This one’s gonna be hard for the tumblr girlies to grasp but hear me out: maybe………. you were SUPPOSED to feel upset about what happened to Marwa

Henlo can u pls write könig secretly using his s/o's fragrant shampoo, soap, ye the whole nine yards, while theyre away?

Sweet-scented König gets separation anxiety whenever you’re gone, to fix this he finds comfort in whatever smells just like you.

warning’s ; gender-neutral reader, not much warning tho just reader being in love with a cute spine breaker, kissing a little there and there.

A/N ; it’s a lil short fic, sorry for that but I do hope you enjoy <3 German phrases stolen from our own mighty god google translator <333

masterlist ♡

König using your shampoo and soap is both silly and flattering to you, its obvious that he’s trying to hide the fact that he is using them. But you’re no idiot to his doings, so when you come home one day after being gone for awhile, his scent hits you. And you realize he identically smells just like you, at first you said nothing, since of course he was your lovely partner and you didn’t mind that your partner uses your own hygiene products from time to time. It also meant the scent was to his liking, and that was even better.

But once your shampoo and soap just began to basically run out, and his stay the same you realized you had to say something about it or else you’ll have to continue buying more and more, and these products aren’t this cheap to begin with. 

You cornered the man once you caught glimpses of him, the man seemingly sensing your reason of approach, cowered away and you sweetly called out his name.

“ Ko. ”

He looked at you, his eyes locking with yours for few seconds before looking away, he spoke with a stutter. And you hardly could contain an amused smile, he was too darn adorable for you, you almost forgot the reasoning of approach. 

“ Ja, mein Liebling? ”

// “ yes, my darling? ” //

You stepped forward, further intruding any personal space this man has, and used your nose to smell the waft of scent adoring the skin of his exposed neck. He smelled absolutely delicious, you preferred the scent on him than on you any day, the ambrosial taste of a man who’s appearance begs to differ. 

At the top floats a note of honeyed sweetness, spread among low irresistible nuanced notes a smell that tickled your brain just right when you were at the store picking and choosing. 

“ what- what do you think you’re doing ? ”

The man asked bringing you back to reality, your lips quickly quiver into a slay smirk.

“ You smell.. wonderful I wonder what soap you’ve been using lately.. ”

The comment seemingly catches him off guard, and you chuckle at his reaction when his eyebrows furrowed in response. You bring a hand close to his cheek, your thumb moving in an up and down motion against it. You try your best not to kiss that frown off his face, but first you ease his worried expression.

“ it’s alright I don’t mind you using my shampoo and.. soap, if you find the smell nice, but I do mind greatly when they’re gone for good by the end of the weekend.. ”

The man lets out a stifled whine, and you knew he was going to quickly explain himself. He lets his strong arms wrap around your body, and he leans to let his head rest against your shoulders.

“ Oh.. meine liebe.. I’m sorry I wouldn’t use it just because.. I use it because it reminds me of your scent.. ”

//“ my love ”//

He explained himself in a rather quiet tone than his usual, you knew this man was a little insecure of his image and probably being caught using a ‘ fragrant ‘ soap belonging to his partner doesn’t make it all well to his ‘ masculinity’. Even though you always made sure to assure him every time he felt anything in such way, this time you just pretended to not hear any word of his sentence, because you rather he say it confidently.

“ come again ? ”

The man looks at you with widen eyes, but he then again looks anywhere else than your own face. And you felt a little frustrated with how much eye contact breaking he’s doing these days, you knew your job wasn’t nice to both of you, demanding your attendance for hours then days then months on occasions. 

Which meant he was left to do some self love on his own, while probably brooding about certain people working with you who were certainly taking your ‘ attention ‘ while doing your job. You always came back home feeling regretful for neglecting the thought of nurturing your relationship further more, would that be possible though with how much time you both don’t rightfully have?

“ Come on.. what did you say hm? ”

Your hand would gently run against the scar adoring your lovers cheek, he swiftly took a hold of your hand into his. And he would lay his lips flat against your palm planting a chaste kiss before snuggling further into it, he then took a deep breath, before releasing a heavy sigh too. 

“ Scheiß-.. I miss you.. everyday I miss you so much, mein Engel.. without you here or your scent I just go crazy.. ” 

//“ shit ” // // “ My angle. ” //

He said with such urgency, and you would lie if you said you weren’t a little surprised with every word coming from his mouth. But he continues before you could say something yourself, his words even demanding much more from you than you could give.

“ mein Ein und Alles, even if I use whatever soap or perfume you put on I can’t seem to forget the distance that leaves me separated whenever you’re not here with me.. ”

You couldn’t grasp how forlorn and desperate this man sounded to you, and you take a little moment to analyze his words, his eyes now look at you with such force it pulls your breath right from your lungs. Such man could love so much he feels empty when you’re not around him, it’s simply a rare thing to be witnessed.

“ I didn’t know you.. felt that.. ”

What you couldn’t manage to muster up with words you did with actions, you took his whole face into your hands pulling him close till you could feel his warm breath fan over your face. You let your lips press against his, his lips warm but not soft, and parted so slightly. You could feel his heart hammer against your chest so loudly, once you pull a way you hear him say with such sway in his tone.

“ Ich liebe dich.. ”

Hi again. I'm on some level here to ask for a complete explanation of every aspect of Hawaiian culture that is even tangentially related to your latest fic because I know absolutely nothing and there is the ever present concern that the terms run through cursory Google Translate and internet searching will lose nuance and implications. There were definitely some references to divinities and myths and such that went over my unenlightened head. The story you wove was rich and intricate enough to be held in the mind of someone who knows less than nothing and still have great meaning and truth, but I know that it will mean yet more if I can see the threads you used to make it. (On another level, I'm asking for the explanation because I am abruptly deeply interested in a topic I had previously not thought about very much, and you seem to be significantly more of an expert than the average internet search.)

first off! well first off i am blowing you so many kisses for this very kind ask, thank you so much for giving me an excuse to ramble at (great, great, great) length.

so second off! i would just like to stress that i am very much not an expert in hawaiian language, folklore, history, culture, etc. i am neither kānaka maoli (native hawaiian) nor kamaʻāina (born in hawaiʻi although not necessarily of hawaiian ancestry), and i have not studied these topics formally/in a setting that applies academic rigor. i am an enthusiastic amateur with a personal connection to hawaiian culture, the kind of brain that likes to fixate on areas of interest, and a willingness to scrounge around for reading material. i have, i think, a decent sense of what some of the baseline texts in the field are, and a fairly good bullshit detector (and the understanding/ability to dig into things when i can't rely on the bullshit detector), but ultimately i am a layman and an outsider with corresponding perspectives and biases. i also, i will admit frankly, have a pretty sharp knowledge cutoff corresponding to the time of first european contact, just because of my own personal interests and reading preferences.

read that whole disclaimer? let your eyes glaze over while you skimmed it? good! here's my real quick (lmao) rundown of Sum Things U Should Know If You Wanna Close-Read Kīpuka:

ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi 101

Good grief when I put it like that I do NOT feel qualified to tell you any of this. Anyway. We can keep it basic just so you can get a sense of the mouthfeel of the words. And just fyi ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi is the proper name of the language; i'll be using "Hawaiian" as the adjective form, sans ʻokina, assuming an English-speaking readership.

ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi as it is commonly rendered today has 13 letters: 5 vowels (A, E, I, O, and U) and 7 consonants (H, K, L, M, N, P, W), plus the ʻokina or glottal stop (that little apostrophe-lookin' dude at the beginning of the word ʻokina, also the source of most of my typesetting woes). Pronunciation-wise, there are no silent letters and no though/through/enough-type surprises: every letter is pronounced, and all of the vowel renderings are approximately equivalent to how you'd pronounce them in Spanish or Italian. Hence, the word kuahine = koo-ah-HEE-nay rather than, like, kyoo-ah-highn, which made me feel gross even just typing it out.

The ʻokina is pronounced, and bear with me here, like the dash in the english nuh-uh. or, if you're a try-hard vocalist—reattack the vowel after the ʻokina instead of eliding it to the vowel prior. So the place-name Kaʻū is pronounced ka-OO, as distinct from the word kau which is pronounced more like kow (which is a bit of an oversimplification of the latter word, but I'm trying to be efficient here).

That leads us neatly into the other diacritical marking used in ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, the kahakō or macron which helpfully appears in its own name. No worries here; the kahakō just serves as a stress marker, so you'd say kahakō = ka-ha-KO instead of ka-HA-ko, or from the example above ka-OO rather than KA-oo.

There are a couple of other little pronunciation tricks here and there. The letter W is sometimes pronounced as a V, and unfortunately I can't really describe the rules for that shift; that is one I must admit I know mostly from vibes. For example, the correct pronunciation of Hawaiʻi itself is ha-VAI-ee, but I've never heard the place-name Waimea pronounced as anything but why-MEY-ah.

Occasionally you will encounter the letter K pronounced as a T, which I believe is an artifact of the morphological shift from older related languages such as Tahitian and Samoan which do preserve the letter T as a unique phoneme. To my knowledge, the Kauaʻi dialect (spoken today on Niʻihau) also preserves the T, but most spoken ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi heard elsewhere is based on the Big Island dialect, which lacks the T. One notable exception is the word tūtū (an affectionate/respectful term for a grandparent or elder), which you really don't hear pronounced as kūkū.

Really, though, listening to Hawaiian music is how I got the language in my ear and imo it's the best way to get it in yours. Can't go wrong with Israel Kamakawiwoʻole (of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" fame), but I have a personal soft spot for Kealiʻi Reichel, Weldon Kekauoha, Amy Hanaialiʻi, and the Cazimero Brothers.

The Place-y-ness of Hawaiian Literature

This is more of a sidenote than its own heading, but I'm the one driving the essay, and I think it's an interesting thing to point out, just because it helps establish a particular perspective I wanted to keep in mind while writing this fic.

Something you might notice as you start to look at Hawaiian oli, mele, and myth is the high level of specificity of place. Hawaiʻi is, let's be honest, not that enormous of a place when you consider it on a global scale—but the specificity of localities within Hawaiian literature is kind of astounding. Not only are there loads of place-names referenced in any given work, there are unique Hawaiian names for landmarks, cliffs, peaks, hills, streams, waterfalls—even rains and winds of specific locations merit their own names.

"kīpuka" is very specifically set on the windward side of Hawaiʻi island, so I made an effort to focus my references to place-names on that region—Hilo, ʻŌlaʻa, and Waiākea are all locations on the eastern side of the island, and the one reference to Kona on the leeward side reflects the coming of someone bearing grievances (in addition to eia aʻe ka makani Kona being an existing idiom warning the listener to watch out for an angry person, the windward and leeward sides of Hawaiʻi island have a long history of territorial warfare and jockeying for control of the island). I'd also considered having the bird discussed in the fic be a different species, the kākāwahie—but that species is/was endemic to Molokaʻi, and quite honestly my knowledge of the history and culture of Molokaʻi as a separate polity is not that great.

(This is partly due to sample bias—my introduction to Hawaiʻi was within a Big Island-based context. At the same time, another thing you may notice about the better-known source texts is that many of them center around Hawaiʻi island and, to a lesser extent, Maui, thanks to the political supremacy during the unification/post-contact era of Hawaiʻi island and Maui aliʻi. Ross Cordy wrote a whole ass book about the Oʻahu chiefdoms that is simply not to be had for love or money no matter how I search for it. I am THIS CLOSE to straight up cold emailing the man and being like I WILL VENMO YOU $75 USD DIRECTLY IF YOU WILL SIMPLY JUST SEND ME A COPY OF YOUR BOOK. PLEASE. SAVE ME ROSS CORDY.)

Girl (Gender Neutral), I Cannot Explain Hawaiian Mythology, Poetics, and Mythopoetics As a Subheading in One Post

Honestly. I can't do it. But some tidbits to assist your further research:

A great deal of Hawaiian literature and oral tradition hinges on kaona, roughly "allusion" or "metaphor." In a description that is useful to precisely no one but myself, it's not unlike the complex plays on words, puns, and deep well of references used in Heian Japanese epistolary poetry. Some of it is easy to grok for newbies: for example, the concept of one's lover as a lei adorning the body, or being splashed or sprinkled with water as a euphemism for sex. Some of it goes a lot deeper, relying on historical or folkloric place-name associations, puns, and ancient practices and superstitions.

The Hawaiian "pantheon" I place in scare quotes because ancient Hawaiian religious practices and superstition were highly syncretic, often extremely localized, and more contradictory the more you read into it. In a very, very, very, VERY rough and off-the-cuff sense, though, there were thought to be four major gods: Kāne (associated with dawn, the sun, the sky, running freshwater, and irrigation-based agriculture, among other things), Kanaloa (associated with the ocean, sea creatures, and sometimes death, as an opposing or complimentary force to Kāne), Lono (god of fertility, agriculture with something of an emphasis on dryland agriculture, rainfall, and peace as embodied in the Makahiki festival), and Kū (god of war, the deified kingship, fishermen, sorcery, and quite honestly a ton of other things in various manifestations).

There were also quite a large number of "lesser" gods, the word "lesser" used just in the sense that they weren't honored to the same extent as the four previously named in state-sanctioned religious practice. Probably the most well-known of these is Pele, the volcano goddess. (I reference another in the fic, Niolopua, god of sleep—but the jury's out on whether or not that refers to an actual god or is just metaphorical in the same way that most people think of "the Sandman" as a euphemism for sleep and not a literal guy who comes into your house and puts crusties in your eyes.)

The gods were thought to manifest in a variety of forms, called kino lau (literally "four hundred bodies"). You can think of this in the sense of "Lono takes on the shape of an albatross or a tropicbird to interact with mortals, while Kanaloa prefers to manifest as an octopus," and in stories kino lau are sometimes represented that way, but in practice it's less of a Greek myth-style practice of shapeshifting and more of an animistic religious belief. The kino lau in nature embody the god and in a metaphorical sense illustrate the interconnection between divine and earthly and the presence of the divine on earth.

(HUGE OVERSIMPLIFICATION. HUGE OVERSIMPLIFICATION. PLEASE DO MORE RESEARCH AND DO NOT TAKE ONE TUMBLR POST AT ITS WORD ON THIS.)

The Endless, in the fic, are very easy to loop into the concept of kino lau, because of their canonical universality. Danny appears as a shark (a symbol of chiefhood), a pueo, or Hawaiian owl (an 'aumakua, or ancestral guardian), a manu-o-Kū, or fairy tern (a bird associated with the god Kū, likely in his aspect as a god of fishermen, navigators, and wayfinders), a kalo plant (a staple crop of ancient Hawaiʻi, a kino lau of Kāne, and a symbol of duality and rebirth), and a snowcapped mountain (a sacred site considered kapu, or forbidden, to all but the highest chiefly individuals). Despair, meanwhile, appears as an ʻalae ʻula, or Hawaiian moorhen (another ʻaumakua, but also an animal whose cry was thought to foretell misfortune), a stingray (for her barbed tail), a hāpuʻu fern (in contrast to Dream's kalo, the hāpuʻu was considered a famine food), a lava flow and its first growths (acknowledging Pele as both a destroyer and a creator of land, just as Despair also embodies hope), and a number of other things meant to embody the devastation of Hawaiʻi (rats, feral pigs, and mosquitoes have decimated endemic birds and insects; the kiawe is an invasive plant species that forms dense, thorny, and difficult-to-destroy groves; light pollution affects behavior and migratory patterns of both avian and aquatic species).

All pretty simple, obviously!

Further Resources and Recs

Okay, so, obviously I'm not going to be able to explain every single reference in this fic in a single post, though I obviously tried my damnedest. In lieu of that, I'll offer some useful resources for further reading:

Stephen Trussel's Combined Hawaiian Dictionary is a fantastic resource for vocab that incorporates several major Hawaiian dictionaries in a straightforward (well, as straightforward as this gets) text-based web page. Ulukau also has a searchable interface, which is a little easier to interact with, but I like having the Trussel for reference.

Huapala is everyone's go-to for translations of Hawaiian lyrics. I've linked to it in the endnotes of the fic for readers interested in more on "Ka Ipo Lei Manu," but it's got nearly any ʻauana-style Hawaiian song you please, and if I recall correctly even a few traditional oli. Again, another slightly old-fashioned text-based site—but we all know how to use CMD + F in a page, do we not?

Native Books is awesome if you, like me, prefer reading things in print but would prefer not to feed your dollars into the maw of the Amazon beast. A lot of the lit on Hawaiʻi was printed either a long time ago or in very small releases and is now out-of-print and difficult to find even in libraries, so it rocks that there's an independent bookseller that specializes in getting those works to an audience in hard copy. @ NATIVE BOOKS PLEASE CONSIDER GETTING ROSS CORDY TO RE-PRINT THE RISE AND FALL OF THE OʻAHU KINGDOM THANK YOU SO MUCH. University of Hawaiʻi Press is also a good source for academic texts, although their website is...mm...difficult to navigate, and do be warned that they charge academic press prices.

In terms of who to read, you really can't go wrong with Mary Kawena Pukui, a Native Hawaiian scholar, author, composer, and educator whose work is the backbone of just, a fuckton of writing about Hawaiʻi, both academic and popular. Her book ʻŌlelo Noʻeau: Hawaiian Proverbs and Poetical Sayings is worth at least a skim just to get the feel of the Hawaiian mindset; it also contains a healthy dose of myth, folklore, and history in the explanations of the sayings. Absolutely adorably, I've found two books she edited that I read the absolute FUCK out of as a child available as PDFs through Ulukau: The Water of Kāne and Other Legends of the Hawaiian Islands and Hawaiʻi Island Legends: Pīkoi, Pele, and Others. Definitely worth a quick read if you want more on the myth side of things.

As a non-specialist, I've really enjoyed Patrick Vinton Kirch's writing on precontact Hawaiʻi. For a field archaeologist, his writing is both highly engaging and very respectful of the peoples he studies, and trust me, I do get my back up easily when it comes to white people writing about Other Cultures TM, so I'd posit it means something that he passes my sniff test. A Shark Going Inland is My Chief is a great overview of the history of the Hawaiian chiefdoms from the first settlement of the islands to immediately precontact, and Kuaʻāina Kahiko offers a bit of a closer look at everyday life in a specific locality in the islands (in this case, Kahikinui, Maui).

Kamehameha and His Warrior Kekūhaupiʻo by Stephen Desha (trans. Frances N. Frazier) began its life as a serialized Hawaiian-language history of the rise of Kamehameha I. It's a dense read, and it WILL test your ability to remember who the hell all these people are to its limit—it mostly discusses the lives and times of the major players of the aliʻi class in the late precontact–early postcontact era, and when you remember that a) a hell of a lot of personal names in this tale begin with the letter K and b) the aliʻi class of Hawaiʻi practiced a mindboggling amount of political marriage, consanguineous marriage, and sanctioned adoption between blood relatives, the family trees get real complicated REAL fast. If you can hang on through all that, though, it's an intensely detailed and very vivid portrait of a culture at a tumultuous moment, it gives a great sense of how the Hawaiians viewed themselves and the world, and it's an interesting exercise in the mythologizing of the Kamehameha dynasty.

Okay, So...?

So...if you hung on through all that, god DAMN are you dedicated. Have what is quite possibly my favorite Hawaiian song for your trouble. It is, funnily enough, about a bird.

EDIT: I am retroactively making this post unrebloggable. I'm really, really glad folks have found it interesting and are looking into the resources I shared, but I absolutely do not want this getting passed around as Hawaiian Culture 101. If you want to learn more about Hawaiʻi, I must stress that you should look to a reputable source and not some schmuck on Tumblr rambling about her effortposting fanned fiction.

opm 179/224(jp) TL commentary

so, about the Saitama vs Tatsumaki battle in the latest chapter.

Normally, I’m tired enough at the end of the work day that when the JP OPM chapter updates drop, I'm happy to just skim the chapter and wait for the usual fan TL team to do their good work and drop the English translation the next day. Usually, I find them very decent and competent.

This time around, however, Saitama’s lines on this particular page had me sitting up a little straighter.

I thought his word choice was oddly far too chummy given his usual personality and his attitude towards people like Tatsumaki, so I decided to check the original Japanese pages again and sure enough, found that I gleaned a very different idea from the JP lines. I would definitely have translated these differently.

Let’s take a look at the 2 phrases in question.

1. “She’s not in the mood to chat at all” (JP: 全然会話になんねえーな )

The plain form of this (i.e. after you distill it from Saitama’s typical style of speech) is 全然会話にならない which is far more often representative of the sentiment “It’s impossible trying to get through to you/this person”. It literally translates to “This is not becoming a 2-way conversation at all” or "you can't have a 2-way conversation with this person"; Google “会話にならない 英語” and you will see multiple suggestions along the lines of “It’s no use talking to you.”

This phrase is used to indicate that the other party is not willing to listen, usually to something important the speaker has to say. Saitama isn’t looking to have a friendly “chat”, he’s trying to make a point to Tatsumaki about not attacking other heroes and laying off his new home before that gets destroyed too. So, while the use of “chat” may help to preserve the lazy informality of his speaking style, it downplays the severity of the situation and his annoyance at her not getting his point. 

I personally would’ve used “Ugh, she’s not gonna listen at all, is she” or “Ugh, talking isn’t gonna work at all, is it” or a similar variation.

2. “Guess I’ll keep her company for now” (JP: 相手しとくか)

Context is everything. Just because “keep company” is the first option in a whole list of different definitions that pops up when you do a dictionary search doesn’t mean that it’s the right definition to use for a translation/localization. Nor does it mean it’s how the phrase is most commonly used in practice.

I'd wager you don’t even need to have much RL experience in Japan or with Japanese people to know which definition should've been picked. Watch enough shonen and sports anime with the original Japanese audio and you’ll soon learn that any time there is a pair activity, game and most importantly, a fight, 相手 i.e. “aite” refers to “opponent”. In a classroom setting, being asked to “相手して” doesn’t mean to keep a student “company”, it means to take up the opposite role in pair work. I’d add that in the close to 15 years I’ve spent studying and/or speaking Japanese, and the 3.5 years spent living and working in Japan, I’ve never heard this phrase being used to mean “keep somebody company” - but since experience can also be subjective, let’s just look at what we can be certain about: context, and our own knowledge of the target language and all its nuances.

a. Context - What’s happening, and who is saying it: Are they fighting? Yes. As opponents? Yes. Is Saitama referring to their fight and a strategy he's going to take (i.e. letting her tire herself out)? Most certainly, yes. Is this line being said by the same guy who thinks of Fubuki only as an acquaintance who's always dragging him into her business against his will, the same guy who in the last frame of this very chapter is thinking to himself "Man I reeeeeaallly wanna go home"? Yes. Should you have picked a definition more related to fighting and opponents from the dictionary's MANY different options like, idk, "take on a rival" to base your translation on? Yyeeess??? Why wouldn't you have?

b. Decision-making when localizing a text: What does “keep somebody company” imply in English? Is there a better way to phrase this and make the localized script more representative of the situation and the character's intent, and less loaded with English meaning that isn't present anywhere else in the text? I mean, Saitama certainly isn't suddenly thinking about loneliness and company when he mentions the lack of buildings and people - a safer distance away from civilization he deliberately went to the trouble of bringing Tatsumaki to.

I'd take some creative/artistic license here myself to make the language less stiff, but would definitely have gone for something less distorted, like "Guess I'll keep her occupied for now". If unsure, then even a more literal "Guess I'll take her on for now" would do a very decent job of conveying Saitama's intent, staying faithful to the original language without sounding too stiff when inserted into the sentence they came up with.

But well, who'm I to talk, eh? Translators are humans, there's no way to be completely objective in any interpretation, and they still do far more work than I am willing/able to do for this manga every update. I just wonder if they were letting certain biases guide their interpretations rather more than usual this time. Suffice to say, I'll be very curious to see how the guys at Viz choose to frame this bit for the official English TLs.

First Post!

Hey guys, this is my first post on this account. To get started as a brand new blog, I'd like to talk about how I am currently learning the language.

Currently, I am using visual novels (VNs) to learn new things. The reason for this is the exposure to new grammar and vocabulary isn't brutal because there isn't much exposition to be had when you compare it to the likes of a short story or novel. You also get to understand the nuances of speech, as well as the pronunciation of words since VNs are typically voice-acted.

However, just reading the visual novel doesn't fill in all the gaps of knowledge you constantly encounter due to all the words and meanings you haven't learned yet. For this, I use a couple of tools that takes the text in the visual novel, and pastes it into a tab on my Google Chrome. This tool is called Textractor.

The above is the textractor app before I boot up the VN.

Below is the Chrome tab with the pasted text.

Why do I do this? Because it'd be insanely difficult to figure out how a word is read if I can't search it up due to it being locked behind a game. However, why google individual words up when you can use something as amazing as a Google Extension?

Yomi-chan is an add-on that can show you the meanings of words on your browser. It uses a variety of dictionaries to tell you the meanings of words, Kanji, phrases, and grammar! Below, is an image of me hovering over a word that maybe I'm not sure of.

Now I know what a word means, and how to read it too. I can even listen to what it sounds like, as Japanese does have vocal intonations that you might need to be aware of for maximum fluency.

Okay, so we now know what that word says. What's the chance of me actually knowing what it means the next time the word comes up? Aside from it being a pretty easy word, let's say it was super difficult! I'd have a tough time constantly searching EVERY word over and over again to understand them. And this is where repetition is great (in a more fun and productive way).

Anki cards! Anki cards are essentially flashcards where you can store your newly found vocabulary for repetition learning later. Make your own Anki deck is likely excruciatingly time-consuming. Imagine for every word you don't know, you have to write the word in Kanji, the pronunciation, the meaning, etc...

The cool thing is, you can actually connect Yomi-chan to your Anki deck, making it easy to just hit a button to add not just that word and it's meaning, but also the sound files for pronunciation, the sentence it originated from for contextual help, and even images!

This way you can just click the button, and move on with reading. It takes literally 1 second.

I then study my Anki cards every morning (or at least I try to)!

I'd love to learn more about how other people learn, and I think my method works pretty well for me.

🔪 ❄️ 🏜️ 🪲 🎨 🧩

ohmygodiforgotaboutthispleaseforgiveme

🔪 ⇢ what's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

I've already answered this but, for you, I have another answer which is not necessarily "weird" but that I think you'll appreciate. I spend A LOT of my research time for Midori Sour on Loki's outfits. I can usually picture what I want in my head (or, not picture, but vaguely describe). Once I have the general idea in my head, I tend to search it on Google to see if there are actual visuals that I can use to refine my description.

Loki's lace sleeveless crop top is one of the more recent examples. I knew I wanted lace, but not just tatted flowers. I figured Loki would wear a knife lace pattern, searched it out, and then found the one that I actually used in the fic.

Actually... now that I think about it, a fair amount of my researching is looking for visual references since I. just. can't.

❄️ ⇢ what's your dream theme/plot for a fic, and who would write it best?

Oooo. For a second, I thought this was what dream theme/plot would I want to write, but this... this is better.

Let's be honest here. I want a truly unhinged attack dog fic, one that digs into all the nuances of a relationship of that nature from both sides of the leash, and I would want you to write it.

So. You know. Do with that information what you will.

🏜️ ⇢ what's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

Having my own work quoted back to me.

No. But for real. I love knowing which parts of my work resonated with people.

Also, any live reacts that are some combination of emojis, key smashes, and the words "holy shit" over and over again.

🪲 ⇢ add 50 words to your current wip and share the paragraph here

Check your dms, man. I'm sure there's one in there.

“What the shit are you doing?” Mobius’s tone is sharper than he meant for it to be, but something is wrong. He scans Loki’s face close up, chasing down whatever it was about Loki’s demeanor that sent every red alert in Mobius head screaming. This is the god he knows, suave and polished, trying to slide by on the grease of his charm, but Mobius also thinks maybe this man is someone more than the god that he knows.

🎨 ⇢ link your favourite piece of fanart and explain why you like it.

My favorite piece of fanart probably changes by the day. But I've been thinking about THIS ONE a lot ever since it crossed my dash. It's so silly and clever while still managing to capture the spirit of the original work. I think mash-ups can be hit or miss but this one really hit for me.

🧩 ⇢ what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?

I do not even click on it in the first place. You know this. But if I do, I read it to the bitter (or sweet) end. It's a curse. I hate it.

x

so i ummmmmm really liked andor. like, a lot. holy shit. i need to make a list of Things I Enjoyed

FINALLY, A STAR WARS SHOW WITH GOOD FUCKING DIALOGUE. THE WORDS FEEL LIKE WORDS REAL PEOPLE WOULD ACTUALLY SAY. CONGRATULATIONS.

ON THAT NOTE: a star wars show that DOESN'T try to cover up bad writing with cgi and nostalgia grabs!!!!! the writing is quite good and they didn't throw in fight scenes just for shits and giggles, they all had meaning!!! huzzah!!!

(like. i am floored that i have enjoyed a disney show. what can i say. i have been disappointed in the past because of their incessant desire to Churn Out Content which results in underpaid workers and Loads Of Hot Shit. i am slandering up in this house tonight)

alright let's talk about the SOUNDTRACK. upon my first listen of the main theme, i was like, huh, kind of boring... by my fifth listen i was like, This Theme Is Going To Kill Me, and So Is The Rest Of The Whole Damn Soundtrack. orchestral swells AND weird and fucked up electronic sounds!!!! they were not afraid of a little out-of-tune synth wobbling, and that i can RESPECT!!!!! also not to music theory on main but IV to VI chords in a minor key, which is in the theme, is just a fucking beautiful progression and i will always love it in any context except for pop music. OKAY MOVING ON

this is the first star wars media i've encountered that i felt had something actually substantial to say about imperialism. like a lot of the other shows and the movies themselves have felt idealistic about rebellion against fascism, and then andor walks in and is like, hey, you know how we fight imperialism? Armed Revolt!! you know what enables fascism! a lot of nuanced factors that we're going to delve into with some Rich Character Development!! and obviously the rebellion in all other star wars media is like, openly an armed revolt, but this show puts that into greater context w/ police brutality, prison systems, and colonization, which makes the politics not more obvious per se, but more impactful and in greater dialogue with its audience. in my opinion. okay moving on again:

let's talk about some characters baby!!! cassian andor was bound to join my blorbo library from the moment i began this show. i absolutely fucking love his development from passive victim of empire to "kill me, or take me in [to your violent rebellion]", AND i love his haircut, AND emotionally repressed characters will forever remain fixtures of my heart. he's so!!!!! you know!!!!! i swear to god the writers did SO well on this one

i am not going to pretend that i remembered most of the character's names. my family did not watch this with subtitles and my auditory processing is quirky and elusive. so anyway i really liked [insert name of Guy Behind Major Acts Of Rebellion - you know, stellan skarsgård] because of his take no shit, give all the fucks attitude, and gravelly voice, and stellan in general as an actor (i am totally not biased because of the chernobyl miniseries). GREAT fucking complicated character.

i did find the writing of vel and cinta so fucking hilarious though. like if you google "vel and cinta", there are questions about if they are a romantic pairing. i appreciate the effort here, and i appreciate the glimpse of an actual nuanced lesbian dynamic in a mainstream company, but star wars is still very wimpy about gay people on the surface. we still have the beneath the surface homoeroticism though so we're good

mon mothma and tay [insert last name] only straight people i can get behind

THE FUCKING PRISON. EVERYTHING ABOUT THE PRISON ARC. first of all: what a fucking physical and psychological horror show. i mean, my god, electrified floors, no escape, nobody ever leaves. all the rest of the horror comes directly from real life, of course - prison slave labor, unfair sentences, shit living conditions.... i don't know the name of andy serkis's character so i will just call him andy serkis. what an EXCELLENT turnaround! from complacent hopelessness to violent hopelessness, and we know which one is more useful!!! FUCK YEAH!!! ALSO: "ONE WAY OUT" OHHH MY GOD!!!! JUST WOW!!!!! and "i can't swim"........ at least he got to see the sunlight... god this is a side comment but i think it's a crime to have to be stuck somewhere where you can't see the fucking sun this INCLUDES places of work UM ANYWAY

i am Tired so i will now sculpt my concluding remarks: i am pleasantly surprised!! i am delighted, even!!! i have gained another character to rotate in my head!!! that is all good night/day/insert time here

So I've been seeing a ton of submas art with the cool triangle pupils and I LOVE IT. Sometimes artists will make Emmet's white, and while I love that too bc DOPE character design, I always think "he does look a bit like he's blind."

So I guess my brain cooked up a new AU!

Blinding Radiance AU

After Ingo goes missing, Emmet does his very best to find leads. It doesn't take him too long to decide to turn to Arceus for help. Or to fistfight, he doesn't not care which. After months of trying, of being unstoppable in his research... He makes a breakthrough, somehow. Im still trying to think of how. Maybe some wild ultra beast and wormhole lore, maybe another legendary, but he finds his way to Arceus's personal realm.

Unfortunately, human eyes weren't meant to see that. Emmet is basically instantly blinded. Hence the white pupils. Arceus actually feels quite bad about this (since this is my Arceus and it actually does care about humanity and the Pokémon of the world, even if it can do surprisingly little)

As a consolation for inadvertently taking his sight, Arceus removes some of the memories of being blinded from Emmet... and leaves him with the knowledge that in a year's time, Ingo will come home.

Emmet is sent back to Gear Station, and his life continues. There is an OBVIOUS adjustment. Elesa helps a lot, but is so relieved that Emmet seems actually much more himself.

Emmet doesn't remember how he lost his sight. But he DOES remember speaking to Arceus and hearing that his brother will be back. Some people believe him. Elesa does because he speaks with such conviction about this, like he truly does KNOW something they do not. Most people who are close to Emmet believe him due to this.

The world at large is more skeptical. Some think he lost his mind a bit when he lost his sight. Buy most people are just glad he's healing and feels happy again. Maybe if he's wrong when the time comes, he'll have gained good coping mechanisms!

After adjusting, he does end up going back to work. Sure he can't drive the trains or direct them but he can still do his other boss duties and run double battles all the same! Everyone has him take it slow at first, it's a big adjustment! But he figures it out verrry quickly.

His galvantula becomes his seeing eye spider. It has six of them, it can spare two! It learns very quickly bc it's always been incredibly in tune with Emmet. Archeops and Eelektross were considered for the job, but neither really walks on the ground and thus might miss uneven footing and stuff like that. He also gets a white cane; I’ve read a few conflicting things via google (thaaaanks google really trust you for info) about color coding. Originally, I was going to have it be white with red stripes and line up with the pattern on Emmet’s coat when held upright to uphold his traffic cone vibes. But it seems that prooobably would mean he’s got hearing loss too, though some sites said ‘totally blind and/or deaf’ so I don’t actually know! Seems to also vary by country! So let’s just stick with white, at least that seems to have a consensus.

While Emmet doesn’t have hearing that functions any better than any other humans’, he’s used to listening for nuance. For using his ears rather than his eyes to pick up on his brother’s emotions. So he would be DAMN good at reading people. And his perception of touch is already somewhat heightened; time to use that to his advantage!

So yeah! Emmet gets along just fine! And he is happy, because he knows his brother is safe and will return to him. He just has to be patient.

...

Ingo does come home, just when Arceus said he would. Safe and sound, he’s deposited in Gear Station. He finds it strange, that he recognizes Emmet before Emmet recognizes him. He approaches, unable to form words around the lump in his throat, and his brother (because that is his twin brother!) doesn’t react...?

He only gets a reaction when he finally reaches him and hugs him, and even then it’s just a jolt. To Emmet, this is stress inducing. No one had done this to him because they KNEW not to... But then he hears the voice, and he can hardly dare hope...

“Ingo?” he asks, and it’s then that Ingo sees Emmet’s face and realizes that he can’t see. “Has it been a year? No, this can’t be real.” Even after hearing Arceus itself, Emmet did hold some doubts...

But all of that vanishes when Ingo takes Emmet’s hands in his and puts them on either side of his face. A moment, a bright recognition from Emmet, and then 

“You are Ingo. No one else would have such a stupid hairstyle.”

And immediately as if on instinct “we are IDENTICAL!!”

Cue laughing and tears and the usual sibling squabbles. Emmet patting his brother’s hat and shoulders and discovering the rips in his uniform like “what did you do to your hat and coat?!” and just. General bullshittery!

I have no clue what would happen after that! They’d probably just go back to being the subway master duo, happy and good at their jobs lol

Whew that was a lot of typing. Take a sketch of Emmet in this AU that gave me a lot of trouble!!

Words I’ve had to seriously struggle to define when explaining to my sister-in-law and/or mother (a list in progress):

POG. - She was aware what “Play Of Game” meant but didn’t understand usage outside of sports.

Blorbo - After much stuttering we came to the conclusion that it’s “a character you really like.”

FML - After explaining what it literally means, I then had to quickly explain that it’s just a way to say “ugh, this sucks”.

Uncle Rick - This was actually done by my little brother who became incensed when he learned my mother didn’t know Rick Riordan was nicknamed that.

Isekai - I accidentally used this term while explaining the story I beta for and then had to Google it so I didn’t explain it wrong.

Rip - obviously she knew what “R. I. P.” means but i had to specify the nuance of just saying the word “rip”.

E - in reference to when people just type the letter “E” in people’s comments in streams. Specifically back when I watched Technoblade and Ranboo streams. I gave up explaining this one.

AO3 - the website. I just had to explain the whole concept of the website. It took like ten minutes.

RSlash or R/ - the YouTuber, and by extension, saying the thread out loud. This one was amusing because my dad was confused too and he spends hours on Reddit.

Beta reading - when I needed to explain why I couldn’t help with the dishes I was in the middle of something. After explaining, she was surprisingly lenient.

Oof - I struggled explaining this one a lot.

IRL - I really didn’t expect this to be a problem. It somehow took longer than you’d expect.

TL;DR - once again, really didn’t expect this to be a problem. Didn’t take that long to explain tho.

Anon - specifically in reference to asking questions on Tumblr. Had to explain it is not the same as QAnon.

Tags - I was talking about fics on AO3. This was what led to me explaining AO3.

Ratio - I’m still not sure she gets it but she doesn’t use Twitter or Insta much anyways.

Stan/Stanning - I’m also not sure she gets it but she claimed to and I don’t use it enough for this to be a problem.

Vibe - how do you describe the concept of vibe? Cause idk and my sister-in-law still doesn’t either. We’re both just winging it.

Slay - this was my sister-in-law trying to explain it to my mother. That was very entertaining.

I’ll reblog if another interesting one comes around.

NAYKT: Season 2 - update 3

Tag list: @mightnightmooon @thelittleautisticgirl

Like or reblog >>this post<< to be added to the tag list

“So what if we introduced a determination factor?”

“Not unless you want to blue-screen again.” Mad points to Google’s screen, tapping at a section of code, “It’d create an overload of unprocessable data.” he drags his finger down to a later part in the code, “But if you shifted it over here, changed it to an interpretation instead you would…”

Mad tapers off, but Google barely notices, staring at the code as he starts to see what Mad is trying to suggest.

“Process instead of pre-empt. Of course. And this would-?” Google stops as Mad nudges at his shoulder. Mad’s looking behind them and the droid turns to follow his gaze.

The door to the lab is open and in the doorway stands a weary-looking Bing. He’s slightly taller than when he left, maybe half-an-inch, and a darn sight scruffier. His hair has grown; Google isn’t sure he likes it. The most notable thing though is the look of shock on his face as he stares at the droid sitting at Google’s workstation, and the madman stood beside him.

“You should go.” Google doesn’t even turn to Mad as he speaks.

Mad doesn’t hesitate, quickly grabbing his jacket from the floor and  throwing it around his shoulders as he heads for the door. Bing takes a few steps forward to let the guy leave but otherwise just stands, staring at Google.

Google hasn’t forgotten what happened. He remembers with crystal clear clarity every one of Mad’s sins against them. He knows what Mad did to them, to Bing, and he has by no means forgiven him. He also knows exactly how this probably looks to the cyborg.

“I wanted to tell you,” Google starts, “I wasn’t sure e-mail was the right way to-”

“It’s fine.” Bing’s words are clipped, his voice tense as he glances away avoiding eye contact. Indication of deception. It’s not fine.

Silence falls between them. It’s been a while since they were in the same room and the air is heavy with awkward tension. With his old processor it would have been easy for Google to ignore it, mostly because he wouldn’t have noticed it, but now he understands the nuance of the discomfort between them; the unspoken anger and feelings of betrayal about Google lying by omission about Mad. It’s not pleasant, and Google doesn’t plan to let it go on any longer than he has to.

The droid stands, heading to Oliver’s workstation and pulling something from a drawer before he strides back towards Bing. The cyborg merely watches in confusion, even as Google stops and holds out a very familiar pair of orange sunglasses.

“What…?”

Google says nothing, patiently waiting as Bing carefully reaches out and takes them.

“You fixed them.” There’s surprise in his voice.

“We improved them.”

They’d found the glasses a few hours after Bing ‘woke up’ again. Snapped in half and abandoned on the floor. Bing had made some off-handed comment about having to get a new pair, but ultimately tried to throw them out. Naturally the Googles weren’t going to stand for that. 

Fixing them was obvious and relatively easy, reinforcing the repaired frames with flexible titanium would stop them being snapped again. The rest of the upgrade was Oliver’s idea and took significantly longer.

Bing turns them over in his hand. “They look the same.”

“Try them on.”

Bing opens them and puts them on, wincing as a bright orange light flashes in his eyes from the lenses.

“Ow!”

Each Google receives a message instantly, and if they’ve done it correctly, the message should be on Bing’s glasses lenses too.

[NEW USER IDENTIFIED]

[WELCOME BING]

[OLIVER] He’s back!

[RED] You finally gave him the glasses then?

[OLIVER] Does he like them? He’s not mad is he?

Bing tears the glasses from his face triggering a [BING IS OFFLINE] message to the Googles. The cyborg stares at the glasses in his hand before looking up at Google in astonishment. “What was-?”

“It’s connected to our network.” Google nods. “Partially anyway. There’s only so much we could manage in a pair of sunglasses. You can see status updates and send and receive messages.”

Bing looks baffled, “Why are you adding me to your network?”

“Well you are our brother.”

Google says it as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world because to him it is. There has been so much madness in the last year but through it all he’s realised that even when he lacked the processing power to truly comprehend it, Bing means no less to the Googles than any one of their brothers. Bing may not be a droid, but he is as much a Google as the rest of them and including him seemed so obvious once the idea had been pitched.

That’s to say nothing of the cyborg’s tendency to wind up in some sort of trouble or other. At the very least, Bing being able to connect to the network would make it easier to figure out when he needed help. No more waiting three days for Google to check the CCTV.

Bing stares at the glasses in his hands, speechless. This isn’t something he ever even thought of, never mind hoped or dreamed of. It almost doesn’t seem real. As he looks up at Google, a warm smile on the droid’s face, Bing’s shoulders relax and he surges forward, tightly wrapping his arms around his older brother in a hug.

“Thanks Goog.”

Google smiles, gently patting Bing on the head. After a moment he chuckles.

“Can you put the glasses on again? Oliver’s worried you fainted.”

Bing laughs.

It’s good to be home.

Previous | Next (coming soon)

Tag 10 People You Wanna Get to Know Better

tagged by @mu-qingfang-stan-account ty <3

relationship status: single (as in "too scared to try finding someone to date considering the state of queer rights here rn")

favorite colors: *james pokemon voice* its lavender (but honestly purple in all shades. my life have improved immensely when i started dyeing my hair purple and getting clothes to match)

favorite food: this is so broad uh... if its sweet stuff I gotta go with ice cream because whatever u want. it got u. and if we are talking about proper meal foods i think i gotta say chicken. shes so versatile what cant she do

song stuck in your head: oughh i cycle thru so many... i guess Leia (Rondo cover) came up a lot in the last few days

last thing you googled: spelling of some word, dont remember which. i often do this bcus im not confident in my spellings, esp with longer words, because I only learned them visually and that doesn't necessarily mean all letters or in the right order. wait i think it was resurrect, i keep forgeting if its two "s"s or two "r"s in there (yes i googled it again to spell it rn)

time: 13:40

dream trip: listen this is just gonna be sad if i answer it, so lets not

last thing you read: I'm currently super mega slowly rereading Scum Villain - like, taking notes every page slowly - so that's been going for the past month or so. If we're talking finished, then pipi's You Fei.

last book you enjoyed reading: I did enjoy Fei a whole lot! As usual, I'm a sucker for priest's ability to entwine some absolute clownery with so much subtle (and sometimes not subtle) heartbreak. Also the more I hear from my friend who branches out into BG cnovels/cdramas the more I realize how special a female protagonist like Fei is.

last book you hated reading: a danmei novel that shall remain unnamed bcus it was recced by a mutual. meanwhile i regret finishing it. the plot was such a friggin soap opera. literally almost Every soap opera trope. i'm surprised nobody's clone showed up, it wouldnt have been out of place! the ship dynamic was good so i finished to get their happy ending but. kinda felt that it wasn't worth it in the end.

favorite thing to cook/bake: gotta be meringues, as long as you know the perfect time for your particular oven theyre literally SO easy to make. and tasty. I like making blini too but they are kinda stressful because you gotta stay on them the entire time.

favorite craft to do in your free time: cross-stitch, it's somehow just the right proportion of mindlessness and engagement for me

most niche dislike: there's this special kind of annoying fans that make me dislike thing that they are fan of literally just because it becomes associated in my mind with their annoyingness. (I don't know how to explain every nuance of how they are annoying, but most often it involves being shitty about something else, that I already like.) And it kinda pisses me off not just on its own, but also on behalf of the thing they are fan of. Like - it usually doesn't deserve my ire! it's literally just the fans, and only some specific ones! But I can't stop my brain from cringing at the sight of the thing. ugh. So: hate it when this happens.

opinion on circuses: im more interested in the aesthetic concept of circuses than in any real ones.

do you have any sense of direction: yeah im pretty good with it, both in "reading maps" way and in "understanding where things are located relative to each other and alternate routes/shortcuts" way

tagging: god please I always forget every single person I ever seen or talked to when it comes to tagging. Literally any of my followers, I'm interested, I wanna hear about u, if you'd like to do this say i tagged you and go off

I have received a couple of asks saying something similar and I honestly don’t understand what’s that about? Please can you guys explain? When did I wish terrible thing on anyone?///

Please don't throw stones then try and hide your hands. You tried hiding behind faux-concern and sarcasm, but that's a pretty specific outcome from what you interpret as "jealousy". You're basically saying they deserve cancer for their negative feelings (plus, from a medical standpoint, that's not totally sound).

And I don't think everyone who's pointed out her connection to Chris as a reason she ever got to meet these people is necessarily jealous. 1) it's kind of true. 2) There seems to be this undercurrent of conflating her getting married to Chris and getting to meet these people with her overall skills as an actress. With all the talk of people getting ahead in life based on who they know vs talented people who don't have those connections who loose out in opportunities, I expected people to take a more nuanced approach to how they talk about this. But I guess not. 🤷‍♂️

Sorry it’s going to be a long reply because I am actually baffled at the audacity of what I have just read.

First of all I don’t try to hide anything or send messages that have to be read between the lines. When I have something to say I say it point blank. I think it’s pretty clear on my blog but I don’t know, you must be new here.

Like I said, I literally googled what were the medical consequences of jealousy and the first article I got was from the University of Rochester medical center. I did not make it up to be funny. Here’s the link :

So you saying ‘from a medical standpoint, that's not totally sound’ is a bit ridiculous. Unless you’re a doctor and have another theory, in that case, please educate me.

Another nonsense statement you made was ‘You're basically saying they deserve cancer for their negative feelings’. Don’t you dare put words in my mouth. I send my dad articles day in day out about how bad smoking is for him and how he risks having lung cancer if he doesn’t. Does that mean I’m saying he deserves cancer????? Of fucking course my father’s health is more important to me than the anon’s but I don’t wish them or anyone else any harm. I was showing them what they are risking for being so jealous about someone so insignificant to their live.

And finally, you again put words in my mouth and that’s really annoying. That specific anon was saying that Alba didn’t ‘deserve’ to be there or to meet big names like Scarlett and Stanley because she wasn’t in their league. That was a very stupid thing to say and -I insist- is only a sign of jealousy because she wasn’t there as an actress that Chris was trying to shove in front of their faces to maybe get her an opening or a role. In that case, yes what that anon said makes sense. But she was there as his (then) girlfriend/fiancee and no matter who was around that table, she had every right being there. So spare us the ‘but lots of talented people don’t always have connections to get the opportunity’, because IN THIS SPECIFIC INSTANCE, it doesn’t apply.

Can’t believe you want a man to keep his wife home for a dinner with friends because said friends are more talented than her in the job they all do.

I will not be replying to any more asks about this specific subject, I think I said enough and only made my stance clearer because some people MISUNDERSTOOD and were offended. In the end, I an only responsible of what I say, not what you understand.

haiii babydog!! i was wondering how you felt about this rentry??? https://rentry.co/IRLnotdelusional i wanted to know if it was wrong or harmful,,, etc!!!

they also had a carrd linked but i wasn’t sure if any of it was misinfo or harmful. sorry if this is against your asking rules and thank you!!

before i start, i just want to clarify that i dont really have an opinion on the word "irl" (as an identity) other than that its just really confusing and unnecessary. i only have a very slightly negative bias going into this.

i should also preface this post by saying that "irl" doesn't have an official coining that i, or anyone in any of my alterhuman circles can find or knows of. which is why we see people claiming it "is or isnt X," because nobody truly knows. the origins of this specific use of "irl" are most likely untraceable because we've been using "irl" as slang for over 10 years on the internet, and this alternate use came up within the last couple years

TLDR: 3/10. poor wording + a lot of commonly made mistake misinfos.

as usual, everything is under the cut, and no screenshots will be described because tumblr still won't give me the alt text editor

oh no... i really dont like this wording. "claim their delusions are real." eugh, it just. i really dont like it. most delusional people i've met on the internet double book keep enough that we recognize our delusions arent "real." at least, not to everyone, only to us. the way this is worded makes it seem like we're deliberately lying or trying to convince other people that we're correct, when this doesnt really happen. i know this is nit-picky and most likely not how they intended to word this, but thats how its worded and its just.. its not good it makes me feel gross.

so it's an unecessary re-branding of spiritual Otherkinity? also, psychosis can absolutely be spiritual. religious and spiritual delusions are very very much A Thing, as are religious and spiritual hallucinations

they talk about how psychosis isn't a disorder, it's an umbrella term for a bunch of symptoms, which is true. but they get the specific symptoms wrong though. the correct symptoms are hallucinations, delusions, catatonia, disorganized thoughts and speech (positive symptoms,) and negative or cognitive symptoms. social isolation and paranoia are not psychosis symptoms, but they can be related to psychosis in individuals. very accidental and small misinfo here, not deliberate at all

nit-picky again, but a lot of their wording about delusional people makes it seem like they really don't like delusional people which is sort of icky. they later confirm they themselves are psychotic so i really dont understand this attitude of "im better than other delusionals." the harm delusions cause isn't always apparent to the people living in them. while it's technically true that delusions must cause harm, we don't always know that. it's not black and white enough to say "if your delusions dont cause you harm you're not delusional" & be completely correct, so it's best not to say anything about it at all if you're not going to delve into nuance

there it is. i knew the Extremely Bad No Good part was coming... but i dont think i was fully prepared lol

canon divergent Fictionkinity isn't a symptom of delusion, holy shit. source much? most grandiose delusional people identifying as fictional characters actually aren't canon divergent at all anyways. infact, i'd say their identities are more stricly canon than non-delusional Fictionkin.

this type of delusion is not called a delusional misidentification. what the hell is up with these people and bastardizing DMS? it's. the wikipedia... it's generally easy to use google. if google isn't easy to use for you, you shouldnt be making educational carrds to begin with /gen. this type of delusion would be categorized as a bizarre/non-specified delusion, aka, miscellaneous. for the millionth time, delusional misidentification syndrome is an umbrella term which encompasses delusions that all follow a similar theme. delusional misidentification syndrome is not identifying as an anime character.

the bottom bit about recommendations for coping with difficult delusions isn't medical advice btw, so i'm not clocking it. it's more like self-help. whether or not its effective i dont know and i dont care, its not really important

yes! very cool. i agree with this. the acceptance and encouragement of delusions can make them worse or more difficult to treat in the future. acceptance should be viewed as a last resort in coping

this is the part thats so confusing to me. i've been saying "irl" (originally "in rl" btw) to mean "offline, real-life" for over 10 years. it's not "first an acronym for an identity." it just means in real life! it's not that deep! i really hope this specific usage for this term doesn't catch onto mainstream media ONLY because it's so fucking confusing

they close the whole carrd by saying that if you disagree with them its fine and blah blah blah

this is another nitpicky thing but a lot of the language they used is overly personable, which feels a little manipulative. like, i don't need your permission to disagree with you. you dont need to reassure me it's fine to disgaree with you. i dont need your approval, internet stranger. the overly personable language (through the whole carrd) makes me feel like they're trying to coerce me into something or convince me of something?

i dont think its intentional.. i think its just they way they talk - like im not accusing them of Literally Being Manipulative. but when you're writing educational carrds, it's best to leave Yourself out of it as much as you can. cuz now i feel untrusting about this carrd, which isn't what the author wants

Words of Experience

for @aro-sides-week prompt of Tertiary Attraction

Summary: Logan always assumed because they’d felt attraction before he couldn’t be aro. When a poetry discussion with Roman gets diverted onto types of attraction they start to change that thought.

/\/\

Attraction is weird. It's spoken about in so many bizarre ways that Logan is convinced society is trying to avoid anyone figuring out they might be aromantic or asexual. They'd spent years wondering if he could be aro but dismissing the idea purely because they know what attraction felt like and experienced it relatively often without the desires for romance that Patton had once described coming with a crush.

They were only illuminated to the nuances of attraction during a poetry discussion with Roman. Logan had been aware for a while that Roman is more intelligent that the needless singing originally had them believing but it was an interesting time to get revelations over how many types of attraction there are.

“For such beautiful words, I would give my all to a woman like this.” Roman sighed as they discussed an Emily Dickinson poem that Logan had been struggling to understand the sentiments of.

They had blinked for a moment before stating, “Roman, you are gay. Why are you implying some poetic words would attract you to a woman?”

“It's not romantic attraction, Logan. Clearly it's not, but are you saying you've never spoken to someone and just wanted to be around them more, or seen someone and without any lust or desire wanted to know them?” Roman exclaimed, forehead creasing when he registered their processing face.

They only replied a few moments later. “I thought that is just what attraction is. Do you mean that there are different feelings to the attraction if it's romantic?”

“Yes.” Roman nodded, lips pursed and debating. “What experience with attraction have you had?” He asked cautiously as if unsure the question would be welcome.

It made them thing carefully for a while, curious and concerned over being able to describe the attraction they had felt. If it hadn't been some level of romantic or sexual attraction, then what might they class it as? “That man from your theatre group; I was attracted to him for the reasoning traps and attentiveness that was needed to hold a conversation without being made a fool of. Oh, and I was attracted to Emile for a while, though that was short lived given his propensity for cartoon references. It was his intellect and knowledge of psychology that attracted me then.” Logan began explaining, trying to remember other occurrences of attraction.

“Intellectual attraction then. I'm not sure how I'd label an attraction based on poetry, like the one I referred to for Miss Dickinson, perhaps charismatic.” Roman suggested, nodding. “If it's not prying, have you actually wanted to date anybody before?”

Logan paused again, feeling like everything Roman was saying gave them a cause for self-evaluation they hadn't been away needed doing. It was frustrating to be asked this specific question though, simply due to how close it came to their revelation over there being different types of attraction. “I don't know!” They snapped, scowling, “How do you know about this?”

“Remus got fascinated by tertiary attraction a while back, left a few google searches open on my laptop after stealing it which I read through. He's now decided to make jokes over any type of attraction he feels being sexual.” Roman easily replied, shrugging a little as if that wasn't a big deal, “Besides, I've been trying to figure out the types I feel most often.”

They nodded, taking a few deep breaths since the attempt to make it a fight wasn't risen to. “That seems to be a reasonable decision. I'm going to endeavour to interrogate the attraction I experience from now on, but  had not understood there are different types of it prior to this conversation.”

Roman nodded again, eyes tightening a little as he looked Logan over before offering, “Would you prefer if we refocus on Dickinson's poetry?” He offered.

“Of course, thank you.” Logan agreed, looking back to the book between them. “I have to say, these likes don't seem loving, despite the poem being reported as a love poem. They seem more to describe symptoms of indigestion.”

Roman leant back, hand to chest as if scandalised. “How dare you! Those are describing the nerves of getting your heartbroken.”

By the time Logan reached home that evening, their head was still spinning with thoughts of attraction and desire. They'd barely taken in any more knowledge or ideas about poetry from the discussions with Roman but for the first time weren't bothered over that. The afternoon was far from wasted when Logan had learnt such important information.

They might soon be certain over a label to use other than queer and it was more than likely to be aromantic.

Vidalia Onions

There’s a sale on vidalia onions.

When I worked in the produce department my boss told me they were her favorite kind. Sweet, she said. I should give them a try.

But I think I will leave with generic yellows.

It’s not that he didn’t love me, or that I couldn’t have loved him, or that we didn’t have a certain sort of relationship, he told me. It’s that he knew I was never going to give it a chance.

Overly reliant on archetypes, one on the list of reasons I have yet to make anything great. Your writing has feeling—beauty, even, when you work at it—but when are you going to make us think? When are you going to surprise us?

I put the vidalia onions in my cart, walk around the store with them, picking up this and that from my list.

He married someone much older. Us barely into our twenties and her pushing forty. He called me once, a few years in.

I miss you sometimes, he said. You understood me.

I didn’t know how to take it. Was he sincere? Angry at his wife? Getting overwhelmed by their differences and finding me an easy ear for his problems? He was drunk, anyway. I heard it in his voice, could’ve guessed it by his words. Even if he hadn’t been, I would’ve done what I always did, which is nothing.

Too many years had passed. What did I care? Yet, that mild annoyance—I had answered the phone, hadn’t I?

So your protagonists are too stagnant for too long. People aren’t like that. People are dynamic, and readers want to see change.

I am standing in the middle of an aisle googling what to use vidalia onions for. Onion rings, the first result. I am not someone who likes onion rings. But maybe this is the ingredient I’ve been needing to change everything. Maybe I am someone who could be someone who likes onion rings.

There is something rosy and warm in knowing what to expect from a person. I did not try to love him—he was right about that—but we knew where we stood with each other. I couldn’t comprehend why it grew so complicated from that.

He had a girlfriend for a while when we were in high school, still in the center of it all. And I did nothing wrong, barely so much as spoke to him when they were together, but I was to blame when it ended anyway. The first time he said he loved me was not to me but to her.

Nothing good comes of hot food left to linger. At a county fair, I was saving a basket of onion rings to share with my sister. I waited 40 minutes for her to come find me at the picnic table. When she arrived they were slimy and soggy and I forced down too many that would soon force their way back up.

I backtrack to the produce section, put the vidalia onions away after all.

Resolution, another weakness. Where is your story going? And what is the point?

Generic yellows. I’ll make a stir-fry. I like stir-fry. I’ve made it many times.

My best friend talks about the complexities of her romantic entanglements, the subtle shades, so much nuance. She tells me that there are so many people to fall in love with in the world and so few of them are the right ones. This discovery makes her somehow more adult than I am.

I remember telling him not to wait for me, when we were young. And he didn’t, but he didn’t give me the shut door I wanted either. So I watched him mostly-move-on through the crack.

I could’ve met someone, gotten married myself. I could’ve blocked his number. I could’ve, at the very least, let it go to voicemail.

As I pick out a few yellow onions, I remember working in the produce department, shelving dozens and dozens. How many times did I take a box from the back, put it on my cart, push it out to the stand, empty the box, throw it away?

Cyclical. I think that’s all love amounts to. Something building, cresting, crashing. Something that you work to get over until it starts up again, maybe in a different place, with a different person, to a different extent. So I’ve skipped over it.

Stagnant water is a breeding ground for bacteria, my friend says.

I am too afraid of risk. Too unwilling to try. I do nothing to encourage the growth of good things, nothing to stunt the growth of bad ones. I ruined him, he told me, by doing nothing at all.

I see that I will not achieve greatness. My work falls flat, molds in its stillness.

I am nothing if not predictable.

Agnosticism Now!

Okay, so I did the dumb thing and argued with somebody online, and now this is a brain worm that I can't express in the tiny blurbs of that particular social media. The following is my long-winded brain dump on my opinions and why I chose the label I did - Hi, my name is Shawn, and one of my adjectives is Agnostic. The argument is over what label I should use to describe my faith/lack of faith. They think I should call myself an "agnostic atheist" where I say just "agnostic" is the better fit. (in their defense, I did say something a bit atheist, but in mine, they're allowing NO ROOM for nuance or paying attention to the fact that I said I don't know for sure). The point of this blog is to get this brain worm out of my head so I can move on to other things. This is self-care. The brain weasels must be appeased or I can't function.

(Not sure if the images are uploading... If not, please refer to the google definitions of Agnostic and Atheist.) First lets treat it draconian - to be agnostic you MUST believe that we will never know if there is a god/gods and we can never know- this is the core to it. Atheism therefore is a staunch belief that there are, for sure, no gods. Well, neither fit me then. But even so, Agnostic fits better if I HAVE to have one of these labels and combining them as suggested I feel takes too much from there might be- but now we're getting into nuances. If you have to BELIEVE in either no knowledge or no god, I fit neither, and tacking on "agnostic" to atheism is kind of disrespectful - IF we're being draconian of the definitions. If we allow nuance, which is how communication and words work - it's how humans work - then Agnostic is still the better fit for me. If I believe there's a god sways with mood and experience. Sometimes I think it's more likely, sometimes I think it's less likely. The only thing I am firm on is that IF there is a god of some kind, they are uninvolved and do not care. That's the only thing I am certain about - and even then, I sometimes utter a, "if you're there, if you care" kind of prayer to the void in hopes that MAYBE I am wrong and there's something out there more powerful than me that maybe gives a shit how things go. But I BELIEVE there's a god about as much as I believe maybe there's a leprechaun who will hear me and decide helping me is worth their time... So yet again, the biggest factor that defines me is not being sure.

Catching me in an atheist moment does not an atheist make! Who I am and what I think just doesn't fall under the strictness atheist people have told me they have (YMMV). Atheism is almost it's own religion- a religion of science and human understanding - but there's a blind faith in the men telling you what to think and know a lot of the time- you aren't peer reviewing papers if you're just some dude, you trust they aren't lying to you and add it to your science faith. I tried that with Christianity for years, and another thing I'm certain of, that I can say I BELIEVE is that some people are fucked up and will try to control you or sway you for their own gain. So even if "true" atheism allows for thinking there COULD be a deity of some kind, I cannot wear that label. That label wants too much from me that I simply don't have. I don't have faith in mankind, and I'm not about to review every single study or test myself. I am very comfortable in admitting I don't know. In admitting that I trust people about things blindly because, well, I'm lazy by nature and like to think that MOST people are good, or try to be. So anyway - no, stranger on the internet- I am not an atheist. It means too much, the label is too heavy. Also, their comparison with "do you feel the same about unicorns" is preposterous, even as an argument to support themselves. What are we arguing here? My belief in magical horse creatures, or the definition of the word? Because if we want to get nit-picky about words, then I'm still right when I say words evolve and are twisty - while the definition of unicorn is more unified in people's minds than god, or religion - do you picture them with cloven hooves? Does their horn twist? Do they have a tail of only hair, or is is more akin to that of a cow? Should we defend our opinion of what it means- or should we allow that other people may think differently than us and that is costs us nothing? If we woke up tomorrow in a world where a large percentage of the population wanted to make life decisions based on their belief in unicorns, and there was no proof one way or another they existed, AND I had to pick a label to say if I believed in them or not, AND there was a word that acknowledged uncertainty - I'd pick THAT word for me. Because by part of what they are being magical, then I can't be certain, and having ideas on which is true shouldn't cost me the label of uncertainty. I don't understand why what I call myself matters SO MUCH to strangers on the internet- especially when I clearly understand the definitions, and the nuances, and hurt no one or even "lead them astray," to use a phrase I only hear from Christians. We're all making this shit up and until we all agree, the words aren't solid and even if we agree now, they might change. Why invest? If you read all that, have an internet hug. I've no delusions that my thoughts matter to people who don't already care about me, I'm not important, but I'll keep talking in case it provides comfort to others, or just makes them laugh.

If you're a friendly atheist, and you think there MIGHT be a god, but are pretty sure there isn't, so you call yourself an atheist - if you like that label and not mine - that's okay! You're valid too! You aren't hurting me by disagreeing with me and we can still get along. Guess my adjectives is a series now...