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The world shifted around Stanley as the bean's car lurched to a stop. Various dry goods and produce leaned into the borrower before returning to their stations. He could hardly move, squished between a box of pasta and the side of the tote bag in which he was trapped.  They had been traveling for an awfully long time, or at least it felt that way to Stanley. He had no way of knowing, being unable to see out from his canvas prison.

Hi, I put up a chapter of my borrower au fic on Ao3, for those who might be interested <3

Once again, I'd like to thank @lizzybeanbutt for allowing me to drag her into my funney au thoughts

I just finished your New Wave fic. I’m convinced everything your write is gold. I loved your TMA fics, with the most heartbreaking demon AU imaginable and the hilarity of Fahrenheit 101. I loved your moon knight fics, starting with Steven talking to animals on the reg at work to the system growing closer with a focus on Jake, i- there’s- it’s sooo much packed into it. When I’m on burnout, of art or writing (maybe life in general at times) I revisit your work and am thrown back into a creative headspace.

You are my favorite writer, you cram so much meaning and thought into your work and it shows. The characters are dumbasses and say the most ridiculous shit and turn around the next chapter and say the most thought provoking thing, and I don’t get whiplash from it because these characters just work! They just do, and I… am very much off track!

Anyways I just got into Batman and reading your fic is fueling that flame! I can’t wait to see what you have in store next, and I shall now stalk your blog for writing tips! I hope you have a nice day broski 💙

Thank you!! This is so sweet thank you so much! This ask is so nice!

Trust me, if there's meaning then it's because I get obsessive over these fics and I massively overthink them. I honestly wish I was better at making simpler, more elegant stories. I feel like nothing I do is truly going to be good until I can find that simplicity.

"Dipshit who says stupid stuff and then turns around and spouts ridiculous philosophy" is just how I talk. But I habitually approach my life from a standpoint of finding humor in everything, if only to soften the blow. I was once told that it's really hard to tell when I'm joking, because everything I say is always half-joking and always half-serious. I feel like that's pretty evident from my narration too...

As for writing advice...um, I was just speaking about this with somebody. When you're plotting a story, the first thing I like to figure out is what I'm trying to say. Everything else should be built around that. The joy of writing is that I think we all have something we want to say, or something we want people to know, or that we have an aspect of ourselves and our lives that we want to express. Most of the time, trying to convey those things verbally just results in a frustrating approximation of your true feelings. I find that when I manage a successful story, the depth and scale of what I'm trying to impart is fully understood and felt. It's rewarding. I think if people aren't understood on some level, by somebody, they kind of die.

Thanks for the sweet ask!!

creative writing, especially character-focused prose, is SO mysterious to me. like it just doesn't work the same way as any of my other creative practices. it's both incredibly conscious (i am TERRIBLE about editing as i go & have all kinds of neuroses around like. not reusing certain words too often or at all, making sure my sentence structure is varied for a better rhythm, etc. when i've only just written something before even going on to the next paragraph) & also it feels wildly out of my control with regards to what the characters are going to do or say a lot of the time!

i feel like the closest thing i have to relate to the experience is directing. i have my actors & i know where i want the scene to go & what the goals are but sometimes the actors are like "actually i'm feeling this right now can we take it in this direction" or they give a totally surprising line reading or just can't seem to make a scene work or they start doing improv & i'm like "oh. okay wow. taking notes"

and that's weird!!! who are these people in my head! especially since i'm writing fanfiction lmfao so these aren't even my characters & they're taking over. it's like...i can surprise myself sometimes when i'm doing visual art but not NEARLY as much as when i'm writing, so writing feels like entertainment in a way that visual art never does? it's work too, it takes me SO long, but also it's kind of like. hoo boy what's gonna happen tonight

Alright, so I have big feelings and thoughts about Ted Lasso! Todays episode was major. 

Big old feelings about it under the cut + spoilers 

I know a lot of us are very used to queer plot lines that focus on the trauma and suffering and they are important stories to tell but they’re not the only ones, there’s the joy that comes with it as well. What we got with this episode was the perfect mix of both. Because of toxic locker room and football culture it was impossible for Colin’s arc to not involve any level of pain or suffering, the important thing is that the resolution to the episode was acceptance and love. 

I know there are people who aren’t super pumped about the fact that we didn’t actually see Colin come out to the team on camera and that’s super understandable, I think it would’ve been a really nice moment to see. And in any other circumstances I’d probably be pretty miffed that the focus was on the reaction of the straight people (well predominantly straight people) in the room but in this case I think that was the right move. From what we’ve learnt about him and his sexuality Colin doesn’t appear to be ashamed of his identity, the reason he isn’t out is because of how football, historically, is bigoted and full of hatred, especially for queer people (I’ve been doing research as I’m writing a play about the impact homophobia in football has on queer fans and the feedback is dire). Colin is in the closet for his own safely and to protect his career, he’s closeted because he doesn’t know how his teammates will react, and as nice as these guys are it’s not guaranteed they’ll react with kindness. So seeing the reaction is vital, we as the audience need to know that Colin is safe and supported, which we do see, he is met with love and acceptance, he gets his second best case scenario. And there’s something gorgeous about how it’s been treated by the writers and the cast. 

I’m also in love with Colin and Issacs ending, Billy and Kola do such a phenomenal job with it, I’ve been obsessively watching it and analysing the acting (my actor brain very rarely switched off), and the way they’ve approached the text and the situation is stunning, they knew what they were doing and they delivered. With them it’s in the little things, and it reads so clearly. 

I just feel like the way the show approached this storyline was wonderful, there are so many ways they could have gone about this and we also got the second best option (I stand with Colin on what the best case scenario is). This obviously won’t be the end of this arc, but we’ve hit such a nice place with it. I do have a feeling it’s going to go down hill for Colin (I could be completely wrong but given we’ve still got a few episodes to go I think we’re going to get a bigger resolution which means we need a bigger fall first, but that’s just me speculating, only time will tell if I’m on to something) but he’s now got the whole team behind him, he’s not going through it alone. At the end of the day this is a show about found family and community more than it is football and that was made abundantly clear at the end of today’s episode. 

Just as a queer footy fan who’s had to deal with homophobia at matches this episode felt extremely poignant and necessary. 

this is so funny to me. People interacting with my posts. So. Naturally. I am curious and check their blogs out. Just to find about five "metas" (neither well written, nor informed, so take that term with a grain of salt) about my favorite characters

not telling anyone to get out of my house but man. buddy. this will not be enjoyable for either of us

I've come to the conclusion that when it comes to new characters I have the same attitude as a poorly socialized dog. I swear every time new content comes around and we get the news of new characters my instant reaction is to just. Dislike them. Hope they have little to no importance in the plot. Even when the design looks nice and the characters seem interesting. They're taking screen time away from my faves and my heart tells me to Bite

I think the disconnect between canon Belos and (a certain genre of) fanon Belos is that in canon he is pathetic (in the dramatic sense) not sympathetic.

ILW // could not tell you what it is recent thats suddenly got me drawing so much... anyway my main ilw mc Horus!! Hunting alone while Amalia is off becoming a lawyer-

very belatedly realized that the earring in game is actually a cross and not an ankh but its okay my delusions are my own.

Ppl are actually still giving me kudos for my silly little fics on AO3 and every time I get a notification I can’t help but be like “??? Y’all still reading this cringe?💀”

Okay so it’s been a few days but I’m still really upset about a comment I got on AO3 the other day. If you don’t have the emotional space or just don’t want to read my rant, please ignore this and have a wonderful weekend.

It was essentially “You shouldn’t write about your traumatic experiences and should talk to a therapist instead.”

Bestie. Where do you think I got the idea? Hayley looked me in the eye and said “you like writing? You should rewrite your experiences with happier endings.”

I said “so stop the trauma before it hurts me?”

Hayley said “no. Do not erase your trauma, but write that your character heals regardless. That your character is loved regardless. That your character learns to be happy regardless.”

So I will continue to write about my traumatic experiences in a way that is safe, healing, and non-triggering for me. I tag everything as accurately as I can so people can avoid potential triggers, so if you don’t want to read about something. Just don’t? Like don’t read the story? But don’t come into my comments, which are almost always the best part of my day, and post negative stuff and try to tell me I’m coping wrong. Maybe writing about your traumatic experiences is bad for you, maybe it makes you worse and sets you back weeks — or even months — in your healing journey, but I’m not you, bestie. Writing has always been my biggest outlet. And, I hate to break it to you, but most famous books you’ve read were probably the author’s outlet about something, ever heard of Anne Frank or Ayn Rand? They both wrote about their traumas, are you gunna dig them up and tell them it’s not healthy and they should just keep those emotions inside of them until they can’t stand being alive any longer?

Like seriously, you don’t know me. You’re not my mom or my girlfriend or my best friend or my literal therapist, you do not know what is good for me nor what is bad for me. So don’t try to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do. Just mind your business.

How do you feel about MiM's success? did you expect it?🤓

oh boy i sure am gonna say some words!

this is an interesting ask bc I don't really perceive MiM as being very successful personally.

I mean, I'm so immensely happy with the reaction it's getting and the interaction it's getting (bc any interaction on writing is literally the best thing in the world) and I absolutely love having the opportunity to share it more than anything!!!

but it's hard to think of it as being successful because I am, of course, comparing to every other fic I've ever posted on the same platform. and, in comparison to the reaction Scene 14 and Take Notes were actively getting as I was posting them live in the same manner I'm currently posting MiM, this is a considerably smaller reaction.

for context, a chapter of MiM usually gets somewhere between 2-5 comments (and maybe around 5 asks let's say). In contrast, Scene 14 was probably getting a consistent 5-7 comments every update (and, if I'm remembering correctly, probably around 10 asks, which is insane to think about in retrospect). Take Notes, in addition, would be getting around 7-10 comments a chapter (and probably ~10 asks as well but I don't really know that number; i'm just making shit up).

Also, I do think it's worth briefly noting that Bite Marks (another chaptered fic I tried to post on a schedule; rip my baby) has about double the amount of subscriptions that MiM has and (what I consider to be) considerably more kudos while also being significantly shorter.

So, when you're looking at the actual "statistics" of fics I've posted, I don't see MiM as being all that successful.

this is of course not to give the impression that I think MiM should have more comments/interaction or anything because I'm not a little greedy monster yknow and I really would be happy and content if only one person read it.

but I just don't think it would be accurate of me to say I think the fic is successful within the scope of how fics of mine have done in the past.

however, this statistical drop off is simply because our fandom is significantly smaller now than it was when I was posting Scene 14 and Take Notes. I could post either of those fics right now and I simply do not think they would do nearly as well as they did in 2021.

But, since those are the posting experiences I have to compare to for all my work in the future, I am well aware that no fics I post following them will ever get the same level of interaction and - therefore - I will never be able to perceive them as being successful. which,, sounds depressing dfghjk but i swear it's not!! it's not something i let myself dwell on (especially bc it's something ALL the writers in our fandom are experiencing). I write fics for me and whoever wants to read them can. it's a blessing to get to be able to share stuff at all!! and all i need is just one reader to keep posting <3

in terms of expecting it, I would say maybe that I never really have any expectations of how people will respond to fics. i'm never right when i make predictions anyway. I just never really know, so I think I'm always a little surprised by how people respond. even after 3 years of posting in the same fandom, i dont think i'll ever get over the "omg people read my stuff and like it" feeling.

so, TL;DR, i feel really good about MiM bc anyone is reading it at all :)

hope that kind of answers this, sorry for the tangent

Abby. You can play piano, you’re a stem major, you like classical music, and your a fantastic writer. Do not sell yourself short, you are a catch fr!

goes supernova

.

rewatched the ova :))))

Its okay to let yourself fall out of love with art or a craft if its not bringing you enough joy to be worth sustaining. You're worth more than what you create, and that's not something you have to apologize for. Thats a lot of grief to handle sometimes too, so be gentle with yourself and remember to not let yourself get weighed down by other people's guilt.

You are not dead. Continue on.