Seeing people complain about the Speak Now vault tracks being too teenagery …. gee, you’d almost think a teenager wrote them /s

thinking about the elections tonight... bad, cellbit, baghera, and forever are four candidates who are devoted to the island- more specifically, to the residents of the island. They care for the eggs, and they care for each other, and the way they exhibit that care through their primary presidential strategies is fucking fascinating.

Bad is who I watch the most, so I know him best. He's a classic mother hen. He doesn't like to take risks with the eggs, and he likes to prepare. If there's any sort of variable that could hurt an egg then he wants to control it. They have a stable relationship with the federation right now- it's not great, but they know the parameters. Don't trust cucurucho. don't follow cucurucho. send the eggs to NINHO every time there's a threat. the time of day changing means you need to run. Other than that they're p okay and roughly safe. But adding a president could potentially change everything. What if the president makes a rule that makes it easier to kill the eggs? And what about the way a president could cause tensions between the players to rise even higher? The dynamics of the island could change drastically. It's safer to neutralize that threat before it ever becomes a threat. It's easier to stop a war before it can start.

Baghera's primary concern is the way the election is designed to pit the residents against each other. All of them know that the Federation is a threat and she, like Bad, is focused on not letting them hurt more people. But, unlike Bad, she's less resistant to change. If the power is spread to multiple players rather than just one, it will be harder for the Federation to corrupt any one of them. Each time before the Federation has gotten to someone it's done so by isolating them. Felps, Cellbit, Jaiden- they've all spent a lot of alone time with Cucurucho. A council isn't just to consolidate the ideals of the island; a council would protect the players themselves. Sure, there might be disagreements and arguments, but they've had those before (and they're having them now!) and there's no reason to think they wouldn't be able to get through them again.

I hit a bit of a wall with Forever and Cellbit's pov here. Everything I know about their plans are from the debates and paraphrased discussions that have been translated here on tumblr, I'm going to talk less about their explicit plan and more about what the result will entail- a single president who takes responsibility for the island. It seems to me like they've recognized the presidential seat as the powerful opportunity that it is, and they want to take advantage of it. Here's some extra personal speculation but, adding rules, adding or removing mods, proposing public works, enforcing laws- those are just the abilities that are listed. Those are incredible opportunities to make the Federation take action, which is more than they've had before. We've seen before that the Federation isn't perfect; the Federation makes mistakes.

By working with the Federation, by making them take action (in a semi-controlled, semi-predictable way) you open them up to more opportunities for them to fuck up (while benefiting you). And, maybe, one of those fuck ups will be the key to taking them down. Maybe they could reopen ender chests. Maybe they could open the nether. Maybe they could learn why the Federation is holding an election in the first place. It's possible to do all these things with Baghera's plan, sure, but that's not a guarantee and, if someone like Bad is on the council, there's absolutely no way to be sure it would get done. And, if there's a council, then that opens up everyone on the council to the Federation's wiles. If there's just one president, then that's where the Federation's focus will be. By using a single person to build a relationship with the Federation, they only risk that single person. By electing ministers instead of a council, they can ensure that the island residents' needs are being heard while placing the federation's focus on that one person. A point can be made that they've done that before- with varying results. like kidnapping. selling your soul. etc. But! overall, I think they've gained more than they've lost by singling out one person. Because of them, we know that Cucurucho can't be trusted. We know that the Federation has a series of tunnels underneath the island. We know that the Federation not only has some sort of cryo technology, but had some unknown reason to use it. We know that there was another person working with Cellbit to take care of Felps (theorized to be ElQuackity), so we know there's at least one more Fed that isn't Cucurucho + blank-faced workers. There's been risk, but there's absolutely been rewards. This is just a very long meandering way to say that their plan to sacrifice Forever to the presidential seat reminds me very much of Cellbit's plan to sacrifice himself to the federation. They're saving their friends by potentially damning themselves and I, for one, think that is cool as hell.

they all care about each other so much. bad's plan means taking on no more risk. baghera's plan means spreading that risk evenly to stand strong together. and cellbit and forever's plan means taking the risk onto themselves so they can reap the rewards for others. am i reading too much into things? no this is tumblr and this smp is about LOVE and i really genuinely think that their election plans are a fantastic example of just how much they love each other

if you're doing prompts this week too I might send in one or two more!

with that said, how about some angst, C1 For mintharaheart perhaps? I imagine minthara is used to her lovers dying, just not of old age.

You're so real for this one. Thanks for requesting it! 💜

Also, I apologize in advance.

--- C1. Lifespan differences

It is the weakness of surface-dwellers in her, thought Minthara as she helped Shadowheart from the bed to the small washroom nearby.

The webbed halls of the new House Baenre were not to Shadowheart's liking at first. She struggled to see the beauty in Qu'ellarz'orl as well, the view of the mushroom forest lost to her. That was decades ago by then, though to Minthara that still felt as if it were yesterday.

It is the weakness she's instilled in me that doesn't call on our servants to aid her, Minthara told herself as she gently pulled the shift from Shadowheart's body.

Her hair, once black, now matched Minthara's silver, though its pallor was joined by new wrinkles and lines on Shadowheart's face. Beautiful all of them, like a suit of armor wearing the proud signs of battle.

"Will you warm the water for me?" asked Shadowheart in perfect drowic. She'd learned the tongue easily, and she used it more than any other language now.

"Of course," Minthara said softly, matching Shadowheart's weak grip on her hand.

The clawed tub next to them, its curling edges mimicking a spider's legs, had already been filled with water. Minthara trusted the servants of her House enough to do that much. Even still, she knelt before the bath and dipped a finger into the murky water.

No heat nor acid scorched her skin.

None were so ambitious — so foolish — as to target the Matron Mother's consort, at least. It had happened once, long ago. A failed attempt and a bad one at that. What Matron Mother wasn't accustomed to having her consort's food taste-tested?

Pieces of that traitor's skull still adorned one of Minthara's favorite spider-silk dresses.

With a word of power and flick of her wrist, the heating element underneath the tub lit with gentle flames. While the water heated, Minthara collected the surface soaps and shampoos that Shadowheart preferred without a word.

I should not be the one waiting on her. She is my consort, and I am her Matron Mother. Her superior in all things.

Minthara thought it all to herself as she turned to the sitting Shadowheart next to her. She slipped the sandals from Shadowheart's feet, saying not a word. Gray-green eyes stared down at her, the wrinkles around Shadowheart's mouth more pronounced as she smiled.

"My weakness," Minthara said, the pet name effortlessly flowing off her tongue, "is the water to your liking?"

Shadowheart dipped her fingers in the water. "It's perfect."

"Then allow me to help you in."

It is this weakness, her, that has infected me so.

Nevertheless, Minthara helped Shadowheart into her bath without even a grunt of exertion or a word.

She never called for her servants when it came time to help Shadowheart with the soap. Her fingers fumbled with it so often these days.

It is this infection that will kill me when she leaves me, isn't it?

When I was a young excited physics student I went down to my advisor and asked for a job in a lab. Those of you who are in the sciences may recognize this as exceedingly common, most schools with science departments will hire undergrads for their labs both to give the undergrads experience and to have someone comparatively cheap to do the least skilled labor in those labs.

For me, the lab I was sent to was one doing cool photonics projects and I was assigned to a guy who was doing the theoretical modeling for them and I got put on a side project for them to develop a method to double check their results using Monte Carlo simulations.

Put bluntly, I toiled away in the little cubicle they had me in for about half a year before I transferred to a different school without ever having produced anything of any particular value other than a Monte Carlo simulation whose temperature readings were not taking into account the existence of a heat sink and therefore got overwhelmed by thermal photons in a completely inaccurate and unhelpful way.

Ultimately, many tasks, farmed out like this in a speculative way to undergrads, fail, certainly it's not exceptional that mine did and I learned a lot about the process in the process, so it wasn't wasted time for me, but it produced absolutely nothing the lab could use to further its results.

This is where it turns from a little anecdote about my work history into a morality tale, because what I have thus far deliberately failed to tell you is that the lab I was assigned to is a provider of radar services to the US Military. Had I produced anything of any value whatsoever the work I did would have been used by the US military to help with its capacity to deliver bombs. This is, unfortunately, as those of you who are in the sciences may recognize, also exceedingly common. Luckily, and through no foresight or moral thinking of my own, simply the inexperience of youth, I produced nothing of value but view the path they tried to set me down as a grim warning of what might have been.

I'm not asking for forgiveness, the harm I might have done was not done by me, although I'm also sure was done without my help. They didn't need it to be me they just needed someone with basic calculus knowledge who wouldn't think too hard about the connection between the work and the world, and they were happy enough that particular warm body was me.

So this is my plea, if you're young and getting involved in the sciences because you're passionate about knowledge and understanding our place in the universe. When you go to get that job in that lab that's such a good stepping stone to the next thing you want to do, take a second and look into where that lab's funding is coming from. If it turns out it's the military, maybe then take another second and really deeply consider what kind of thing your work can be used to do and if you would like some of the most bloodthirsty people on the planet to be able to do that thing because of your help.

I got lucky that I didn't help, but I'm hoping that with this warning you might be able to not help on purpose which is a greater moral good than what I managed.

thinking about how, in a lot of fics i’ve read with BotW Link he has a fear of caves. Or, well, trauma around them due to, you know, being dead inside one for a century and locked away.

and then in TotK the world collapsed and suddenly there are caves everywhere. But, they aren’t just new caverns, many of them have ruins inside and I just. I know Link is ~supposed to be a blank slate character~ and all that rot. But like, if this game full of caves and darkness below is supposed to be a sequel to BotW — I dunno. It just feels lacking that we get nothing, no reaction to caves in general, none to what happened to the Shrine, none when you discover what is below the Shrine. I mean, the way they did Link’s reactions to memories in BotW was laughable anyway and obviously I am craving for far more than nintendo will ever give — but what is courage without fear?

Watching Bad's vod where q!Foolish, q!Cellbit and q!Baghera are trying to set up q!Bad with q!Forever, now with CC!Bad's comment about his character being oblivious in an aromatic way is great

The others talking about who to ship q!Bad with while he sits in his chair, the aromantic and skephalo flag slowly fading into the background because this man will not be with ANYONE unless it's Skeppy

And I love that about him. They're currently talking in metaphors and q!Bad is just "????? I don't understand" and I love him for it.

Foolish: we're talking about the emotions in your heart right now!

Bad: Diamonds are forever!

Either he did that on purpose or that's the best coincidence to ever happen

friendly reminder that self harm is lying to you

The lil corner of the Good Omens fandom that I generally see is getting more and more into publicly declaring that That Theory I Dislike Is Bad And People Who Ascribe To It Should Feel Bad, and I don't know if it's really new, or if I was just lucky enough to generally be missed with that shit the last four years.

Different people's brains work differently, which means they will notice things, form interpretations, maybe come to extremely firm conclusions, all different from each others'. Different from mine, different from yours.

I get that some people think that they have the brain which produces the Objectively Superior theories (and/or which can easily determine which other people's theories are the Objectively Inferior ones). I just really missed the memo where Your Interpretation Is Not My Interpretation (And That's Okay) was dragged out back and fucking shot.

Anyway this blog is an "I may not agree with your theory but you may trust that I won't publicly heap scorn upon the very idea of having it" zone if anyone was wondering.

everyone has these thoughtful reasons and careful media analysis to make their point about why sylki will/won't "be endgame" and thus it's okay (or not) if they argue a bit first and i am slightly ashamed to admit that my entire thought process thus far has just been "well there's six episodes to fill, of course they'll drag the romance plot out as long as possible." :'(

imagined calling mvk a blorbo to his face ... idk if he'd be offended or just unfathomably confused LOL

Made me think of this wonderful tweet

baddddddd. he's giving pomme first pick of their dungeon loot rn. he's so NICE. not just to the eggs but in general (i am always thinking of those elegant letters). but the eggs are the only ones who he will quickly and easily show vulnerability to. with everyone else it's like there's a layer there, a wall of silliness he keeps up on purpose, but it just. isn't there with the eggs.

there's something about the way that he cares that I can't put into words. like he cares so much. so fucking intensely. look at dapper. look how kitted out that egg is. look at how much time bbh has spent with the eggs, and look at how much time and effort he puts into figuring out how to keep them safe. he goes HAM when it comes to caring for the eggs, but it comes so naturally to him. it feels like caring for people with his whole entire soul is his default, but he doesn't want it to be. or, maybe want play a part in it- maybe it's too dangerous to care so much so quickly. maybe that puts other people he loves at risk. maybe it scares people. but that wall between him and other people is one that he built, and it's bbh, so he built it strong, so even when he's surrounded by people who have proven over and over that they care for him (that they care for the eggs, that they will not hurt them), he can't fully believe it.

im just. bad knows foolish so well. he knows that man wouldnt on purpose kill any eggs. but pomme killed foolish and bbh, dying of laughter, having the time of his life, told her to "put your armour on. just in case."

i keep seeing this post and no offense to any of my mutuals who have reblogged this but like...what? i'm not full on anti-civ by any means but subsistence farming is one of the MORE achievable leftist commune goals...there's people all over the world who are doing it as we speak. and even if you don't go 100% self-grown you don't need a huge plot to meaningfully supplement your diet!

(the fast food part gets me too like. maybe it's bc i didn't really eat fast food until i was in my twenties? due to allergies. but i wouldn't consider it a staple.)

Tubbo is snitching.

Oh.

Oh dear prime .

This just further proves the anarchist Tubbo theory - he:

doesnt support the feds, nor the order - or bbh- after whatever sthings happened between them, and now all he got is himself and friends. Man just want to bring his eggs back. And Fred. And Ron.

Watchout, here comes Tubbo with the Tubbochunk

miniature crochet clown cloak experiment 1

pattern i more or less followed is here:

i made some alterations, mainly, the scale

Tainted batch (Patreon)