swelled to impressive size, whereas others have disappeared entirely as their members were needed elsewhere.

There have also been sites once holy and protected, like Idune, that were overtaken by miasma and are at the present impossible to cleanse and like. Make protected again. Idune cause that's where the bodies of the old gods are, the old gods were killed by miasma, etc. It is simply... too dangerous to go there. Though people still try, like unfortunate one-chapter protagonist Chloe Duval who went to Idune to research miasma and was killed by monsters there.

I hope your day is as lovely as you are!! Thanks for the ask!!

intro post?

ok so I'm not really sure what to put here so I guess I'll just put some stuff about me and my interests

agender xe/it/they

aroace apl

I have never had nor am I interested in sex or a romantic relationship. I don't know how repulsed I would be if I actually tried. There definitely would be a lot of sensory problems. Sometimes I reblog allo stuff because it's funny though.

I don't consider myself loveless but I don't really understand what it means to "love" someone platonically beyond just feeling strong empathy for everyone around me, and sometimes enjoying the company of certain people. Like I could talk with someone about shared interests and have a really good time, and do stuff with them all the time, but if they were to suddenly disappear from my life I wouldn't have any desire to go back to them kind of thing. I don't ever get the desire to seek out and interact with specific people who I am "friends" with.

ADHD/autism, low-medium support needs

Ashkenazi Jewish

While many of the issues that I comment on or reblog about do not directly affect me, I'm a radical inclusionist by nature and I care (probably way too much for my own good) about the well-being of other people. I do not aim to comment on any one specific issues and I do not currently have the mental capacity to be a proper advocate about any one specific issue.

Special interests (TW infodump):

FOSS (free and open source software) philosophy as a political movement

User freedom and privacy; software that is written in the interest of the user rather than the developer

Rampant mass surveillance that the public turns a blind eye to. In the EU, there are privacy regulations for corporate, but you still often times find governments doing pretty bad things. In the U.S., corporate mass surveillance is arguably on the scale of a dictatorship like China or North Korea. It's still there, just much less in-your-face. And yes, there are in fact problems with this. "I have nothing to fear because I have nothing to hide" is such a stupid argument. How do you know when the Powers that Be decide to change what is allowed? Suddenly you do have something to hide. What are you going to do now? I'm sure it's an issue that a large portion of this site worries about, y'know, being full of a plethora of different minority populations.

Freedom as in the user gets to decide how to use the software, not the developer. Most proprietary software contains artificial limitations that have been implemented purely to exercise control over the user. This is Richard Stallman's Freedom 0.

Collaborative, communal development not for the purpose of making money, but for the purpose of making a tool to do the job. That tool is then shared with everyone for free so that anyone can work to improve it or use it as a jumping off point for their own work. Under a software license like the GNU GPL, if you fork a piece of software and create your own derivative, and you want to share that derivative to others, you are legally required to share the code to the changes you made. That's what makes such licenses so powerful. Collaboration and sharing isn't optional; it's compulsory. And it should be, because working together as a whole society by pooling our time and knowledge is always better than competing with one another for the same goal.

As should be obvious by now, FOSS ideology is inherently very left wing, but it gets co-opted a lot by right-wingers who use "privacy" and "freedom" as dog whistles for "I get to post hate speech and incite violence online without personal repercussions. Oh, if it weren't for the consequences of my actions!" They completely ignore the fact that FOSS is literally communism as a development model.

Some people will advocate for FOSS from a freedom perspective, like Richard Stallman, the founder of the Free Software Foundation itself, did, (Yes, there was a whole bunch of stuff concerning his reputation that happened but most of that was proven to be false. Of course Stallman's a little crazy. He wouldn't have started what he did if he wasn't.) and some people will advocate for it from a practical, leftist perspective, like Eric Raymond, author of "The Cathedral and the Bazaar." (who has sadly since gone Q crazy, but that doesn't change the validity of what he said before.) The reality is that both perspectives are equally important.

the Right to Repair movement, which is very similar to FOSS on a practical level. It targets hardware such as electronics, vehicles, medical equipment, farming equipment, etc. Right to Repair does not ask for $0 products (and neither does FOSS. You can still make money with FOSS. Look at companies like Canonical and Red Hat.), but rather for the ability to legally obtain parts and documentation so that consumers can fix things themselves. Electrical schematics, documentation, and diagrams should be made available to the public in some capacity at all, even if they need to be paid for. Right now you can't even pay most companies to get them. It differs ideologically from FOSS because it doesn't really care about collaboration and sharing. It simply states that you should have the legal right to fix your property.

Unix systems

CLIs (command line interfaces) are superior for almost all purposes. I might not even bother with a GUI if I could run a usable web browser in a TTY. w3m gets the closest with support for rendering images, but still no JavaScript.

I often stim by fidgeting with the command line. Visual from what's going on on the screen and tactile from the keyboard. Don't ask.

Proper package management systems. Imagine an app store, but the entire operating system including core components, libraries and applications are installed and updated through one central system, pulling from one central repository. On your desktop computer. It hurts me every time I need to go look up a website and download a package or executable installer. There's Chocolatey and WinGet for Windows and homebrew for macOS but it's still nowhere near as good as a proper implementation.

---

Hardware,I especially enjoy learning about much older 8 and 16-bit machines because there's much less abstraction between hardware and software and it is much easier to visualize and understand what is happening at a very low level that you just don't see on a modern system. Even with a microcontroller like an Arduino there is still a ton of abstraction going on and you just don't get the same learning experience that you would building a project raw with a 6502 and some logic chips.

I'm not really that into programming but sometimes I'll do a little shell scripting. Why do tedious, repetitive work in a graphical interface when a couple lines of code logic suffice?

The history surrounding the development of computers and software is also really interesting to me. There's a multipage infodump that I am omitting here.

Most other general stuff about computers is interesting to me

Feel free to ask me about any of this stuff but there's no guarantee that what I respond with will be even remotely intelligible.

Also THANKS TUMBLR EDITOR for making it literally impossible to make hierarchical lists. They seem to render in the editor but then they disappear when you click post.

💸 📘 🔋

Question about the muse—send a symbol!

💸  = Has your muse written their will yet? If yes, what have they decided to give to people? If no, why not?

So, Devang has a weird thing going on with her 'will'.

I don't know if it's legally binding in any country so much as held by certain persons capable of ensuring the enactment of it. And it's got a whole preface to it that involves...times and circumstances.

It's not really built to be activated, per say, by her death so much as by a specific period of Total Absence. She had it drawn up with help from several Contractual Beings to hammer it out into very specific wording and a careful placement of words.

She has died A LOT. But never fully moved on spirit wise. It's part of the whole reason she's a 'Ghaster' now. So! With that in mind she'd rigged the will special.

Every so often she updates the testament.

At this point, the will is just what is to be done with her assets and possessions should one of two things happen:

The Impossible Due To Death Curs: Die.

Or

More Likely Due To Death Curse: Disappearance Without Return.

Option two is the idea that something also common to Devang's life until fairly recently is that Devang will fucking DISAPPEAR at random to some other universe or reality at the whim of who the fuck knows what at any given time. And with that in mind it's always possible that, unlike in the past, she will never find her way back.

That's primarily what the will is for.

She has a lot of Hidden Wealth in the form of money, estate, and resources that will be give to mostly her children that are alive at the time. With some wordage about the money just moving down the line if they have children. Some does got to people like Charlie and Worth, but they get a smaller hashout just because she knows they won't be comfortable getting that many digits to stuff in their couch cushions.

The pizzeria is going to Maya unless Maya gives it to someone else.

Sentimental items are more directly named inheritors.

Remaining stuff is to be liquidated into cash and either separated to previous survivors or funneled into carefully curated charities--like Rook's and Miles'. (People she's already anonymously depositing random unsuspicious sums to when they take such things.)

However, if and when this Will is every activated remains to be seen.

📘  = Describe an AU verse/story that you have written out for your muse that you’d love to roleplay. Why did you choose to make them that way?

SCREAMS ALL OF THEM MOTHERFUCKER ALL OF THEM ALL THE TIME I LOVE ME A GOOD AU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE ME A GOOD OLD "FLING THIS-VERSE DEVANG INTO ANOTHER FUCKING UNIVERSE PLOT"! I LOVE!!!!!!!!! AUS?????????????? YESSSS.

None of them are written out. Earlier today I thought about updating the AUs pages in this site's about...

I've also continued to think about Well-Adjusted-Crown-Royal-Devang!!!

I just never...get to...do the Thing!

Oh! I also forgot that I was working on a The Last of Us!Devang series of fanfictions, but I just...had a hard time thinking anyone liked them so I lost the gumption to continue it--but it was kinda fun for a minute, I guess. I have no doubt I'd do it a little different each time if I kept picking it up to redo it, though.

I try to keep true to the character, always, but I do love mixing and matching experiences to the character to see how they're the same quintessential self while they behave differently due to their very different life influences. It's fun as heck!

Devang, especially, for me is a character I have a fairly easy time adapting to anything and anywhere. I think because she's the longest standing and the one I know the best to keep those Core-Devangy-Traits no matter where she ends up or becomes some-where/place else.

🔋  = Who or what drains your muse the most? Who or what helps to revitalize that energy?

I don't think people drain Devang. I think circumstances drain Devang. I'm not sure how to word this in the way of how much her Life Events generally take their toll. You probably know what I mean.

I do know that aside from that, there's a drain that comes with her being in public spaces. Her mind kind of overworks itself into a tense anxious type of paranoid frenzy.

And that sounds like those people in highschool that are always like 'yeah, dude, I ONLY sit in CORNER booths with my BACK TO A WALL'--but that's kind of how she lives a lot of her life. She might not always put her back to a wall, but she's always counting doors and windows and peering into reflective surfaces. Things like that.

That's very exhausting. Especially if she doesn't get the payoff of a Paranoia Well-Founded.

Her recharges tend to be Box Time. Which--she has to do different now after the Boo Box and now the Graveyard Hole. But just somewhere quiet, small, dim, and ostensibly Safe is enough. What she does in the box can vary. Snoozing with partners or family, reading a book, playing a handheld game, playing something on her phone, a movie--whatever.

If she whirls into a bottle of alcohol and takes to sitting on her porch then she's doing the opposite while making it look like she's let her guard down. She hasn't.