#like I'm just having the worst week but then I logged on and saw an ask about my favorite subject and then it was just like
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Were Zack and Henry Disney Channel kids or Nickelodeon kids growing up (if the channels exist in their universe?) Because I personally feel like Zack would quote SpongeBob and sing the songs unironically. (Also prank calling Ray and asking Is ThIs ThE KrUsTy KrAb?)
Oof, I’m kinda botching this new friendship already, aren’t I? 😬 I sincerely apologize, I’m kinda going through stuff right now so I haven’t logged on in quite a few days and I had everything running strictly on a queue. I would also like to once again apologize for the amount of words I’m about to spew out for such a simple question and I thank you immensely for continuing to indulge me despite the fact that it takes me a billion words to get to the point 😅
I love love love this question, but I feel like it can get a bit tricky with the amount of crossovers that have existed on both channels. But before I get into all that, let me just say first that YOU GET IT! I’ve legit thought about Zack quoting Spongebob to Henry multiple times. Like, it’s just fun to think about them both growing up with it, but while Henry kinda grew out of it after a while and really only watches it if like, Piper’s watching it or something, Zack still kinda does regularly. So, Henry recognizes the references from the earliest seasons, but Zack can quote scenes from the latest seasons that just go straight over Henry’s head 😅 (and then Zack is facepalming because Henry has essentially ruined the joke by forcing Zack to explain it lmao)
WAIT, WAIT, THIS JUST MADE ME THINK OF SOMETHING FUNNY (well, funny to me anyways) but, I have this HC that I carry over to basically every universe that's basically, Zack knows how to play guitar and he often does so just like, as a hobby, so I just got the image of Hen and Zack in their shared apartment and it's one of their date nights where they decided to just stay in, and they had a little picnic on the floor, and it's all intimate and cute and romantic, and Zack pulls out his acoustic guitar and ofc Henry thinks he's gonna play like, one of their songs or like, a love song or something and Zack even strums a few chords to make Henry think that but then he just dives straight into the Campfire Song Song, and then Henry literally just gets up and leaves the room at that point (but, he does come back a few seconds later to sing along, because, well, you have to. It’s in the lyrics. Also, Henry’s just used to Zack’s antics at that point, he finds them endearing. and it’s not like he hasn’t pulled his own shit during the course of their relationship. it’s another thing that makes them so compatible.) (they’re idiots to idiots in love)
But, anyway, back to the original question; like I said, it gets tricky with the liveaction stuff because of all the crossovers and even,,, reusing actors, so it’s kinda hard to say like, what would be just a tv show in this universe. It’s a little easier with the cartoons I’d say, so I don’t really mind saying they exist as tv shows but like. Even with the Loud House, since there was an episode with j*ce and Cooper like,,,,, would Zack just make a joke about “hey that character kinda sounds like you” ??? who knows
But, since Suite Life had crossovers with Hannah Montana, That’s So Raven and Wizards then I would just assume that would rule those out as being just tv shows. (although, sometimes i do forget about the crossovers because I thought about Zack finding out Henry’s secret, and being the little shit that he is is just like “oh. so you're just like Hannah Montana :)” but then I remember he like, sort of knows Hannah Montana alsdjf but then that opens up the possibility of Hannah actually existing as a popstar in this universe, and Hen just being like “are you trying to tell me you know Hannah Montana? Like, the popstar Hannah Montana? Best of Both Worlds Hannah Montana?” and Zack just being like “yeah! She ate cake off my sweater vest once :)” henry, after several seconds of silence: “are you messing with me? I feel like you’re messing with me. You’d never wear a sweater vest.” Zack: “this coming from the guy who still tries to convince me he met Bigfoot” “I DID MEET BIGFOOT”) (yes, I’ve thought extensively about this conversation)
But, even with like,,,,Phil of the Future. I mean, technically I could say that’s just a tv show but since Brenda Song was in it for a bit like. Do Hen and Zack just think her character has an uncanny resemblance to London??
There was an episode of HD where Hen and Ray were watching Drake and Josh in the Man Cave, so I could see both of them being fans of that show when they’re kids. And I know both Nathan Kress and Jerry Trainor were guest stars so that might make it a little tricky, but I’d also like to believe that they (meaning Zenry ofc) enjoyed iCarly and also enjoy the reboot.
I can’t believe I’ve never thought about Zack pranking Ray though. Like, I’ll be super super honest, I cant stand Ray, and I’m so SO close to just straight up making him the villain in one of my AUs that I kinda project that hatred through Zack a bit. Because, Zack sort of only sees the damage that Ray has done when it comes Henry, with basically throwing him into crime-fighting at just 13 and not really training him or giving him any slack when it came to Henry trying to figure out how to balance that world with school and his social life and whatnot, and even just the trauma Henry would face with like, losing his superpower in order to save the world and just,,,getting his ass kicked all the time. And since Hen is basically Zack’s world, he’s just,,,,,not really a fan of Ray; he basically tolerates him when he has to for Henry’s sake. But, I love the thought of him using prank calling as a way to get petty revenge lmao. Like, ofc it doesn’t really do anything, at best it just confuses Ray and maybe drives him insane/ruins his day, but. Any way Zack can get minor revenge on him is enough (also can’t stop thinking about henry catching him in the act one time and just being like “are you prank calling Ray again? 🙄” Zack: “👀 No. That was………Cody.”)
Anyways, I’m sorry, I feel like I just rambled on forever in the most incoherent way possible and didn’t even answer your question 😬 but this was still super fun to think about anyways 😅
#asks#literally saving my life with these asks#like I'm just having the worst week but then I logged on and saw an ask about my favorite subject and then it was just like#'actually the worlds okay :)'#i'm aware of how pathetic that sounds lmao#also that's not to pressure you to keep sending them. just saying it's appreciated when you do!#I always have so much fun rambling about them#I know you kinda gave your thoughts in the ask but if you have anymore I’d love to hear them!#like I know I love rambling about them myself but I also love having discussions with friends and hearing their thoughts too :)#If you have any ofc. No pressure either way 💕
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Weathering Your Storm
22!F1 grid X female!driver!reader
° Venture your silent sea
Part 2.2
Words count : 2.3k?(excluding the texts).
It's finally done!
Warnings : grammar,not edited, not proof read.
*it's long and packed , and I hope you enjoy reading it .
F1.grid masterlist
...............
Two weeks gone by and now she had her mind was made , she had her time to think and evaluate her career in new light away from the pressure of actually driving and having her view clouded with the rush of her hectic schedule with no time to breathe . So she took a step back , not complete letting go of hope but to process what she's doing and what to come .
She went off the grid but her dad as always found his way to her , not that she minded but she felt the weight of thinking that she failed him somehow , he didn't say anything after she told him what went on that weekend , expecting some sort of a grand reaction but he just looked at her and asked " are you okay?" She wasn't sure how to answer but she shrugged " I don't know yet" , he nods and went on with collecting firewood as they were doing before she stopped abortly to tell him not expecting this , it was like ripping a bandaid and I felt like one .
Hours later they both sat at the fire side by side in a content silence, she took a look at her father finding him lost in thoughts staring at the fire ahead and before she could stop herself she asked " are you disappointed?" He glanced at her hunched form , knees up to her chest and her hands around them , he saw that little girl trying to act tougher than her heart is . He asked back "about what?" She gave him a quick glance picking a dry branch to doodle on the dirt before her " disappointed in me" he scratched his growing stubble in thought " and why would I be?" She cleared her throat " you know, I basically got fired mid-season with no seat for next season or even a chance in the reserves " he gave her a knowing look asking bluntly " and why would that make you think I'm disappointed in you?" She rubbed her forehead " cause I feel like I failed " he gave her a long look , gathering his thoughts and turning in his foldable camping chair " I already told you , and I'll keep on doing so until you accept it. You are never going to disappoint me, I'm beyond proud of what you've done and what you'll ever do because I know how hard you worked to reach where you are now , and with a seat or non I'm still proud of you . Yeah I'm saddened that you won't be out there driving to your heart content for now but it's not your last race" she cuts him " but you don't know that, so far no team reached out and they know how chaotic it'll be to give me a seat , they won't take the chance , not after this" giving her a shrug he kept going " I just know , the same way I knew you're destined for great things when you drove your first race , hard headed and determined, holding your head high and beating all those taller boys with their mean dads" they both chuckled at the memory, as he added " it's will take time " she lowered her head " but what if I never get any seat ? , what if I got a seat and it turned up worse than last year ? , what if I stopped racing?" He sighed heavily before answering " for the worst and the best cases I'll be there for you , and if you wanted to quit I'll still support you and still be as much proud of you , it's your journey to fulfill it the way you see fit and no matter what remember it's yours so don't let anyone or their words or decisions makes you forget that . You hear me ?" She nodded in understanding giving him a determined smile as he ruffled her hair up laughing as she groaned in annoyance smacking his hand away before pulling on her cap and tying her hood up covering her head and pulling the strings to secure it around her face .
Both basked in silence watching the wooden logs crack in the fire but got startled as his phone pinged with a new message
(from Max's pov 🤭):
He chuckled quietly cause her to raise an eyebrow in suspicion " What got you laughing?" He shook his head turning off his phone before leaning towards the fire his elbows on his knees and he turned his face to her in a serious manner " have you thought about what I proposed?" She nods with a groan " I did and I might take your offer " he gave her a knowing smile " it's only till you get a seat and it might be sooner than you think , but you'll have fun and still travel whenever you want aaaaaaaaand" she tilted her head in question earning a huff from him before he explained " you'll get to be your own boss !" She gave him a side eyes " if it's soo great , why are you dumping it on me? " He leaned back and crossed his hands behind his head sighing dramatically " I want to live my life too, I'm still young , I'm going out to date again , find me a ...." She cuts him with a disgusted face " DAD! Ew no ! I don't want to know about you romantic life , last time was traumatic enough!" He laughed at her face throwing a punch of dry leaves at her " oh ! Grow up, be grateful I'm not snooping into your nonexistent love life!" She gasped in offence " Wow! Just wow! My own dad is bullying me!" She stood up dramatically ", you know what!? I quit! Find you a new person to run your business" he held his hand to his chest as he kept on laughing " I didn't even hire you yet!" She only groaned louder sitting back down and chucking a wrap paper at him as he kept laughing, joining him eventually as the both spent their night with her relieved that a weight is off her shoulder.
°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°
Two days later
Settling back home in Monaco after your trip turned you back to the stressing atmosphere, as days gone by and it now settled in that you've got no seat for the rest of the season, let alone next season or the one after . Getting back home was both the best and worst thing to do right now . Still got piled stacks of paperwork to do , piled forms to sign and things to move , but staying in your bed looked more appealing than doing anything else so that's what you choose for now .
The news is yet to spread , but it's only a matter of time before it gets leaked , your face blastered on every sports site and every gossip magazine , you can already see the headlines . the slander and rumours of why would a team like Mercedes suddenly drop their driver mid-season ? Speculations and allegations of every absurd theory under the sun would make appearance , But that's for future you to worry about, now you just want to sleep in and let shit happen .
Glancing at your phone on the bedside table , having it turned off for the past two day after ignoring calls and emails asking about your whereabouts . It'd only take sometime before someone figured out where you dipped to or Danny might fall under pressure and snitch on you and come barging in dragging you out of your so called hibernation . You made a note to come up with a way to tell the guys later . telling them rather than them finding out from media or worse George himself , so you gotta make the most of the quite atmosphere as possible.
But That didn't last long , half hour later and someone's already bounding on your door , opting to ignore it as whoever is knocking is bound to get tired or think noone is here and leave . But that didn't happen , 10 minutes and they won't leave , you huffed removing the pillow off your head and getting up shoving the covers aside sliding out and blindly heading to see who's trying to break your front door down , throwing on the first thing you found on your way out , one of Danny's old hoodies you've stole and claimed as yours , covering your messy hair with the hood and trying to wipe the sleep out of you eyes , Praying silently to every higher power there is to not be one of the guys .
Groaning quietly as whoever is knocking covered the Peep hole ,so after contemplating for a second before swinging the door open startled by who stood before you , he smiled at your stunned face " you're a very hard person to reach Y/N " you kept looking at him in confusion before snapping out as he asked" would you mind if I came in? " .
•••••••••••••
~~~~~~
The guys showed up as promised all concerned about you but as well relieved to finally see you before them , easing their minds for moments as they anticipated your words .
They settled in around after dinner , no one was joking around as usual or starting a conversation, all waiting for you somberly to say what's in your chest as they waited patiently , Daniel gave you a reassuring smile squeezing your shoulders as he sat on the single chair by the window along with the rest , all except lando who kept shaking his leg up and down nervously so you decided to put him out of his misery as you stood before them " I just wanted to wait to tell you face to face instead of you finding out from the media or someone else, well , I basically no longer have a seat " they looked at you in silence still not processing what you've just said, so you elaborated " I'm no longer part of the grid formation" the first to respond was Max who shook his head in denial " No" you sighed at his response , next to him was lando looked at you in guilt not finding the courage to say anything in fear it'll make the situation worse so he opted to keep his mouth shut , Carlos was spacing out so you opted to let him process it more before snapping him out , Charles looked very confused as he asked " why? " , you shrugged at him sitting down as you spoke again " I honestly don't know, they wanted me out and here I am " Carlos snapped at this " what about your contract?" . You shook your head " already terminated " they all looked bewildered , various " what!?" Sounded around the room " they already signed another driver for the second half of the season " Charles whispered " you're not even finishing the season?" You shook your head in answer .
Max stood up hands balled up and shoulders tense " who signed?" You refused to answer so he looked at Danny who sat back not having the same shocked reaction like the rest of them " you knew , so tell me who they signed for that fucking seat?" He looked at you before turning to him in defeat " It's not my place to tell " max scoffed at him before turning to you again " why ?" You glared at him " cause I know you won't hesitate to go up and fight him over it , I won't let you do something that stupid " he challenged you " well whoever that bastard is he deserves what's coming for him" you pinched between your eyebrows " No Max, he doesn't" he tilted his head asking " so you just give up to him , you've worked your ass for them and now they just swiped you aside and signed someone else!" Charles stood trying to calm him " Max, hey , calm down for a minute " he ignored him , still irritated so you know he needs to get it out so you let him " I'm not calming down! Why should I ?" Carlos spoke up next " cause you are not the only one who's upset about it " Danny agreed " we all are beyond pissed believe me" you added next " but you have to remember 'never take anything personally in this sport' , yeah i lost my seat so what !? It's not like It's the end of the world " and before he could argue you stopped him " here's the thing all of you can be pissed as much as you want here in this room you can scream and yell as much as like to get it off your chest , but the moment you step out it stays here , cause out there it won't affect you as it'll me , I'm already out so what can they do more ? , But you're not, you still got your season to finish, so you have to promise you won't do anything out there because I won't be there to smack any sense back into you brains " .
He stared back at you folding his arms challenging you " I won't promise you anything until I know who is he " you glared back not fazed " I won't tell if you won't promise " you both started each other down before Carlos groaned smacking you both to cut it out " fine I promise!" You gave him a deadpanned look " George" Charles asked with wide eyes " Russell!?" Daniel nods " the one and only" Carlos turned to Max who got eerily quite compared to earlier " Max ?" He just nods curtly before sitting down not uttering a word for the rest of the night .you clapped after a beat of heavy silence " so! , who's up for desert?" .
#f1#f1 x driver!reader#f1 x female driver#f1 x female reader#wys#weathering your storm#f1 x reader#22!f1 grid x reader#max verstappen x driver!reader#daniel ricciardo x driver!reader#lando norris x driver!reader#charles leclerc x driver!reader#carlos sainz x driver!reader#max verstappen x reader#charles leclerc x reader#lando norris x reader#Carlos Sainz X reader#Daniel Ricciardo x reader
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I'll say the admins' decision that purgatory 2 is as canon "as the ccs want it to be" is awful and going to cause so many problems.
I think it's perfectly fine to have CCs choose to be out of character for their own lore because then they don't have to commit to rp all the time, but you absolutely cannot do this with the MAIN plot of the story. One of the main reasons is that not everyone will pick and choose what's the same as canon.
A perfect example is just a few days ago, Phil was involved in a main story point of protecting Luffy who escaped. Luffy told Phil that he was looking for Tubbo/Bagi, and of course, because Phil was not informed of anything going on, he told them that they went back to purgatory. Even though Bagi and Tubbo said their purgatory isn't canon. So now imagine Phil is panicking about Luffy not finding the people he's looking for only for tubbo or bagi to show up randomly and confuse the plot even more.
I will say that I don't really care about how the story should be perfectly consistent because I know that's impossible, but it's more about how it's ruining the rp choices of others. Phil did such incredible rp stressing over how everyone left for purgatory again, but for them to show back up without a care or explanation? Undermines all of his emotions and effort into making it feel real.
Another point is how it's effecting the CCs efforts for consistency. Tubbo gets kidnapped IN FRONT OF HIS FRIENDS EYES, but logs in the next day and gets attacked by a code. So now you face the confusion of either believing he was taken and how that effected the characters rp around him, or believe that the code is back as a main story element. You can't believe both because they directly contradict eachother, so you end up wasting a good plot point for another. For example, Fit has canon separation anxiety and seeing tubbo go missing in front of him could have made for good character development.
Baghera was asked to stay off the server for the past few weeks because the admins had lore planned out for her. She expressed that she missed being on and seeing her friends but trusted in the admins that her return would be worth it to wait for. So some characters are allowed back and immediately cause inconsistenties but some people have to wait? It sucks for CCs like Baghera, Slime, and Pol who express how they want to get back on but are committed to their lore. But I also can't entirely blame the people who came back from purg2, even though I do think its a bad rp choice on their part, because the admins specifically told them they could.
Finally, the worst part is how it demeans the story being told. Imagine after purgatory 2 ends all the people coming back could talk about the hell they went through, the people they met, the fate of Cellbit and Baghera. But instead Bad's "1/4" came back and immediately told Pomme he saw Baghera. Isn't that lame? Doesn't that feel like a waste of good exposition? Hell even Foolish was there and just chose to ignore it because, hey, there's no canon reason he should know that!
That's the problem now is that no one knows what to tell eachother anymore, because it will only be inconsistent with what others are saying or doing. The stories is slowly losing its integrity because it's doesn't know what is important to take seriously anymore. Should you worry about the code attacks? I don't know, it happened to someone who wasn't even technically there. Hey I saw this missing person but I'm also supposed to be missing too, so should you even believe me?
It's confusing, it messy, and it will absolutely ruin story lines down the road.
I love the story of the QSMP. It's what drew me into the server and made me love it ever since, and to see it get pushed aside for a competitive event really sucks. With the way the server has been so rp and lore dependent for the last nine months, it just feels so strange for it to not be the focus anymore. Purgatory was fun, Purgatory 2 looks even better, but I would not trade them for the fandom toxicity, story inconsistency, or divided attention on gameplay it created.
I know with time the story will pick up again, people will return, and it'll be well throught out and planned again. I just think it's important to be critical of these decisions now so they don't get repeated in the future. If there ever is a Purgatory 3 or some other event, all I would hope for is that it has a clear and defined plot revelvancy so you don't have to scramble to tie up all the loose ends later.
#qsmp#qsmp liveblog#qsmp thoughts#qsmp analysis#qsmp crit#im gonna tag this with crit not neg because i dont mean it negativitly#and i think its important to see why the frustrations are there#this like my fifth essay on purgatory in the last month#im losing it dudes
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Do experience systems do more harm than good?
Earlier today I saw someone talking about the common wisdom that you can't make an RPG without SOME sort of system where after you finish a session (or maybe an adventure), the GM gives you some sort of points that, whether automatically or based on assigning them, makes your character better at doing stuff. Not only do I strongly disagree that that's something every game needs, I'd like to present the argument that even in games you'd have a hard time imagining without them, experience points might actually be doing more harm than good.
Before I even get into this, let's take apart the obvious perks to having experience systems:
1- It helps maintain longterm interest in keeping a campaign going when the players are getting some sort of regular reward.
This is true of certain campaigns, but I don't think I'd really ever want to be in one. In a good campaign, everyone involved should be having a fun time just hanging out with each other, putting themselves in the shoes of the characters, building up a story and a world together, and generating cool memorable scenes. That should be more than enough incentive to stick with a game, and if you don't have those things going on, you should really stop and work out what's going wrong, not try and pave over it by powering everyone's characters up. I don't need to boost some Watcher Score when I marathon through a good TV show or a movie, and I'm not even getting to influence how those unfold, you know?
This is also one of those many things where what we have today is sort of a twisted ghost of what was originally conceived back in the early days of D&D. I had an old project on this very blog where I was reading through the books for 1st edition AD&D with a critical eye, and a huge takeaway from that was that Gary Gygax seems like he was just the absolute worst kind of GM (also backed up by reading message board posts of his, and various accounts). Back in his day, leveling up wasn't the expected inevitable progression as a game went on necessarily. You'd roll your stats, with some harsh restrictions, be forced to play what you had, roll your HP too, and the game was just kind of inherently hostile to the PCs, so you had a good chance of dying in a given session. Not only that, but when you did, there was no real coming back from it, you make a new character, starting from scratch, with 0 experience, and see if you can keep this one alive long enough to get up there again.
And aside from the carrot of maybe getting one of those elite high level characters if you stuck with it, there was the stick of characters partying their gold away. Seriously, by AD&D 1e rules, characters would just kinda burn through... I want to say it was 100 GP per level per day. And not in-game day. Real life day. You'd better show up for every session, because a week from now, your character's going to have 700 less gold in their pocket whether you show up to play or not.
We don't really play that way anymore. At least nobody I know does. Leveling up is planned out in advance by GMs, characters level up at the same time as everyone else even when the player misses a session, and if you need to make a new character or you're just joining the game late, obviously you come in at the same level as everyone else. I don't even want to dignify the arguments against doing that with discussion. It's even common for people to start games at levels other than 1 because people just don't like low-level play.
And you know, this is way outside the scope of what I was sitting down to write, but I've gotten into the jobification of video games before, right? Where people keep doing stuff like daily login rewards and weekly challenges just so there's a sense of obligation to log into games every day? That crap doesn't actually make things more FUN, it's in there to keep players compelled to play regardless of how much fun they have, and that's... literally the argument behind experience as an incentive to keep a game running.
2- It good when number go up!
Funnily enough, this is the hardest one for me to refute. There is some basic direct release of the good brain chemicals when you have numbers, and they go up. And I mean... sure, but in a tabletop game you're not generally seeing a number climb on its own, you're getting points thrown at you that you have to jot down or mark off or otherwise track and do math with, and like... there's plenty of other results from playing the game good to release the good brain chemicals. You don't explicitly need this one.
3- It's cool when you can have a story where like some dorky little kid starts off barely able to do anything and all unconfident and then gradually gets it together and gets more confident and competent as time goes on!
Oh yeah, everyone loves that sort of thing, and there's a strong case to be made that this is the primary reason people feel the need to put an experience system in basically every RPG, but those systems are all kind of just the worst at actually delivering on that, is the thing.
D&D and its derivatives are the absolute worst with this. The way I put it in this earlier conversation, you start out all, "I am a poor peasant child, barely able to afford the clothes on my back, a length of rope, a week's worth of food, and this dagger here" and then a few months later "I am basically a god and any amount of money less than 1,000,000 times my starting net worth isn't even worth stooping over for." And when I made this point someone corrected me that if you really go by the expected pacing, a campaign without big stretches of downtime between adventures with the recommended combat pacing is going to get you to level 20 in a month.
Now, I don't want to completely spit on the D&D power curve here (the economic one though can absolutely go to hell, stop making me a billionaire as a side effect of killing monsters and do all that bookkeeping). I do enjoy the eb and flow, campaign to campaign, of playing the same characters as wimpy little nothings and demigods over however long it takes my regular group to finish a campaign. But as far as having characters with arcs to them? It is AWFUL!
First off, it's just too damn fast and abrupt. When our little ragtag band heads off into the swamp to deal with those goblins or whatever, we're going to come home from even that little speed bump of an adventure tougher than all our neighbors and absurdly wealthy, to a point where it feels almost inevitable that you leave your old life behind completely and look down on everyone you grew up with.
It's not IMPOSSIBLE to have some sort of long or medium-term personal quest to avenge my parents or show I'm better than some bully, but it takes a real delicate touch to do it right, since you really have to decide up front when exactly I'm going to have that confrontation, make the villain something of an appropriately challenging nature for the level I'm going to be when I settle things, and that I don't manage to arrange that confrontation much earlier or later than planned, because again I'm pretty quickly going from dealing with food rationing, animal attacks, and slippery ravines, to taking down monsters four times my size without breaking a sweat, to like changing the course of history and rivaling evil gods. There's a very small window where it makes sense for me to get back at that owlbear who put me in the hospital or whatever.
And that's not even getting into the problem of how I've got these other three humble little kids from home experiencing all this rapid growth at the same time. Can't really have a wise old mentor if we're using experience as experience. We're either never going to catch up, or we're going to leave them in the dust if they're not leveling with us.
Now, again, D&D is kind of a huge exception here. Most RPGs I've played instead go with a starting setup where you don't start off as some starry-eyed youth who can't do anything, but instead have some skill-based system where every character is an expert without peer in a handful of skills that fit some archetypical theme, and for anything else, they need outside help, either from fellow PCs, or making arrangements with NPC experts. Standard with this is a little drip-feed of extra skill points, but this... really doesn't work for what we're looking for here. If I want to be the party's hacker, I'm going to start off as an excellent hacker. I'm not going to put all my points into shmoozing people and then expect the rest of the party to put up with me looking for the any key over a dozen adventures before finally working out this make or break ability.
4- You gain new abilities as you level up!
So... first off this actually isn't generally all that true. If you're playing a wizard in D&D, sure, every couple levels you get access to a new tier of spells, and hey that's a big game changing deal maybe. Most level-ups though are just about numbers going up. All of them in most games. Hitting harder, more often, in bigger areas, maybe. Skills and abilities work more consistently. You maybe get more HP.
For now though let's focus on when you do level up and get cool new abilities. One moment you're some kid with a stick, then you bonk the magic number of goblins with it, and now suddenly you can make all your friends fly, unbound by gravity, or you can read the thoughts of everyone around you, or you can teleport home where it's nice and safe no matter what the situation. Well that actually really sucks for the GM!
Let's say I'm doing what everyone ever making an 8 or 16-bit RPG did and lifting plot concepts shamelessly from Laputa. We've got our big floating continent. Maybe we've got some kinda evil emperor up there, raining terror down on people or something. Nobody can get there and confront him... until they hit level 7 or whatever and have access to the fly spell. I better get any air superiority based adventures out before then. Also anything where there's a tower that has windows, or dangerous terrain, etc. Better get mysteries and hidden agendas taken care of before that mind reading. Better not think about trapping the party or them getting word of an attack somewhere else before that teleporting. And that's assuming I'm being on the ball about that sort of thing. I might have this whole thing planned, where the party desperately needs to get to that flying continent, and it's this whole quest hook where maybe they have to befriend a dragon or help build an airship or get some kinda rubber bones potion and access to a powerful cannon. Whole adventures about getting that power of flight, and any of these might just totally fizzle because oh whoops, the party leveled up and they just do that now.
Less dramatically, what if we're playing of those skill point games. I'm already a super great seductive femme fatale sneaking past laser sensors and stealing keys off people I'm charming right from the start of the game, and hey, cool, that's a nice simple archetype, everyone knows what I'm good at, we can plan missions around me being all sleazy over here while someone else sets up in a sniper position and someone else is in the basement hacking and all that. Several adventures down the road, well, I have all these skill points, I haven't been able to put them into the stuff I'm good at, so now I'm also a combat monster. The original combat monster can also hack. The original hacker can also charm the pants off everyone. We're starting to develop a lot of redundancy, but that's not necessarily bad? But then we play a bunch more adventures. Those secondary concepts capped off, we're working up more. Nobody is unparalleled at the thing they originally did. Have the party is equally amazing at a given thing. If we keep going like this, eventually everyone is going to loose all sense of unique identity, and there isn't really a strong in-game reason we need this whole ragtag crew anymore. Anyone of us can take on any problem solo, really.
5- The power fantasy of being super amazing.
This is kind of a point I've already hit but I'm stuck with this format, but the thing with experience is, again, sometimes sure you gain new abilities, but usually all your various numbers go up, and that actually kinda sucks in practice. First off, it's a lot of tedious bookkeeping, in basically any system you can name. It also doesn't generally really make a difference in the grand scheme of things?
I'm level 3. I've got a +7 to hit, doing 15 damage a hit, and an AC of 18. I'm fighting some orc with 40 HP, 15 AC, and attacking at +5. I level up a few times. Now I'm level 7. I've got a +13 to hit, doing 30 damage, and an AC of 24. I'm fighting crustaceanoids now, with 80 HP, 21 AC, and attacking at +11. Objective numbers wise, crustateanoids are way way tougher than orcs, but in my experience this is the EXACT same fight. I hit on an 11. I need 3 hits to take something down. It's bad news for me if my enemy rolls a 13 to hit me. All we've done is a bunch of annoying math refactoring with nothing to show for it but cosmetically reskinned mooks.
Now here, interestingly enough, I ONLY have the D&D type example here. Again, most other RPGs I have don't have that same sort of rampant power creep. You start out absurdly skillful at whatever your specialty is, and there's little if any room for growth, numbers wise. So here, if we go from orcs to crustateanoids to hellborn cyberdragons as enemies, not only is this technically a set of progressively scarier enemies to have to deal with, they actually ARE more meaningful threats to the party. Maybe those orcs were all show, they never really hurt us because we're awesome secret agents or something, but now things are getting serious because these crustaceanoids are just as good at sick flips and firing machine guns in two different directions as we are, so we have to take them much more seriously. And oh damn, after this we have to deal with a hellborn cyberdragon? Those are so scary if we all just rush in we're probably all gonna die. We need to come up with a whole complex plan to avoid directly engaging that if at all possible, and run for it if that doesn't pan out, or something.
And hey, we don't need something even more epic than a hellborn cyberdragon to top that. One of those is still going to be harrowing no matter how late in the campaign we bust it out. We can establish a power balance early on and keep it relevant like that. PCs gotta get more innovative and clever not just kill most monsters until demigods are easily punchable.
6: Revenge of 3- Well character growth is still important!
So, I really shouldn't be trashing experience points' ability to deliver cool character growth if I don't have some alternative to it, right? We need some way to change things up so the game doesn't stagnate. Well sure, but we can do better than experience there.
Just off the top of my head, how about we go with plot relevant respec-ing? Like at any given time a character's got their main spotlight thematic kit. Your best of the best at being a hacker or wizard or whatever. Maybe also a secondary skillset. And then definitely some number of slots for stuff they're into but it's not their main thing. Maybe we have a few variant minisets for those. Like if someone just unlocked their psychic powers and haven't fully figured them out, you have access to this here set of abilities. Once you have your big dramatic power mastery moment, that becomes their main thing and we demote their previous main thing to a secondary thing... and if we don't like this psychic stuff in the end, we demote it back down and fill a tertiary slot with like Lost Psychic Powers, where you still get to be all knowledgeable about how this sorta crap works and maybe have some battles of wills but your cool telekinesis is all locked away. At least for now.
I don't want to sit down and fully design a game at the tail end of a blog post here, but feel free to try this out with whatever system you like. Just pick whatever level feels like the good one, build characters with that as their basic kit, let'em have a few dips into secondary and tertiary angles, do a lot of getting thrown out of orders and taking major injuries and getting temporarily possessed or infused with mystery things. And you can do the plucky young kids in over their head thing with this sort of system easily enough. Start off with just the tertiary interest/mini-skill-packs, and once whatever you want to grow into starts coming up, rapidly grow into that over the course of a few adventures, no needing some big dramatic status quo change like this usually calls for.
Oh and I haven't been talking about video games here, but kill experience there too. If I'm not doing the whole Metroidvania/Zeld'em Up thing to pick up new powers as I explore, just gimme the whole kit from the get-go. Have traditional difficulty curves. We're good. Leave the skill trees and the level-grinding out of it. What are you holding back for, replayability? It's been raining free big-name big commitment games for years. Quit demanding that much of our time.
Oh and I keep forgetting to beg for money while I write these. I went 24 hours here without eating because I was just out of food and couldn't afford to go to the store. Someone took pity on me and hand delivered a big bowl of soup. Things are getting real bad. Patreon link.
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There was a theory a while ago I saw that the eggs weren't meant to last this long and was meant to help them/spy on them originally but because the players cared so much for them and protected them, they lasted.
And with the way that the new tasks and sweets are it seems that they want the eggs to die again. But if they wanted that why give them their lives back before?? And what was the point of adding Chunsik if he's just gonna die in a few weeks. It's just forcing the players to have to be on everyday again and starting on a week when a lot of them can't/won't for their own mental health/social life.
Like even Em's admin thinks it's unfair and she's gonna die because Bagi's not here the rest of the week, Mouse and Tina are variety streamers that have the awards this weekend and Niki basically only streams once a week. Like the best bet is that Mouse logs on in the next few days because she doesn't have to physically be at the awards as a vtuber so has no irl 'obligations' to hang out with friends like Tina. But Em also needs to be awake because all of them need the 'baby' to be there and she's sick and slightly burnt out after today so might not be up for the constant dungeon tasks they get - the admins are tired, what about the players who also have other responsibilities and irl lives aswell.
There has to be another option. It's the perfect mix in that it's bonding tasks to get the sweets but it's the worst way possible. If they can't be on to do the eggs tasks or can't do enough of them do you think they have the time to be doing bounties to be able to pay the extortionate price for emergency cookies?? And at least with the original cookies you could get massive excess to help each other but now like Philza would be able to get barely enough to save Chayanne and Talullah nevermind help out Sunny while Tubbo's dead. And yes BBH is addicted and bound to do them all but he won't have excess enough to help Leo or Pepito if their parents don't log in or Chunsik if Acau can't complete enough on Sunday. They're gonna have to lower the amount required especially if it's still that non-parents have to feed double because that's impossible with only 36 tickets/18 cookies available this week and 42/21 in a normal week since they skipped Monday. It would just be slightly better if the tasks weren't dungeons but collecting stuff still and they all lasted till Sunday night.
Apparently Chayanne's admin has said that everything will be fine but knowing all this information it was fucked from the beginning so there must be a lore reasons and nothing bad is going to happen because if Em permentantly dies from being "lassoed and beaten to death" in a split second and "neglect" (because her parents have busy irl lives for one week) I'm deleting everything and it would be on par with Trumpet dying from "neglect" which was in no way Maxo's fault and I wasn't even there for that one.
#obligations in quotation marks because she wants to hang out with her friends she doesnt see a lot irl#and it would probably feel weird to have to abandon them in the middle of the day/play all day#to get tickets so her minecraft child doesnt die#trying to not say id kill myself#we just got canon autistic ace Em and if she dies im gonna delete all my qsmp art and sketches i want to finish#everyone else id be mad but theyd be fine because eveyone else has two lives#i feel like i had more to say but i dont remember#tw rant#qsmp#fuck the bunny and capitalism
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GUYS DONT PRESS P ON THE TITLE SCREEN WORST MISTAKE OF MY LIFE (Dev log #15)
AT LAST, SUMMER IS HERE!!!!! I am so excited I can finally rest I- oh right. Summer classes. Sigh. Well, they don’t take up the whole day thank god and I don’t need to be there, but It’s still not exciting. Oh well. Maybe I’ll play the sims 4 again and check on how my poor little torture victims are doing/j Jk jk, I don’t torture my sims. Unless you consider naming them things probably EA wouldn't approve of, then yeah I guess I am a horrible person.
But yeah, on the week I released the demo (which by the way, thanks for the 58 views!!!! thas crazy) I was putting up with finals. Some of my classes had to be pushed to the next week, and that was INFURIATING. It was kinda agony because I just wanted everything to be done and over with and I was practically exhausted. Like sleeping at 7 pm exhausted. Yeah......Well, should I even talk about how my life is going? I flunked the review for my major. Thank god, honestly. I mean, I didn't do it on purpose, and I am sad in a way that I flunked it, but I didn't want to continue on the route I was going on. I feel kinda stupid for even trying but I guess it's ok to make mistakes in your early 20's rather than your 30's... for some reason.
Ok, dev time. I decided to take a break from making sprites for a bit. So I worked on a part of the game that I would have left a secret, but I think it’s quite funky hehehe
I like old computers. I would have replicated the windows XP thing because I have so many memories of it, but I'm scared Windows might snipe me or something. I once was lying on the couch my parents turned into a bed (I think I was sick at the time), and it was late at night, and the computer was shutting down (it played this sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb2jGy76v0Y) and for some reason the noise absolutely scared the absolute living shit out of me (I think I was like 4-5 years old and I was terrified of bassy sounds). I do not remember ever having any positive relationships with computers before I turned 6 lol. I’m pretty sure I used to think I could live without them. Oh you poor bastard. If you saw me now not only would you not understand a single word I’m saying, you would be incredibly disappointed with how dependent I am on computers. I think once I'm done with that I'll try to fix whatever is going on outside scene, because that's the only scene that causes the game to crash. I'm pretty sure it's because there's too many objects, because when I turned off the animations and the visibility it still took forever to load (like, nearly 2 seconds. The scene takes 4 seconds to load, and normally a scene would take me less than a second to load). soooo, uh yeah, I'm trying to find an occlusion culling equivalent to solve this because that's a 3d game thing, and this is a 2d game lol. I'm thinking of turning off visibility for when they're outside the viewing frustrum (player's line of sight, or more like rectangle) because it cuts down half the time for when the scene loads. If nothing works I guess it's just deleting and re-adding the child back into the scene every time the camera is on them... sigh. If it ticks me off too much I'll probably return to doing sprites because there's still a lot to do lol.
Well.... I so far got no other ideas for references in this game, so I guess I'll put in the inspiration of the outro (which is the Portal outro)
youtube
(not my video)
I know, I know. Cheesy. BUT instead of it being in the antagonist's view, it's the protagonist's view instead. I tried singing for the song, but every time I do I make Jojo Siwa sound like a professional vocalist (I don't even know why she still sings. Didn't she bust one of her vocal chords already? Or is that a rumor? Either way that's already gotta be a sign that you probably shouldn't continue on the route you're on.) I literally had 5 attempts on my computer and they all sound horrible. I'm not going to put them on the internet for my sake and your sake too. So yeah, no vocals. But the lyrics will still be there. They won't have the typing effect though.
I once had a strange dream that I was looking through the itch.io comments and someone kept spamming about how they headcannoned Xandra to be a trans man and were like honestly I don't know how my brain combined those several factors together but I find that funny.
yes its the caseoh meme. no i will not apologize
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Brand new Susan's Hell Sprint snippet incoming
Log of Susan Adams, written December 1st, 1973
Aunt Dot passed away in October. Unfortunately, it wasn't really a peaceful or natural death. Well, I don't know about the peaceful aspect. She drank an entire bottle of wine, then wandered out into the woods and fell asleep face down in a roadside puddle. Someone heard her dog howl in the woods and found her the next morning.
It's a strange feeling, to know she's gone. I enjoyed Aunt Dot's company. She was a small, chatty woman with once black hair and freckles on the bridge of her nose, a sweet, gentle soul with a great appreciation for life in all its forms, and a great storyteller. She always had a lot of ghost stories from the valley she lived in - she had this house she built in the fifties, in the middle of the woods, near a lake. The place looks like it's straight out of a fairytale, especially in the mornings, when the fog looks like spirits wandering through the long grass and spindly trees.
After Aunt Dot's death it was me who inherited the house.
I had been there before as a child, two or three times. It really was a beautiful house, but one that left you with a somewhat uneasy feeling when darkness fell upon the valley.
And I had the worst dreams of my life in that house.
There wasn't a single night when I did not wake up sobbing at some point, calling out for Aunt Dot until she came running over to the guest bedroom to calm me down. What happened?, she would ask. What did you dream about? And I would curl up, a shaking mess, and stutter something about a burning house, or a woman in red hanging upside down in a tree and staring at me, her burnt cindered face twisted into a grotesque, horrifying grin. Those nightmares were freakish. That's why, eventually, I stopped visiting and she began to stay with us in the city every summer.
Before selling it, however, nostalgia got the best of me, and I decided to return one last time. For old times’ sake. I think some part of me just wanted to see if it really was as spooky as I remembered it. Morbid curiosity. It's a little bit silly.
But anyway, I traveled to the house. I planned to stay for a month; I ended up staying for a week. I dug through the house, found old photographs, postcards, notebooks, letters, all kinds of memorabilia. I immersed myself in the history of that house.
In the end, I left it unsold. What I found creeped me out too much.
But back to my visit. I arrived in the nearest village on the evening of October 26th, a week after Aunt Dot’s funeral. I planned to go to the funeral, but I didn't get the day off at work. I quit my job after that, by the way. I'm currently looking for another one.
The weather was terrible. It was gradually getting darker on the train ride, and by the time I arrived it was absolutely pouring. Murky knee deep puddles stood on the roadside and rainwater ran down the streets. The emptying trees stood in the dark like starved giants. There were only a few lights on in the village, and out by the woodside I saw the flickering orange glow of a lonesome window.
I was thirsty and to be honest, a bit lost, so I walked into the nearest pub to look for directions. The place looked like time had stood still there for a long while. It was mostly empty, but it was still early in the evening.
I sat down at the counter and the friendly bartender poured me a beer. “So, why are you here?”
“I’m uh, Susan, the niece of Dot Wilkins,” I awkwardly explained, cleaning my glasses on my shirt. “I inherited the house and I uhhhhhh wanted to come visit it.”
“Oh dear, poor Dot. She was a lovely woman.” He shook his head in disdain. “Such a shame, what happened. Where are you staying?”
“Uhhhhhh the house in the valley.” I laughed nervously. “But I don't really know the way, it's been years since I was here.”
The bartender tilted his head and leaned forward. “Between you and me - you're going to have a hard time finding someone who’ll accompany you to that house after dark. There are a lot of stories about that place.”
“Oh.” I hesitated, running out of things to say. “What now?”
“You could ask Rory. He really doesn't have any issues with going there.”
“Rory?”
“He lives down by the woodside. Bit of a strange guy, but you can trust him. He actually got along quite well with your aunt.”
“Oh, that sounds nice. Is he coming here?”
“Oh, he's here every night. One of my favourite patrons.”
“That's nice.” I awkwardly played around with my sleeves.
The door opened behind me and a gust of cold air entered the pub. The bartender's eyes lit up. “Speak of the devil, there he is!”
I turned around.
Rory was a tall and slight young man in a green turtleneck, who would have looked like a girl that looked like a boy if not for the slight ginger stubble on his chin. He had shoulder-lengthed flaming red hair, with bangs so thick they completely covered his eyes. His nose was Roman, his cheekbones sharp and he had dimples, and I think I fell for him, just a little.
“Hi Stevie!”, he greeted the bartender and grinned. His sharp teeth gave his smile something foxlike, just the tiniest bit uncanny, almost like a snarl. “How's it going?”
His voice struck me. It sounded like birch trees in the wind, like green woodpeckers calling to each other in the treetops in the mornings, somehow light and deep at the same time, young and old, timelessly classy, somehow, inexplicably fascinating.
“Hi Rory. Same as usual?” Stevie reached for a glass and grabbed it as soon as the young man nodded. “Not much special. Say, would you want to take a walk out to Dot’s house tonight?”
Rory tilted his head. “Tonight? In this weather?”
“This lovely lady here is Dot’s niece.” Stevie patted me on the shoulder. “She inherited the house and she's planning on staying there.”
“Oh dear.”
I smiled nervously. “I have to admit, I'll most likely sell it. I visited a couple times as a kid, but I always get nightmares in that house, so…”
“Hm.” Rory sat down next to me and folded his hands, his rings clicking. “Why'd you come here then?” He must've seen how anxious I was, because he quickly added: “Sorry, I'm not being hostile, I'm just curious.” He chuckled.
I shrugged. “Nostalgia, I suppose. I haven't been here in years, but it is kind of a childhood memory, so…”
He nodded. “Ah, I get that.”
The rain came down like it was the end of the world. We sat in that pub and talked and talked, and laughed and laughed, until finally it was almost midnight and Stevie wanted to close the place. Shuddering, the two of us found ourselves in front of the door. When I looked up I saw barely illuminated droplets fall out of the void that was the night sky.
“Alright,” Rory said and smiled at me. “Let me just get my jacket at home. You can come along.”
“Thank you.” I awkwardly trundled along down the street. The lights in the windows became fewer and fewer, and when we reached the last house on the street it was almost pitch black.
“Maybe I should get a flashlight as well,” Rory suggested and I laughed nervously. “Sounds good.”
He clicked his tongue and pulled his keys out of the pocket of his jeans. With a slight ta-chick he opened the door. “You can come in for a moment.”
I stepped inside. It was warm and comfortable. The corridor had green wallpapers and a faded movie poster from fifty years ago stuck to one wall. Rory grabbed a scratched up brown leather jacket and grinned at me. His white teeth glinted in the dark. “I'll go get the flashlight upstairs. Be right back.”
“Okay.”
I awkwardly waited while he jogged upstairs. I listened to his footsteps and him mumbling something under his breath, then rummaging through what I assumed was a drawer. Then, finally, I heard a triumphant “Ah!” and then he came back downstairs.
“Took a bit of searching,” he explained. “Let's go.”
The wind roared quietly in the treetops when we set foot into the forest. I was glad that I didn't pack more than a backpack for the trip. Carrying an entire suitcase along would have been an absolute disaster.
“So, how come everybody's so spooked by the valley?”, I asked after we had walked in silence for a while.
Rory glanced up. His damp hair stuck to his face, completely hiding his eyes, but he didn't bother to brush it away. “Ohh, that.” He chuckled. “It's a long story.”
“I think we have time, don't we?”
Rory smiled. “I suppose we do. It is a ghost story though. What are your thoughts on ghost stories?”
“They scare me. Though I think that's the purpose, haha.”
“The valley has set the scene for a lot of tragedies in the past two hundred years or so,” he began. “Over and over, people died here. Sometimes quietly. Sometimes with a bang. But they died, over and over, and for all kinds of reasons. Drowning, falling from trees they climbed, freezing to death, burning to death, murder - of course -, the list is long and, dare I say, creative.”
“Oh.”
I hesitated when I saw something white flickering among the trees. When we got closer I saw that they were ribbons tied to a wreath of flowers. Rory paused.
“Is…this where it happened?”, I asked.
He chewed his lip. “Yeah. Shame, really. I liked your aunt. She was a wonderful person.”
“Yeah, she was.” I felt a bit lost for the moment. “Did you know each other well?”
Rory continued walking and I hopped after him. “Everyone knows everyone here. Though, I suppose you could say we were friends. Personally, I believe it was our mutual lack of respect towards the valley.” He chuckled. “She was never afraid of whatever is going on here. She had many stories to tell about it.”
The flashlight hushed across an opening among the trees. We were leaving the woods and stepping into a field.
Rory pointed into the distance. “The house is over there. Do you see it?”
I squinted and barely saw the contours of it, like a pale giant sleeping in the long grass. “Yes.”
“Well, then let's go.” He smiled.
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Hi, Annika. I just saw your last post and I wanted to check in and see if you're doing okay. I am sending you my best.
jesus christ this is two months old, i am so sorry. thank you so much for checking in on me, it's honestly so nice to log in to see. i appreciate it so much. i'll just put explanation under a cut because it's all just a lot. you don't have to read, but at least i can use it to dump my brain for what's been going on, because i don't have anyone to talk to about it.
but ily for caring about me, i truly was scared to log in and find that no one had noticed i was gone and that people just forgot i existed.
so basically, my dad was in the hospital with a blood clot in his eye at the beginning of december, which fucked up his sight a lot. and everything was just so heavy with christmas being the worst time of the year for me, and then on top of that last year was absolute hell for me so i just fell heavy into the depression.
then on january 4th or sth my dad had another blood clot in the brain, which brings us to the ninth blood clot in his brain in about two years. this time around was the worst hit so far, and he now needs so much help. so i'm basically his primary caregiver again. he has a nurse that comes a couple times a week, and social health workers coming every day to make sure he eats, do some cleaning, help with stuff like laundry and such, which is a huge relief. but there's still so many other things he can't help with, and that all falls on me. like going to his hospital appointments with him because his memory and eyes are basically worthless at this point.
on top of that my depression is just getting worse and worse. except for when i go to help my dad, i don't see anyone socially. my dad never asks me about how i'm doing, how my life is, or anything like that, neither does the rest of my family. i only hear from them when they ask about our dad. so i am more or less just a tool for them.
and tumblr just started feeling like such a negative place. most of what i saw was people telling others what they were allowed to like and not like, and if you didn't adhere to those rules you were told you were a monster. and most stuff i saw on my dash seemed to be new things i didn't have the energy to engage with (i still haven't watched wednesday even though i was so excited for it). and it was a lot of all the bad crap happening in the world, and tumblr didn't feel like an escape any longer, it just felt like it was amplifying my depression, and speaking into the catastrophe thinking side of my OCD and anxiety, and it made my intrusive thoughts hit a level i honestly haven't experienced before, and i was genuinely afraid of myself.
and i'm just exhausted. the past three months i have been in bed when i haven't been doing stuff for my dad. the only thing i have for myself to keep me sane atm is running twice a week, yoga once a week, and song lessons once a week. the support person i got switched to after my old one quit is on sick leave now, so i have a temp, but i can't really talk to her because all of my shit is just such a heavy baggage and i don't know where to start, especially since i'm hopefully only seeing her for another month.
i'm just tired. if i didn't have cas to take care of, i think i would have asked my doctors about options for psychiatric hospitals for a while. i feel like a zombie most of the time, and i only keep going because there's not really any other alternative. so i guess that's that.
at least i was able to work things out with my vet bill, and i'll be paying the last installment next month, and cas is strong and healthy as if nothing happened.
also, i'm using pedro pascal to cope.so that too.
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every time i come back to fandom spaces - like, the concept of A fandom at all - it seems like everyone is just so... hostile.
and yes some of the things that people are getting riled about are legitimate concerns and stuff, but it seems like everybody is just at each others throats more and more. feels like fandom is less a community and more a kind of label that some people present as some army rank or something.
i dont know. there's just something really sad about it. to log on and see shit like "if you think the princess would ever dare to wear a PURPLE 🤢🤢 skirt instead of the PINK one she is always seen wearing then you should kill yourself and i mean that genuinely." all the time. from all fandoms. from fandoms you didnt even know existed. from fandoms youve been entrenched in for years.
over the last couple of weeks i had started to wonder why i slowly felt less and less comfortable with being in fandom territory over the last 10 years, and i saw a post today talking about how tumblr itself is generally just hostile in the worst way and it clicked. it isnt really a fandom specific issue, it just happens to be prominent in fandom. it's not just a tumblr issue, or even an internet issue though. people on a day to day basis talking to their friends make jokes that are genuinely so aggressive and violent; there's some level of normalisation at play. i'm not sure where it comes from. there's something to be said about how it probably isnt healthy that we're constantly surrounded by news of Yet Another Moral Failing somewhere in the world, how there's a latent anger at everybody and anybody in every direction.
i'm not saying we're in the wrong to be angry at the world. i just think its sad that we've turned art and appreciation into a battleground for some reason.
fandom used to have rules like "dont yuck someone else's yum" and a whole litany of other phrases. but now everyone is just hostile all the time. it sucks. makes me want to stay far away.
#srs09:m:haix#suicide tw#<sprry i forgot that tag#idk im just. sat in my thoughts on this one#its why ive been so quiet especially on the fandom front lately#i cant talk to anybody about the things i like because everyone has something negative to say all the time about innocuous things#to be clear this is just about how ppl attack eachother over literally insignificant things born from personal interpretation#and not a commentary on where the line should be drawn for 'acceptable' vs 'unacceptable'/(un)ethical content#edited to add a readmore bc i figure nobody really gives a fuck anyway bc this has been discussed a lot lately in all fairness
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A Kiszka Carol
@safety-sam posted a while ago about reading something like this, and now that I'm home for break I actually had time to write it! There were about a million paths I could have taken this down, but I like how it turned out and I hope you do too :)
POV: Jake makes the decision to work over the Christmas holiday, and has his eyes opened to what's truly important
It had been a long day. Maybe a long week. Screw it. December had been the longest month of Jake’s life. The album was being finished, and despite the rest of the guys heading back to Frankenmuth for a much needed break, Jake had decided to stay behind in Nashville to get as much done as possible. And just to add a log to the fire, Jake’s lack of presence at family Christmas had sent him into the worst twin argument there had ever been. Even Sam and Daniel had gotten involved, and both Jake and Josh had shot words to each other that were neither holly nor jolly. So when he got home from the studio in the late hours of Christmas Eve, he had dozens of texts from his family saying they missed him and that they wished he would just set work aside and come home. He sighed to himself and set his phone on the bar, pouring himself a drink and heading to the bedroom, clicking off the lights on the way. If he had been at home, the hallways would have been lined with Christmas lights, but his Nashville apartment was starkly contrasting. He tried his best not to think about everyone gathered in his parents’ home, singing carols and being merry. Blocking it from his mind, he stepped into the shower and let the hot water run over him, his exhaustion quickly creeping in. Maybe it was the whiskey, or perhaps it was the hours he had just spent in the studio, work still unfinished, but there were hours of tossing and turning before Jake finally made it to sleep.
Suddenly, Jake shot up in bed to the sounds of yelling coming from outside the door. His brows furrowed in realization: somehow, he had woken up in his childhood bedroom, and he recognized the voices as those of his parents. Surely this was just a dream, but somehow it felt so real that Jake felt the need to bring his hand to his face, lightly slapping himself to wake up, to no avail. He stepped out of bed and opened the door, creeping down the stairs to listen to the heated conversation happening in the living room. “Samuel called last night, he isn’t going to be able to make it back. He said work is just too busy right now,” Jake heard his mom say, sounding defeated. “So what, we only have two kids home for Christmas?” His dad shot back. “No, I already told you, Ronnie couldn’t get a ticket home. So it’s just Jake.” What about Josh? Jake thought to himself. “There is no Josh here.” Jake jumped and looked to his right, noticing Daniel next to him. But it wasn’t quite the Danny he knew. He was dressed differently, looking ethereal in his own way: Dressed in all black, yet almost glowing- otherworldly, perhaps. “What the fuck, Danny? You’re here too?” Jake questioned. “In a way, yes.” Jake took a moment of silence, still trying to wrap his head around the situation he had found himself in. “Haven’t you figured it out yet? You have to see what you really have, Jacob,” Danny continued, Jake still looking completely lost. Danny huffed and continued explaining, realizing that Jake was too stunned to put any pieces together. “You didn’t go home for Christmas this year, right? You stayed behind to finish the album. And that started a fight with your brothers…” Jake nodded. “So I’m here to remind you of the amazing life you have. And maybe,” Daniel gestured to the scene continuing to unfold at the bottom of the stairs they stood on. “You’ll get a glimpse at what life would be like without.”Jake felt a shove from behind him, spinning around to see… It couldn’t be. Jake saw himself walking down the stairs to his parents. He looked different, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. All he knew was that the man he was looking at wasn’t him. “Okay, so that’s me,” Jake glanced at Daniel, who nodded. “Without Josh?” Another nod. Jake gulped, nervous to see what this dreamland had to show him. “Wait,” the other-Jake said. “I’m the only one here for Christmas?” “I guess so, Jacob. Apparently your siblings didn’t see this as a priority,” his mom sighed, sinking into the couch. Dream-Jake pulled a phone from his pocket- “Well, I’ll come back after my show and we can do gifts and dinner, I guess.” His parents nodded and he made his way out of the house, Daniel following and turning to Jake from the bottom of the steps. “Well, are you coming or not?” The lump in Jake’s throat grew as he thought of what else he was about to see.
The pair reached the front door and stepped out into the Michigan cold, and Danny turned to face Jake. “Well this is where I leave you.” “But you said we still have more to see?” Jake asked. “You do, but I won’t be the one joining you.” Suddenly Jake felt a hand on this shoulder, turning around to see Sam standing behind him. Much like Danny, Sam looked slightly different as well: he was clean-shaven again, with long hair, and his outfit consisted of a plain cream colored jumpsuit. “Dude, what’s up with you guys coming out of nowhere??” Jake jumped. “Perk of the job, am I right Daniel?” Sam laughed. “You know it,” Danny smiled, snapping his fingers and instantly disappearing. Jake slowly blinked, accepting that understanding what was going on would not be something he could wrap his mind around. “Well then, let’s head out, shall we?” Sam asked, putting his arm out for Jake to take. The pair suddenly flashed their way to the town music store where Jake had spent many hours growing up. “Larson’s?” he asked Sam. “So I need to pick up something for the band?” Sam didn’t answer, just shaking his head and leading Jake into the building. The “other Jake'' stood behind the counter, re-stringing a guitar. A few customers milled around, but the store was otherwise quiet. A man who Jake recognized as the owner of the store joined him behind the counter, handing him a piece of paper. “We’re down for this quarter, Kiszka. We need to start making more sales if you want those paychecks to keep clearing,” the owner told him before stomping back off into the office at the back of the building. “God, this is depressing… let’s speed things up,” Sammy mumbled, raising a hand. Jake looked around the room and watched as customers and himself moved around at high speed. Sam noticed him watching and grinned. “Pretty nice, huh?” Jake nodded, still trying his best not to think too hard about how any of this was happening. Sam lowered his hand, bringing things back to normal movement. The office door opened, Jake’s boss poking his head out. “Why don’t you head home early Kiszka, I’ll close up here.” Jake watched himself pick up his phone, assuming he would be calling his mom. “Hey, Kyle,” Jake heard himself say. “I’m off of work early, so I’m heading over to the bar now.” “The bar? On Christmas Eve?” Jake mumbled, following Sam to the door. “Just you wait, my friend,” Sam replied as Jake braced himself for their new method of travel.
The bar in Frankenmuth was where the guys had played many shows at the beginning of their career, before they started touring. It was a great starting point, but they had all been thrilled to move on to bigger venues with more enthusiastic fans. Jake and Sammy stepped in to see the usual group of Frankenmuth residents in the dark and dingy space. Jake turned to the small stage, expecting to see his brothers there with “him”. “Wait, what the hell?” He turned to Sam, confused as ever. “Do you not remember, Jacob? There’s no Josh here, so…” Jake’s heart dropped into his stomach looking at the scene unfolding in front of him. The “band” was composed of himself and three guys he went to school with, rather than his brothers. They began playing, but the energy was nowhere near the level of energy the band usually had, even then. “No offense dude, but y’all kind of suck,” Sam laughed, shoving Jake, who was white as a sheet next to him. “Yeah,” he gulped. “I think I’d rather…” He began another comment, but stopped himself. “No,” Sam said, “Say it, Jacob.” “I want to say I’d rather have no band at all, but I have a feeling you’d show me, and I don’t know if I want to see it…” “Well at least you’re catching on, then.” Sam smirked, holding his arm up again to take Jake to their next destination.
Jake opened his eyes to see a building where he had spent far too much time as a teen. “We’re at high school?” Jake furrowed his brows. “Yes, you actually never graduated. Without your little brother to help you with your homework, they held you back.” Sam said, his face dead serious. “Jake gulped. “Not actually, but that’s my last joke you’ll have to put up with,” Sam smiled. “Wait, I don’t know where I’m going, Sammy,” Jake blurted hurriedly. “Well I’m not leaving you alone, obviously,” Sam pointed behind Jake. He turned to see his twin at long last, and unlike the other two, he looked strangely more like himself. He wore a long gold cape, similar to what he would wear on stage, and familiar eye makeup to add to the ensemble. “Well, someone had to steal the show,” Sam mumbled under his breath, but before Jake turned to reply, Sam was gone.
“My brother! Let’s head inside, I have much to show you,” Josh held out an arm towards the front doors, and the pair made their way inside together like they had many years ago. They found themselves in the science wing, and Jake heard a familiar voice booming from one of the classrooms. “And don’t forget about the quiz on Friday!” Just then the bell rang, jolting him, and he realized the hallway would soon be swarming with teens. “So um, what exactly are we here for, Josh?” Jake yelled over the din surrounding them. “Well, why don’t you take a look in here,” Josh pointed to the room nearest to them. Jake walked through the door to see himself, this time older and looking equally exhausted as he does during tours. He sat at the desk in the front of the room, tiredly flipping through a textbook and clicking on the computer in front of him. “Well you look just thrilled, don’t you?” Josh chuckled. Jake gulped, lacking words. “This is supposed to be if we never started the band, right? No music, no brothers, no…” he trailed off, unable to continue. The uncomfortable silence was broken by a student entering the classroom. “Mr. Kiszka?” they asked, and Jake #3 turned to face them. “I’m just here to get my phone back, if that’s okay…” “I suppose,” Jake replied. “But I better not see you with it out or messing around with those earbuds in my class again. I can’t control what you do in your free time, but you know I don’t tolerate music in my classroom. All it is is a distraction.” The student nodded, quickly leaving the room as soon as their phone was back in their hands. “Seems like the kind of teacher we would have hated in high school, hmm?” Josh whispered to Jake, then leading him back into the hallway. “Have you learned your lesson yet, my other half?” Jake nodded, unable to catch his breath or form a coherent sentence. The pit in Jake’s stomach was growing by the second; over the course of this dream- if that is what it was- he had seen his life without his brothers, without his band and their success, and without music at all. And nothing could have made him regret his decision to miss the family Christmas more. “I guess I have let things get a little out of hand…” he mumbled to himself, looking at the floor. “Lucky for you, there’s still a few hours left before everyone else wakes up…” Jake heard Josh’s voice reply, but his surroundings became blurry and Josh’s voice sounded further away. He blinked, and suddenly was back in his bedroom in Nashville, jolting up in bed to get his bearings. Was he awake? Was it all really just a dream? He glanced around for his phone, grabbing it off of the nightstand next to him and checking the time. 1:11 AM. If he really tried, he could get back to Michigan by the early morning. If he was lucky, before anyone had woken up to open gifts. And he was going to make it, if it was the last thing he did.
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Thess vs Backlogs and IT Issues
Well, if this is the setting for the next two weeks, I'm in deep shit.
Scruffman, our office manager, is on leave for the next two weeks. I had a feeling that things were going to get a little ... problematic. Goblin has a "when the cat's away, the mice will play" mentality and has a habit of chatting in her usual "I Hate Everything" way whenever she gets the change - read: "when Scruffman isn't at his desk". This monopolises the time and attention of everyone in the office, so less work gets done. That's not even counting the whole thing where Temp will dodge all the longer work - with Violet on long-term medical leave, that still leaves me to do the lion's share of it, because Milady tends to take over Scruffman's duties when she's away and so she's busier than usual for the next two weeks (when not sucked into Goblin's Grumble Vortex)
In addition to this, we had some changes to our transcription software recently and it has not been particularly well implemented. Having to tag our typing with our initials is bad enough, but the window on which we have to do so is slow to come up at the best of times, so that's a fair chunk of time wasted. Again, that's under the best of circumstances right now.
Logged in today and the queue was at 375 and climbing. We were backlogged as far back as Saturday (because of course the various doctors and techs are still coming in on the weekends), and all the ones left from Saturday were - you guessed it - the long and complicated bullshit that Temp doesn't want to touch. But yesterday's typing was effectively untouched when I logged in.
The queue when I logged out for the day was approaching 400. Barely anything got typed unless I typed it (except for seeing Milady take one fifteen minute long monstrosity, for which I am very grateful because I got something like three 10+ minute bits of dictation on top of the ones that don't take long to speak but do take long to type because of having to deal with the formatting - it's a thing). Most of the urgent cases got done - but not all; the longer ones of those were left behind as well when I logged out. I just hadn't noticed because I was busy with all the long dictation and the stuff from the more difficult doctors and techs. I barely saw anything taken out of the queue, and when I did, it was in bits and snatches of shorter pieces of work between the longer, complicated stuff. And like I said - not that much of that got done either.
Of course, some of this might have something to do with the transcription software, which was at its worst today. It crashed seven times, and hung for at least five minutes a dozen more times over the course of the day, at least for me. It's possible that people got slowed down because they were having the same problem, but I don't know because no one keeps me updated when Scruffman's not around. I'd bet good money that they didn't try to talk to IT about it and just used it as an excuse to relax and futz about all day, but at least it's sort of an excuse. Ish. Kind of. I mean, I was slowed up, but I wasn't slowed up that much...
If we're still in this mess when I log in tomorrow (and I honestly expect it to be much worse tomorrow), I may actually have to pull some overtime. I have spoken to Scruffman about doing so if it becomes necessary, because at least I don't have to commute, but I'm honestly not sure I have the spoons for that kind of thing. Thing is, we need to at least get partway caught up. This reflects badly on all of us, but the others don't seem to fucking care. Scruffman's away, so they can do what they want, apparently. And it's leaving us massively behind.
So tomorrow is going to be a day. If our transcription software is still a mess of hiccups and crashes, I'll be emailing IT and asking what the hell is going on. If the queue is still obscenely long (and I would wager, knowing the doctors' work patterns as I do, that it'll be approaching 500 cases when I log in, if my colleagues in the office keep on the way they're going), I'm going to have to log some overtime to at least get us so that we're only one day behind and not two. I'll obviously keep a record and email Scruffman about it, but I can't just let this stay like this. And I can't make Goblin and Temp get a fucking move on - hell, I couldn't do that even if I was in the office.
Fuck. Just ... fuck. Two whole weeks of this bullshit? Are you kidding me?!? Scruffman is obviously entitled to use his annual leave, but we're already massively understaffed because no one hired a replacement for Sunshine and Sid, so if Goblin and Temp refused to pull their respective fingers out, we're going to end up so deep in backlog that we'll end up with calls from clients asking what the fuck is going on. Most of this stuff is fairly urgent. It's histology. It's people being investigated for potential cancer in a lot of cases! I don't necessarily expect miracles, but I expect at least the kind of work ethic that doesn't involve turning the office into a chat-and-coffee corner the minute the managers' backs are turned. If I have to keep the whole place afloat for two weeks, I WANT A FUCKING RAISE. Or at the very least overtime pay.
Thankfully my own week's holiday comes pretty much as soon as Scruffman comes back from his fortnight. I'm going to need it. Especially if I have to pull overtime.
*flashes back to typing queue when I logged out before*
...When. Especially when I have to pull overtime. UGH.
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Hey, dream pal again….
I am okey, sorry if the “worst week of my life” coment freaked you out, im cool.
I did walk through a forest, but funny enough I had walked in it many times irl and was around said forest when the dream happened, so I just assumed this is why I dreamed about it. I was with Jazz there and here is were I lost the short guy and found “you”... I wasnt sure about the oak trees since I am not a fauna guy but after looking up how they look, huh, guess what? there were in the dream too.
One of the things that really haunted me about the dream is that I know and I have been in all the places of said dream while awake… Even the store you drew has a strong resemblance to a store I know, but again… no mural which I find so intriguing.
I do remember talking to the girl I found while Jazz was still in the store. I don’t remember much of the conversation besides comments on Jazz, the death environment and someone saying that it was going to be okey (I trully don’t know who said that). I remember getting angry, but not the reason why I got angry.
The dream doesn’t end in the store for me. After the store we hit the road, and I sat on Jazz’s passenger seat as I looked out of the window, I wasn’t alone in the car, and I know more than one person was on the car, but I dont know if it was the same girl from the store. I know they *looked* white (it could be the cappibara lady, who knows), but we where quiet all the way.
In the dream I knew there had been an apocalypse and I knew Jazz was the only Autobot I could find, but I was also aware (to a small degree) that is was a dream. Who knows maybe this is why I got angry when we left the store.
This is so freaky… The dream doesn’t end on the road either, at least not for me (who knows, maybe the car passenger NPCs logged into a different server)… But after that I was alone.
I have to ask, in the forest did you happen to see other animals (a mule/ donkey)? or a small cabin?
Dude Imagine I end up finding the other people in the dream… that would be, creepy ngl.
The dream pal,
- R
i'm happy to hear that! <3
oak trees are pretty common but they felt very prevalent enough in the forest i walked through that it was worth noting. usually, where i live, they're a bit more sparse and mixed with tons of other trees.
and before i continue, this got EXTREMELY long and detailed so i'm placing everything under a cut hsdfsdfs
the forest in my dream was one i walked through many times irl too!! it was heavily based off the forest right behind my house at first, which has a small creek in it (that's where i started off in my dream actually. went into my backyard, saw a capybara and followed her into the forest) but the path and size were different, both much larger. the path went straight instead of turning left, there were more slopes around it, a thicker canopy, and the creek i passed through was further in and running perpendicular instead of parallel (it was more reminiscent of a wider part of my creek downstream, but the location was all wrong) there was also a small hill just before or right after the creek. around that point, it melded with a different forest i've walked through only a few times before: the forest behind my high school, which had a mf maze for its trails that we hiked on a few times and a very large river in the deepest part, to the left. the desire path i walked on in the dream was a lot more like those ones. perhaps, if you were the girl, you walked on a different trail until we bumped into each other? (tho i don't particularly remember there being any forks in the path)
the supermarket was a lot like a regular ol walmart but it doesn't particularly remind me of any i know. most walmarts here are part of a strip mall/near one and i don't remember if there were rly many other buildings in the plaza from my dream. probably all got destroyed. not sure, the details of the plaza are fuzzy besides a very, very dusty and crumbled parking lot. very large lot, but i'm not sure how large, and how much had dirt and grass had grown over it
the mural i'm sure is something straight out of horizon forbidden west. there are holograms in the game of the heroes of the apocalypse? called "ten." the holograms had a couple graphics that the mural was most likely based off of, mainly the orange and yellow background (stole this pic from ign)
after seeing the mural, jazz didn't move or speak in the rest of the full dream. he just sat on the rubble next to the mural. i would've loved to have hit the road lol but i guess he needed time. i really wish i remembered more about what happened towards the end, but i do know that, alongside the worry and the sympathy, there were feelings of dread and a slight urgency. we weren't in active danger, but we could be. that place was abandoned for a reason. (it felt as though jazz was the one in danger, but he found the girl to be in more danger than he was. classic guardian syndrome i guess LOL)
that's so wack tho. we both in some way knew we were dreaming (usually i am not aware of that in mine) and everything i bumped into was some amalgamation of a place i have been to before, even if the general area was a bit more rural than where i live lol there wasn't a cabin tho. mainly just feelings of there being stores and more houses (i live in the suburbs) around us. the houses kind of had the feeling of... being very recently built or still under construction? obviously they're not new now but back then, before the apocalypse, whenever that was, they would've been brand new. not sure if that's an important detail lol
i don't remember bumping into any animals besides the capybaras and maybe a chipmunk or squirrel but i did collect vegetables/fruits?? there were like. bright red tomatoes, cabbage and fresh peaches i picked up from around tree trunks (reminded me a lot of things like breath of the wild) and i tried to give them to the mother/child to help them, since it was clear they were looking for food, but the mother did NOT trust me. she didn't want to be near me and i'm not sure why i kept following her. she looked like she felt a bit uneasy around me as she did not speak english at first, so it was easy to misunderstand my intentions
anyway i decided to give the general area of my dream a go, so let me know if anything in it reminds you of something. it's hard to nail every detail exactly, since you know how dreams like to do good ol switch-a-roos on things but this should be at least a little true to my dream
it's very possible the forest trail was longer but i do not have a solid concept of the time i spent on it. mainly just the beginning. also not sure if jazz and the woman appeared before or after the creek. it was a very shallow but wide stream (honestly i do not remember really walking through it. i just remember seeing it but i KNOW it ran through the trail) anyway, don't be fooled, this whole place i drew is MASSIVE. imagine it's close to a mile long from top to bottom. the forest was huge, the parking lot was huge, the area beyond (north-northeast) was huge with powerlines that felt like they ran parallel to the street but looked like they went perpendicular ...not sure how that worked. they had a field with lots of overgrown tall, dry grass tho
either way, i hope something looks familiar! dreams are so weird with how much context they can provide without needing to actually see it? so i hope you can trust my word on this lol i built purely off what i remember feeling in my dream. and honestly, if i had to say, definitely felt like that sort of area would've had a donkey LMAO or maybe more so deer, but i did not see any nor feel any from the given context
also wondering, how tall are you? and a little more obscure, but do you own or have owned any shirts like this? it's a regular long sleeve, waffle knit shirt with some sort of magenta heather pattern (thanks google for making me have to draw it)
it's probably not important but thought to ask anyway on the off chance you do
#jazz dream#we dont actually call the forest behind my house a 'forest' we just call it 'the creek'#because the creek is the only reason why there are trees there. the whole shape of the forest follows the stream#or rather. ppl cut down the forest to the shape of the stream as they built around it#fun fact our creek leads back into the big ol bay :)#..not really an impressive feat given just about every if not all streams/rivers/etc here lead back into the bay lol
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Hi, how's it going? I just saw your post about spoons and how people in this RPC act like you're an ableist asshole over it, and holy shit do I relate, because it's literally happened to me too. Rant incoming, but I thought I'd pass some validation your way... I have a lot of feelings about this.
Like you said, tumblr users have become absurdly brazen with the "you're ableist" accusations towards people with disabilities who are just trying to enjoy a hobby, and trying to ensure their needs are met by making them clear/upfront in their rules. Like, jesus christ... If you have depression or low spoons, and you easily burn out from high partner/character turnover, or if you don't spend a lot of time online, or if you get really disoriented if you log on once a week and see a lot has changed re: your partners' blogs and such, that's a valid concern. It's not being fucking "ADHD ableist" to say you burn out if partners have a high turnover with their blogs or characters, so you prefer to follow people whose blogs and characters are more stable. It's not "ADHD ableist" to say you prefer writing longform posts rather than one-liners. It's not "ADHD ableist" to say you have memory issues, so you can't manage when threads or characters change a lot. That last one about memory is very ironic, because ADHD can literally affect working memory too, sometimes you need to take the exact same approach with it! Anyways, long story short, there's no "right" way to roleplay. My approach to roleplaying isn't going to be compatible with everyone else's, that's just the way it works. But some assholes don't understand that at all, and they throw fists over it, and I just? Stop.
We're not saying "if you roleplay this way, you suck ass", or "this way of roleplaying is better than the rest", or "if you read these rules, you must do as I say because I'm a bossy controlling high-maintenance bitch", but that's literally what the Reactive Outrage Crowd seems to interpret from our rules... Which we've put upfront out of courtesy, before people even interact with us. And I'm sick of it. I've seen it happen to my friends, and it's happened to me, I'm sorry to hear it's happened to you, too, ugh. You can be the nicest person, and you still get shit because people take screencaps out of context or whatever, and they think their disabilities and ND traits give them full license to order us to conform to their own specific needs, which they wrongly believe is the only "right" way to roleplay, so we must conform to them, and them only.
What the hell happened to, "we are fundamentally incompatible as writing partners, so instead of trying to force each other to fit into a mold, which is only going to lead to frustration, let's acknowledge we are too different, and find partners who are more compatible"?!
Honestly, these last few years.
The worst part, in my opinion? How tumblr's RPC is full of petty-ass roleplayers who like to pretend they're inclusive, and understanding of people who are ND or who have disabilities, but as it turns out... They're only accepting if you're the "right" kind of ND or disabled, fuck you if you're anything else.
Are you autistic, and do you have very blunt or direct rules that are formatted in bullet points? Maybe you'll hear, "wow, if I wanted to apply for a job and check off boxes, I'd go on indeed, lmfao" (I wish I were kidding, this has happened). Have health problems and need to explain the specific ways it affects your writing or blog organization, which involves a lot of tag lists and explanations? "Wow, these rules are so long, nobody with ADHD is going to read a textbook, lmaoo." (Yes, I've also seen this.) Prefer not to follow people who are super into one specific fandom, because you don't want to hear about it, or because you don't want a higher likelihood of seeing that content on your dash (due to accidental untagging or something)? "Lmao, this person sounds like a wet napkin".
Are you kidding me?
Some people are so ready to shit on rules and posts that do literally nothing wrong. The only things these rules and posts do is show incompatibility with the person's own roleplaying style, in a totally non-judgmental way. But people equate these rules and posts to ableism and rudeness, because they've gotten it into their heads that their own way to roleplay is the "only way", and then they start stirring up the Outrage Porn mobs. Hey, look everyone, here's the latest in "shitty ableism," let's all stare and wonder wtf is wrong with this person who's done literally nothing even remotely offensive! Like that's not a super fucked-up form of entertainment. And why is it always "ADHD ableist", like you said? I feel bad for the people with ADHD who genuinely don't give a rat's ass about people's rules or finding faults in everything, and who just adhere to the live and let live mindset.
Like… Come on, people. There is nothing wrong with ADHD, or with preferring high-turnover threads or short rules and things... Just like there's nothing wrong with the alternative. Just shut the fuck up with the rules bullshit, regardless of your disabilities, and stop acting like you know what's best for all people and their own disabilities. People who are clearly incompatible with you don't owe you shit, especially if they're not hurting anyone or forcing you to do anything. You need to stop being so entitled and learn how to walk away like an adult. And stop calling everything ableist without it warranting it, because not only are you hurting ND/disabled people more often than not when you use it (sometimes without even realizing it), especially on a website like tumblr, but you're grossly watering down the term, and that's going to bite all of us in the ass one day. You shouldn't be proud of that, you should be ashamed.
Okay, I'm done lol.
(Shit like this is why I don't go on tumblr anymore, for the record.)
This needs to be framed and displayed in the tumblr rp museum of excellence, thank you for saying it
#hi jazz 🥺#it's going good!!#this is good shit tho really good shit#i want to ask what fandoms this is worst in but i feel like i know the answer lol#i really have nothing else to add#tumblr rpc#ableism ment cw#tumblr rp#bullying
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Campfires Made Easy: My Black Beard Fire Plugs Review
I've always considered myself a bit of a seasoned outdoorsman. Whether it's a weekend hike in the Peak District or a week-long camping trip in the Scottish Highlands, I'm always up for an adventure. But there's one thing that's always frustrated me: getting a fire going, especially in less than ideal conditions. Damp kindling, forgetful lighter packing, and unpredictable weather – these little gremlins have turned many a picturesque campfire into a damp squib.
That all changed when I came across Black Beard Fire Plugs. Intrigued by the promise of "Start a Fire In Any Condition!", I decided to give them a go.
Tiny But Mighty
The first thing that struck me about the Black Beard Fire Plugs was their size. Imagine a pack of after-dinner mints – that's roughly the size of the container holding 50 fire plugs. They're incredibly lightweight, which is a godsend when you're trying to pack light for a trek. These little blighters take up practically no space in my rucksack, leaving more room for the essentials (like a decent cup of tea!)
Unfazed by the Elements
Now, onto the real test: performance. I've used these fire plugs on several camping trips now, and I've been thoroughly impressed. One particularly miserable weekend in the Lake District saw us battling persistent drizzle and stubbornly damp firewood. Just a single Black Beard Fire Plug, sparked with a ferrocerium rod (not included, but readily available), had a roaring fire going in no time. They truly live up to their waterproof and windproof claims – a massive relief when the weather decides to play havoc with your campfire plans.
Easy to Use, Long Burning
Another big plus for these fire plugs is their ease of use. There's no faffing about with kindling or coaxing damp wood into life. Simply pull out a plug, fluff it up a bit, and spark it with a lighter, flint and steel, or even a battery sparker. They catch light readily and burn for a good eight minutes, giving you ample time to get your fire established with kindling and larger logs.
A Must-Have for Any Adventurer
Overall, I'm absolutely smitten with Black Beard Fire Plugs. They're compact, lightweight, and completely dependable, even in the face of the worst British weather can throw at you. Whether you're a seasoned outdoorsman or a casual camper, these fire plugs are a fantastic addition to your kit. No more damp squibs – with Black Beard Fire Plugs, a roaring campfire is always just a spark away!
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About friends. Long.
You know that moment when you notice that one person that's not there? Say you were talking to someone on discord and then at some point you see the list of DMs and you see their name with the grey icon. Or perhaps in some game or platform, where it shows last online several months/years ago, even worse when it's shown in days.
I am terrible at keeping up with people. I'll go months without talking to someone and if I run into them for me it'll be as if I saw them yesterday while they are confused about where I've been since then. It's not intentional, I just get focused on whatever I'm into at that moment and at some point in the past I decided not to be the one "in charge" of organizing anything anymore. Choices with consequences.
When a friend has gone offline (you can't really contact them in real life) for long and I feel them missing, my mind goes dark places. Not only because I'm a very negative person but also because experience tells me what the most likely reason is. They are either very busy with school/work, they are in jail/mental facility or they are just gone.
I have not, nor will I ever attempt to kill myself. I'll keep living until I fall, and then crawl until I can't move anymore. It would be a lie to say I've not thought about it, and I don't lie. During the worst period of my life I cried myself to sleep many times. Awful. I live in a way that it never gets to that point again.
The fourth option aka something else requires their attention for a long time is also a possibility. They are staying off the internet for whatever reasons. Kids, family issues, friends in need, others and such. It is the least likely scenario in my experience.
Point being: I saw a friend's icon on discord. I have not seen him in months, but I don't know how long exactly. I take things for granted. He's just some dude I met thanks to the souls community. We talked a lot, played together for a bit and generally chilled while hanging out. I've asked a couple people in that "hey have you seen [friend] lately" kind of way, just in case someone had talked to him. Nothing. The first time was said in a curious way (it's been a while eh) but the others in a more cautious one.
I saw (online) a guy that knows him IRL. I thought about asking. It would be a bit weird right? Not really, he probably knows. But a part of me was scared. What if. That feeling of dread again. When your mind tells you what the most likely explanation is. I put it off for weeks. I just now sent him a DM, he appears offline and told him to answer whenever he wants (it's early here).
---
There is another friend. Met her on tumblr. We didn't get to talk much, we didn't get to play together. I took things for granted.
Years ago, when I was in highschool I started playing quake live. Played that game for ~5 years, although the last two I was on university so my time playing was significantly lower. Met lots of people who I would spend entire days with.
One time someone joined the lobby and sent a message to let us (as in, our very small community) know that his brother had passed away, and had asked him to let us know. That was the first time I got informed that an online friend had passed away. It was shocking, we stopped the match and a couple people logged off. The dread hit me later. So, he's not going to play with us anymore? Just like that. I know it sounds childish. I was a kid.
Way more times than I'd like that same situation, or one that is similar enough, has happened. Someone letting me (or us) know that someone has gotten in an accident. Someone got in a fight that didn't end well. Someone took their own life. In real life I've lost several relatives to old age. Someone very close to me took a whole bunch of pills and had to get taken to emergencies.
I have no words to express what I want to communicate. The only way I feel like I can do it is by sharing my experiences, because I cannot fathom what it's like to lose someone that close to you.
Saw a few posts that sounded ominous. Went to sleep while "no way, no way" repeated in my head. Some other thing happened, not again. And then there was a confirmation. Devastated, wanted to cry and couldn't. What to do even. It happened again. This is what poetry is for I think, to put words together to express what cannot be expressed on prose alone.
---
Another friend. Met him thanks to the souls community, again. He is relatively known when it comes to his "achievements". Not super famous, but well known enough that saying more would be doxxing.
Many months ago he stopped online activities, so to speak. No discord messages, no streams, no videos. He later posted a short note on his twitter about his mental health problems, attempted suicide and a brief recounting of his life situation.
He is alive, not sure if doing well or not. Taking a very long break from "the grind" (my words). I hope he is. I take it for granted he will be.
One time he DMed me at like, 4 am. This is a regular hour for me on night schedule but not for most people. We'd talked before you know, but not late at night like that. Just asking me how were things and such. We talked a bit more and told him to get some sleep (he had to go somewhere in the morning).
Later after I read his note I went back to check the date. It was barely a few days before. Was that one of those so called "cries for help"? Was I meant to dig more, comfort him somehow? No, that's how you end up thinking it's your fault or something equally stupid. I talked to him as a friend. I do not hold some sort of convincing ability to reassure people. I could be kinder, perhaps.
---
Whenever I see people on tumblr mentioning those who they used to know, who passed away one way or another, is this how they feel? I believe the english word is grief. Insufficient. Limitations of the language.
There isn't a conclusion to this. I just saw some friend's discord name and got sad remembering. I either type it out or trigger my insomnia. It's 8 am the insomnia has been triggered 10 hours ago.
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t-break: day 2, somehow
wrote up all of yesterday's at once, instead gonna add to this as a draft throughout the day and post before going to sleep (if i remember to)
head still feels foggy. not quite in the same way as yesterday? depersonalization isn't as bad at least. i've also been really badly dehydrated as a result of how much weed i'd been having so i've been guzzling water. idk what effect it's having.
already extended my k-safe's timer until tomorrow evening so i'm forced off until then i guess.
idk if i'll still keep it up past then. this is my second t-break attempt since starting this blog and i was going to post a log for the last one and didn't bc i figured i'd get to day 3 and then false alarm! t-break cancelled! maybe actually making posts about it will help me commit, idk.
had a dream last night - the shed in my backyard had been extended into a full house. at another point there was a dragon i was fighting? in the sky, and for some reason it had to assemble at the start of the fight??? and i tried to kill it before it attached its front legs so the fight would be easier because it coildn't fly as fast????? idfk
having trouble eating, probably not helped by the fact that i'm using phentermine for adhd at the moment and it's an anorectic lol
no idea if it's weed related or not but for the life of me i can't get to the right fucking temperature. always just too hot and i'm sweating or just too cold and i'm chilly.
cravings are stronger today than yesterday. extended my k-safe's timer by a day in response, so now it opens tomorrow night. too fuckin scared to lock it longer than that.
fucking adding to it through out the day lol ALREADY WROTE THAT DUMBASS. case in point: memory's still pretty fucked, brain's still too foggy.
i also stopped drinking coffee about a week ago and thank fuck, no withdrawals that i can discern (furious wood-knocking). anytime in the past i've stopped caffeine i've gotten brutal migraines and nausea, probably the worst kind of drug withdrawal i've had.
the thing that really... messes with me? scares me? is that i've seen a bunch of people repeat that while a good chunk of the brain fog should clear up within a few weeks, it takes months for it to go away it's entirety and... just the thought that it will take half a year or longer? and i don't know how much of this i'm going to have to feel until then?
i added another day to my k-safe. as in it's at two days now, this isn't just me forgetting that i mentioned it already again. it now opens monday night (today being saturday.)
might skip my adhd meds tomorrow, see if it makes eating any easier
...not sure i feel like this is definitely going to end prematurely? probably will but like... it doesn't feel like a forgone conclusion
saw a new video was up in a youtube series i'm watching (brickcrafts's lego city) and managed to correctly guess that i'd missed a video bc it had been too long since i last remembered seeing one and, fuck me that's a little bit of hope.
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