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kelleah-meah · 8 months

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My Fourth Mabon – Plans for My 2024 Autumnal Equinox Celebration

Once again, I’m making plans for next week’s Autumnal Equinox, but for some reason, this year feels different. I can’t quite articulate why or how it feels different, but let’s just say my spidey sense is tingling. Not in a “beware of danger” kind of way. But in a “you’re on the precipice of something significant” kind of way.

Edit: I've since learned why I feel my spidey sense tingling. It's because of the recent Nodal Shift into Aries/Libra. This is technically my reverse nodal return. My NN is in Libra and my SN is in Aries.

Anyway, until I can suss out the why of it all, I’ll just make plans for the equinox that feels in the spirit of what I’m sensing at the moment. Either way, I’m sure I’ll overdo it and put too much on my plate like I always do. 😏

Let’s dive in shall we …

Since the equinox falls on a Saturday (September 23rd) when I have to work, this is going to be a little different from years past. My plans will likely fall over 2 or 3 days because that’s just how I roll when it comes to celebrating the arrival of my favorite season, so that part is actually the same as years’ past.

Even though I have to work, it’s not all bad. It just so happens that I’ll be working outside at an arts & culture festival in the park, so it’s a chance to enjoy nature throughout most of the day (keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn’t rain though).

But once my work day is over, my plans look like this:

Note: The arts and culture festival has been cancelled due to a rainy forecast, so that changes my plans a little bit. Also, because we're behind at work, it looks like I'll have to work Monday and Tuesday next week. Oddly enough, I'm not too upset about that. 🙃 We have a lot going on that will finish off the year and kickoff the fall season like we haven't done before. A little extra work feels justified in order to pull it all together.

Friday (9/22) –

Prep & bake apple crisp dessert 🍎 ✅

Saturday (9/23) –

Meditation + Study of the Tao + a Tarot Spread for Mabon 🧘🏽 ✅

Work at the gallery 🖼️ ✅

Return home & cook Mabon dinner 🥘 ✅

Enjoy Mabon dinner 😋 ✅

Watch a movie from my Fall/Halloween theme list (probably Clue) 🎬 ✅

For dinner, here’s what I’m making:

- Hobo Meatball Stew (recipe found here, except I’m using ground turkey and adding tomato sauce, zucchini, corn, potatoes, carrots, garlic and paprika – and this year, instead of using the crockpot, I’m just going to cook it straight on the stove) ✅

- Cornbread (nothing fancy)

- Apple crisp topped with ice cream (for dessert, as a farewell to summer and hello to fall) ✅

I’ll probably have some hot chocolate later in the evening as a final hat tip to the beginning of autumn.

Sunday (9/24) –

Join my hiking group for a morning hike 🥾 [cancelled due to rainy forecast]

Sleep in! 🛌 ✅

Read my book 📕 ✅

Do light cleaning around the house 🧽 ✅

Stretch 🤸

Shoot TT vid 🎥

Paint and reflect on my journey 🎨

Write in my journal ✒️

Monday (9/25) –

Work at the gallery 🖼️ ✅

Return home and relax 🏡 ✅

Continue organizing home office 🗄️

Lift weights or stretch 🏋🏽‍♀️

Do confidence spell 🕯️

Tuesday (9/26) –

Work for gallery from home 🖼️

Go for a walk or ride bike in park 🚲

Continue organizing home office 🗄️ ✅

Write new blog post 🖥️

Promote new blog post 🎺

Also, since I had lofty plans to do this last year, but didn’t even get close to starting it, let’s see if I can actually give the Fall Photo Challenge a genuine try this year.

Here are the photo challenge prompts (forgive the blurry screenshot):

All in all, I’d say this is a reasonable plan for celebrating the spirit of the equinox and the start of my favorite season. I'm interested to see how it all turns out.

#mabon #autumnal equinox #fall equinox #witchblr #esoteric spirituality #photo challenge #the occult #autumn #autumn equinox #nodal shift #reverse nodal return

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thisisjustafiller · 2 years

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food log and babble

6/1

oops i posted this earlier when it was meant to be a draft. i didn’t eat anything else so eh kind of doesn’t matter.

9:30AM: coffee

1:00PM: chocolate covered blueberries (130)

4:00PM: rice and fake crab, black coffee (400)

total: 530

gonna see about bumping that number up tomorrow. just got home from work, i’m tired and honestly not hungry. i was thinking about having a slice of pizza from work (340, not bad at all) but it got tossed before i could get to it. oh well. i’m just happy i know the cals for it so i can have a slice if ever i want it again.

work was good, can’t complain. my knees started hurting a little towards the last 15 minutes but other than that e z p z.. now i have a tarot order to do before bed and then nothing on my schedule until sunday.

i’ve begun microwave shopping with the boyf now that he’s on his own in our condo, as he wants one so we can meal prep and heat things up easily. mostly to save time/have less of an interruption during most days, but also for dieting. he always tells me what he eats and shows pictures, and he is not eating enough at all. i talked to him about it today and told him to beef it up a bit because he’s getting into disordered territory (he already does body check photos and calls them such, has been prone to under eating and has toyed with multiday fasting), and he tells me not to worry and that he’ll be getting a nutritionist soon so he doesn’t fall into bad habits. he plans on getting one through the gym he wants to join, but he may go back to his previous one if that falls through. she did a pretty good job last time. in the mean time i’ve convinced him to up his quantities a bit for tomorrow. the dude has a bmr of 1800 and is eating around 900. jfc dude. it’s bad enough i have someone else that i’m always talking out of taking too much lax to purge and dealing with that, i don’t need him going off the rails too. and no, neither of these people are aware of what i’m up to in analand. i’m sure to eat normally in front of ms lax, and in front of my dude too when we’re in person with each other.

i wonder if i can ever undo this damage i’ve done to my eating patterns. the entire two weeks i had my dude here i kept thinking “once this is over i can starve again” every time food or beverage hit my lips. i might have really done it this time. i’ll revisit this thought in 50lbs.

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maliro-t · 5 years

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10 Tarot Drafts Babey!! You can click them to see what cards I’m going off of (or they’re under the cut w/ some explaination). They’re in chronological order for what I’ve done so far.

I don’t post abt process in depth that much on here but this is the kind of project that I spend hours prepping for and thinking about, and I worry there are a lot of choices that don’t make a lot of sense if you aren’t in my head so I want to justify myself. Also I’m too excited about it to just. Not. So. Big long under the cut

thank you to everyone on this post for the inspiration!!! you’re the real heroes

My process for these involves a decent amount of reading ( I use ata-tarot as my main resource which is immeasurably helpful), write a bunch of notes, figure out what kinds of symbols/ images I’m interested in as related to the card, and then it becomes trial and error with composition until I’m satisfied.

(highlights from my Extremely Intellectual Notes include: “make them fucking ice axes you cowards”, “are they moons? are they tomatoes?”, and “it’s her reflection binch”)

So! Some thoughts for each of them!

Quentin- The Fool

This was the one that started it all lads, and it’s kind of a given, since the fool is the one that sets the story into motion and sets us down the path, so to speak.

Eliot- The Magician

I went back and forth on this one a little bit because there are definitely a few different people that I like in this spot and mostly it came down to Eliot not really feeling right to me anywhere else. But, yeah, creativity, individuality, a balance of logic and emotion. Eliot. (also, potential, which is why I went with a s1 eliot look. I’m not gonna explain all of my symbolism choices in these because we’ll be here forever but I wanted to make sure that one made sense lol)

Fen- The Empress

I really love the reading of El as the Empress, but this one was such a Fen card for me- Maternal archetype, unconditional love and care, facing even daunting tasks with a smile.

Margo- The Emperor

Structure, regulation, ruling with a firm hand. Armor. Yeah. High King Margo.

Fogg- The Heirophant

Keeper of forbidden/secret knowledge, often associated with tradition, institutions, and mentors or teachers. So, Brakebills was the immediate thought for me, and more specifically Fogg.

Kady- The Chariot

Kady was really tough for me, and I kept moving her around, but I like the chariot. The main association is with emotional control/force and mastery of self, which, of all of the main crew Kady is the best person in this camp imo. She’s incredibly disciplined, particularly in this area, hence her proficiency with battle magic.

Josh- Strength

Josh was another tough one for me, but strength deals with the ability to rise above emotion and desire (the “inner beast” if you will), and while that’s not how I would categorize him at first glance, more than one of Josh’s major story beats deal with. kind of that exact thing. oddly enough. So, that plus some symbolism stuff made me really love this one for him.

Penny (specifically 40, i guess)- The Hermit

This one emphasizes being above emotion and desire, which I think maybe he’d like to think he is (he isn’t), but aside from that it also is about deliberate self isolation and sacrifice of one’s old/ material life as a part of a search for wisdom, as well as listing to one’s ‘inner voice’. I think Penny’s isolation is more about protecting himself, but I still really like this one. Also, he literally gives up his life, twice, and as a result becomes Woke Library Man.

Alice- Death

This is actually the first one I drafted, and the second I was absolutely sure about. Death is one of my favorite cards, and deals with transformation, resurrection/rebirth, and chaos, which I feel really encapsulates her whole journey from s1 to s4, with all the different (sometimes literally resurrected) versions of her we see, and her eventual search for redemption (another kind of rebirth) in s4.

Julia- The Star

Funnily enough, I didn’t actually make the hedge connection until after I’d already marked her down for this one. The star is about hope, light, and divinity, particularly in the face adversity and despite maybe having lost sight of the path, which I really, really love for Julia.

Anyways, these are the ones I really want to finish, but I have 5 others I’ve marked down If I get to them. In the mean time, this is proof that I’m actually doing something, even if it takes me ten years and consumes part of my soul along the way.

#my art #wip #the magicians

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narutaleseries · 5 years

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ABOUT NARUTALES This series is for us to really indulge ourselves in different ships of Naruto we felt like we didn’t get enough of or were written badly.

There will be one volume at a time. Each volume will feature either one zine, a cookbook, a tarot deck, or some other sort of format. If possible, each volume will be physical, with merch. All volumes will have an overarching theme of bonds, exploring relationship in Naruto. Some types of relationships that can be explored are: - familial (ex: Naruto/Iruka, Sasuke/Itachi, sand siblings) - romantic (includes LGBTQ+!!) - teams (inoshikacho, Akatsuki, the Sanins, etc.) - mentor-mentee (Sakura/Tsunade, Sakura/Naruto/Sai/Yamato, etc.) - and friendships (where can I start, there are so many!)

The tentative plan would be that each volume would concentrate on one type of relationship. Before each volume starts, there will be a vote to see which type of relationship will be the focal point of the volume.

My tentative plan for each volume will be as such: Volume #1: Physical zine with merch: Volume #2: Physical Tarot Deck with merch Volume #3: Physical Cookbook with merch and potentially more volumes depending on interest level! There is a possibility for maybe projects that have never been heard of before!

This series will be canon non-compliant, meaning they’re based on canon, but one can change and shift around events or diverge from canon. A rewrite of sorts. With that said, I’m also thinking of having these zines be story-focused, so more comics and fics-with-art kind of thing, but that is just a tentative plan. I also have a half-idea of how tales is a homonym of tail, referring to how Naruto was ostracized due to being a jinchuriki of the nine-tailed fox; how all the jinchuriki’s were isolated but that I’ll work on later with my mod team. if you feel the same way, or even just want to enjoy more ships in Naruto, please consider joining, and/or showing your support!

TENTATIVE SCHEDULE Nov 10 – 30: interest post Dec 1 – 22: mod apps -- Dec 24: results sent Jan 5 – 30: survey Feb 1 – 21: contributor apps -- Feb 29: results sent Mar 22: ideas/assignments Apr 12: check-in 1 May 3: check-in 2 May 31: final June: formatting June – July: preorders Aug – Sept: productions period Oct – Nov: shipping period

FAQ Q. Who is the current mod? What kind of experience do they have?

A. Mod Humanbob, pleasure to meet you!

(Website is currently under construction but it’ll be finished very soon)

Q. What will the current mod be doing for this project?

A. My major role will be organization, and my minor roles are communication! I’ll also be chipping in on other tasks, however, as I do have experience in all aspects of modding (other than graphic designing and formatting though. I can correct things but not make things myself - I’m hoping to learn how to do that soon 👀).

Q. Wait a sec - doesn’t Mod Humanbob have two other projects she’s working on? How will she manage them all?

A. Totally understandable concern! I’ve been staggering the schedules so the busy moments won’t overlap, as well as tried my best to place busy moments on holidays or times when I’m not busy with irl things. I’ve also decreased the workload by a lot by having templates of pretty much everything, which I can simply copy/paste for each project and adapt it. I also really like prepping everything before the project actually starts, so then a lot of the work is already done. For example, if you’ve noticed, all my projects have Twitter, Tumblr and sometimes Instagram already set up, with the theme and everything. I actually have most of the things sorted out, it just needs filling in with the help of my mod team and implementing. I have all the items needed for up til creations period - maybe the end of creations period even.

I’ve also been a part of 4+ zines at once, 2 of which I was basically head mod for. They are both completed or in the shipping phase as of now. Thus, I am not inexperienced in participating in more than 2 projects at one time.

Q. What mod roles will there be?

A. I will be taking in 3 - 4 mods, for a total of 4 - 5 mods. each with 1 major role (organization, marketing, graphic designing, or finance), along with 1 - 2 minor roles (communication, formatting, shipping, writer liaison, artist liaison, merch liaison). All mods must be able to chip in on various other tasks - things like participate in discussions, help make decisions and/or helping another mod out with a task. A more detailed description of what each job entails and how I envision the mod team to be will be posted with the mod app. I’ll also be taking on mod interns as well! Details TBA in the Mod App Post!

Q. Will the mods have to stay for the whole series?

A. Nope! You can decide to stay for all the zines, 3 of the zines, or just 1! So long as you let me know! I’ll be asking at the end of a zine whether you’d like to stay for the next one. The only rule for this that I think is best is that you cannot leave and ask to come back, ex. you mod the 1st zine, not do the 2nd, and then ask to come back for the 3rd.

Q. Manga or anime? What about the Rock Lee Spin-off?

A. All of them. They each have a special something that really adds to the story - it was so dope being able to not only read but also watch my favorite story in the whole fucking world. Rock Lee Spin-off is a fucking wild- Wait what? You weren’t asking about which ones I like, you were asking which ones will be included? Wow how rude. Hmmm good question - what would you guys want to see?

Q. What is the General Interest Post?

A. This is to quickly gauge everyone’s interest in this project ! If you want this zine to happen, all you need to do is reblog or like the post or follow the Tumblr/Twitter.

Q. What is the Survey?

A. The Interest Survey will be a Google Form with questions asked by the mods about what you want from the project. There will be one for customers and one for contributors.

Q. How will the contributors and mods be compensated?

A. For the time being, this project will be for charity - this means all profits made after shipping and product expenses will be given to a charity. I’d like to provide each contributor and mods each a free bundle, though, but that will have to depend on how sales go. If sales don’t go so well, then everyone will each receive at least the zine PDF, and a chance to buy everything else at production cost.

Q. What charity will you be donating to?

A. The organization has yet to be determined. I will discuss it first with the mods I hire, and then possibly ask in the interest survey which organization you all would like us to donate to.

Q. I have other questions - what do I do?

A. Feel free to message or send ask to @narutaleseries , or even through my personal blog @humanbobjeanpants ! You can also tag me or this zine in a post, or reply to any of the posts here. You can also email [email protected] , or dm or tag us on Twitter!

#faq and about #naruto #naruto shippuden #team 7 #team 9 #team 10 #akatsuki #konoha #sakura #sasuke #kakashi #gai

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bondsacrosstime-blog · 5 years

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Remaining Orders Announcement

Hi! My name is Cari, or @Storyofthedoor online, and I will try to explain what is taking so long with the shipping! :D Sorry this announcement is really long, it is quite detailed, I tried to thoroughly explain what has happened with the remaining 60ish orders.

TL;DR version: 60 orders to go! Struggling with getting money transferred from one mod to the other. Still trying though!

Long version:

First I want to apologize that it is taking so long to finish the last orders. When I joined this project, I really wanted to make sure the shipping was fast! I’ve been a part of, and purchased, a lot of zines that take months and months and months …. To the point that I’ve wondered if the zine is actually coming or….? So I didn’t want that to happen to Bonds Across Time. I’m sorry that for some orders, they have had to wait a long long time.

So I’m gonna start at the beginning, and then try to explain the difficulty.

In the beginning there were two mods! They were Nayuun and (x). They worked on Bonds Across Time together throughout the making of the zine. Nayuun organized artists, and (x) organized writers, and the zine came together to the point of being a book ready for preorders. At this time, I was just an artist. My total involvement was to make an art, and occasionally talk to Nayuun. I didn’t attend to anything other than that.

And then the paypal problems started.

Some of you who have been wanting a book since the beginning of January remember the paypal account being frozen with funds in it just a little bit into preorders. There was never a way to get the funds out of paypal. Nayuun tried to talk to paypal several times, and if you’ve ever had a problem with paypal, you can imagine how that went. Their customer service does not particularly deserve applause. At all. There was no resolution, all the preorders were returned to the buyers. Around this time, (x) needed to leave the project. Their work is still in the zine, but they had no other involvement after the initial paypal problems.

This left Nayuun by herself, and this is her first zine. It is most definitely difficult to run a zine, especially as a single mod, and especially if you’ve never done it before.

So I, Story, joined the mod team! C: My duties are getting stuff printed, and shipping out US and further abroad orders. Nayuun will handle Canadian shipping.

I’ve run a few projects, including kickstarters and a tarot deck zine, so I feel comfortable working with printers and doing shipping.

With this new layout of mod tasks, Nayuun and I opened preorders again! This time with payments being directed to Stripe, through the Storenvy shop.

Now begins the second round of financial problems. Remember: Nayuun has not run a zine before, so couldn’t see this coming. I *have* run zines before, but I and my fellow mods have been completely US based while running them. Nayuun and (x) are both Canadian.

Preorders go great through Storenvy with Stripe receiving payment! Honestly thank you for that. C: We are both really grateful that the preorders went well.

Storenvy is set up to receive payment in USD and dish it out to Stripe in CAD. (Because both prior organizers are Canadian this set up makes sense. This right here is where the problem happened. If hindsight was helpful at all, I would use hindsight to make Stripe receive funds in USD.)

No problems so far.

Because I, Story, am handling the printing and most of the shipping, we determine it’d be easiest if I received the payout from Stripe.

Stripe is holding the money as CAD.

My bank accounts are all in USD.

This isn’t really that big of a problem ….? Americans and Canadians transfer money to each other and conduct trade all the time…..?

We deposit the money into Nayuun’s bank, Stripe won’t let anything else happen.

There are plenty of ways to transfer money internationally. Paypal comes to mind, but we’ve just had huge problems with paypal freezing funds. Also they take a percentage instead of a flat fee. So two other methods are more common with large amounts of money. Wire transfers, and money orders. I’ve done both wire transfers and money orders, but only to US and China receivers. I’ve never tried to receive a wire transfer or money order from Canada.

I think a wire transfer is faster than a money order. It only takes a few days. So I tell Nayuun to try it. I provide bank info for me.

For this first wire transfer attempt, I use my local credit union. I go in person and speak to them, they say a wire transfer from Canada is fine? It just needs to land as USD. Sounds fine.

A few days later, Nayuun’s bank receives the money back and claims they can’t send money to my credit union. To be fair, that credit union I use is small, who knows if they even know what they’re doing.

So I use a larger online bank for a second attempt at a wire transfer.

I guess which banks we’re using is not terribly important private information. This is a wire transfer from TD Bank in Canada, to Discover Bank in the US. These are two giant, common banks. They both know how to do wire transfers. I mean they probably both do wire transfers, to each other, dozens of times a day, independent of Nayuun and myself. Is there something I’m missing or not understanding?

We wait for the transfer to work. Nothing. TD Bank says it will take 4 - 5 business days.

I call Discover Bank. They say it will take 14 business days. They also say they cannot look up the wire transfer without a firm USD amount. When we initiated the wire transfer, it was for this large sum of CAD, and I assume a fixed USD amount was not given because it would be based on the exchange rate the day the transfer occurs……………? Discover Bank will not look up the transfer with the firm CAD amount. Who knows why. No amount of asking or calling will change their refusal. If I were to try a wire transfer a third time, I think we should initiate it as a firm USD amount, and whatever CAD is required is what goes. Not exactly convenient there but possibly more traceable by Discover.

TD Bank now claims the wire transfer may take up to 20 business days.

We wait ….

We waited a week for the first wire transfer to fail.

Now we wait four weeks.

The second wire transfer fails.

No explanation is given. None. At. All.

I know it’s hard for you, the preorderers, to count out the time here and understand why things are taking so long.

We closed preorders mid Feb or something like that?

And then had to wait about two weeks for Stripe to release all the funds to Nayuun’s bank.

And then we work on the zine and put it all together and get the printing going. Maybe a week or two for print prep and initiate the printing. I think I paid for printing beginning of March on all the merch and books.

A week to try a wire transfer.

Four weeks to try ANOTHER wire transfer ….

And we arrive now at mid April.

This …. Might? Maybe? Lead you to ask how any merch has been printed at all? Or how any zines have been shipped at present? If the funds have been tied up in multiple failed wire transfer attempts?

I, Story, have been paying for the printing and the shipping so far, just on my credit card. I don’t mind getting it all going. I do really care about the project. C: I love zines, and I love self publishing. I really want people to feel happy preordering an artist produced book, too! The helpfulness of a credit card is it does allow me to get a project going! While I wait for Stripe to make funds available … while I wait for a wire transfer … and a second wire transfer … but of course a credit card payment does come due. I paid for all these things at the beginning of March. That billing cycle closes end of March. That bill becomes due end of April, and I must pay the card bill or pay an additional interest penalty. That is how the credit cards do the do.

So! Here in a week or two I am indeed paying this card bill, for a few thousand dollars of printing and shipping. ^^; I have a bit of money saved, it will be ok.

But I’ve got about 40 orders left to ship, and about 20 orders that are Canadian and need to go to Nayuun for her to ship. And I have no more money to get stuff going until one of these methods of fund transfers works out.

It is pretty tiresome and frustrating that the funds exist, they just can’t be moved from Canada to the United States? None of our banks will tell us why.

Now we are trying a money order. When I last shipped a proof copy of the book to Nayuun, it took about 9 days? She lives in Alberta, I live in Maryland. Maybe in 9 days I’ll have a money order in my mailbox? *But can I just point out here that we have experienced first hand that MAIL DOES INDEED MOVE BETWEEN US …. Ok money order, you have no excuses.*

I’m sure you can imagine, I feel pretty dumb now. I’ve spent a lot of money, and am struggling to be reimbursed, and it is no one’s fault. Not Nayuun’s, not mine, just cosmic bad luck maybe. All we can do is keep trying to find a way to deal with a funds transfer? If not a money order through the post office … then…. Western Union? Or we try paypal again (my hopes are not high.)

I’m sorry again that I’ve got all this stuff printed and I’m unable to get the remaining orders going until we can manage this funds transfer. ;_; I really hope a money order would finally work. That would be really great if this kind of old fashioned method could just go through and be fine. ^^;

Thank you to those who have received your orders so far and loved them! You’ve made all the effort worth while, and I really appreciate it. C: I hope that when the remaining orders go out, they will be worth the wait.

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forfansbyfans · 6 years

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Challenge Yourself: A FFBF Artist Interview

Homestuck Tarot Acts 6 & 7 - Cards Illustrated: Queen of Pentacles, Four of Wands, Page of Swords

It’s always fascinating to see how huge the Homestuck art community is all over the world - Where are you from?

Coastal California, born and raised

We’re in love with the tarot deck! Can you tell us a little bit about how you became involved?

Aryll (who organized the event) posted about it in a Homestuck Art server I'm an admin for (the Homestuck Artists Discord Server) to help get the word out. I was one of many people who was excited by it. I'm incredibly impressed by her selections for the cards, every one was absolutely perfect. (Also she's an amazing artist, and the project is filled with incredible artists, and being able to work with them and get crits from them and see their process was also just incredibly fun and fulfilling.)

Tell us a little bit about the artwork you contributed to the deck – how does the art tie in with the meaning behind the card?

Alright, this might take a bit, partially because I did three and partially because there's a lot in there. I'll try to get into what I can!

Queen of Pentacles: The Queen of Pentacles is a perfect fit for Jane and the Nanasprites. I drew Jane as the queen she is in Propsitian regalia, with a maternal Nanasprite on each side to offer guidance, resources, compassion and playful mischief. The cake Jane's holding with the pentacle frosting represents her material wealth, financial success and security. It hints at her business and creative talents but in a way that's entirely hers, without any crockercorp baggage tainting it. She holds it with an open hand, representing her willingness to share with family and friends. She's centered in the piece, emphasizing her stability. At her feet grow pumpkins, that are both a literal image of pumpkins she grew that (though she didn't know it) sustained Roxy and an entire city of Carapacians, as well as a metaphor for the life and sustenance she creates for those around her. The life symbol on her throne furthers these themes. Lil Seb represents caution (he's on guard, ready to protect his charge) with Jane's hand on his head representing her compassion and maternal affection. (Not to mention holding him back from causing too much mischief! The Queen of Pentacles knows how to keep her family in line) In the background, prospit shines in all its glory, a flourishing kingdom of gold. Skaia shines above, an entire universe waiting to be born, in part thanks to Jane's hand, but she's down to earth and her eyes are set forward, focused on the practical, there here and now. Jane is a great character. I love her and I loved drawing her.

Four of Wands: The Four of Wands depicts S: Unite, one of my all-time favorite flashes. The alpha kids come together in person for the first time ever in a series of shenanigans and time travel. I took some artistic license with the chains on the lanterns so they'd reflect the wands in the original card. Where in the original it evokes a Chuppah, here, homestucks lanterns represents the very life force and the interconnection of the alpha kids. At that very moment, Jake's kiss has caused Dirk's lantern to burst with life, spreading the light of that to all the other lanterns as well. There's also an echo of Dirk's heart symbol in Jake's lantern, and the light almost seems to pierce through Jake's heart. (A lot of this symbolism was in part inspired by some fantastic essays on DirkJake and the lantern scene in particular by RevolutionaryDeulist on tumblr, which I definitely recommend checking out! :3) I tried to keep a symmetry and sense of movement to the card. It's a card of happiness and reunions, that both follows and precedes a lot of hard work. It's everything coming together at one moment, and even if things might get hard again soon, for a while now pure joy. Dirk, Jake, Jane and Jake all see (or are about to see) each other for the first time in person, after what is probably the worst day of all of their lives and a lot of work. While it harmony, celebration, goals achieved and reunions and unions of all kinds, its also a transitory card and can even symbolize a breakdown in communication. (Something that the alpha kids, unfortunately, had plenty of problems with!) Dirk, Jane and Roxy are both acting and watching. There's more to it, but this is the most complicated of the three and I'm afraid the hardest for me to explain, and I seem to be repeating myself so I'm gonna stop now.

Page of Swords: The page of swords is a perfect Tavros card. He's energetic, passionate and creative. Tavros is waiting in the beginning, eager to begin this new project, and look what a beginning it is! An army of countless ghosts waits with him, inspired by his charisma and kindness rather than forced. It's about being ready and moving forward. And importantly, he's successful because he made the choice to do this on his own, ignoring the voices that told him he couldn't succeed and wasn't good enough. It's a card that encourages you to find the people who will nurture your ideas rather than those who bring you down. It also represents communication, which is what it took for him to gather up this army. The breath sign in the clouds is there for multiple reasons. Breath is, of course, Tavros' symbol, and also, the Page of Pentacles is a wind card. But within the Homestuck canon, breath also represents freedom and charisma and many of the aspects of this card. (Also, god rays are cool and fun to draw and make some neat lighting effects.) Like Tavros, of course, the card only represents the beginning. It represents gathering people and friends, and communicating with them, new ideas and the start of something great. But Tavros at this point understands himself well enough to know his own strength. He formed the army, but he isn't the one to take the lead, and he's okay with that.

How have you grown as an artist over the years and what has helped you grow?

Practice is great for improving, but more than that you need to challenge yourself, and you need things to inspire you to do so. I've been drawing since I was three, graduated with a BA in art, and been living off caricaturing for almost a decade. But I also felt like my art was stagnating, and the thing that inspired me most has actually been Homestuck. I actually only got into it recently, only a few years ago, but it's gotten me drawing for myself again for the first time in a long time, and the art discords have a lot of events that have been encouraging me to draw. So even the time I've started drawing homestuck my art has improved more then it had in a long time, and I've really had fun with it again for the first time. But the best way to improve is definitely to find the things your worst at, and study and draw it a lot. Bad at hands? Study a bunch of pictures of hands. Learn anatomy, skeletal and muscular structure. Trace hand photos, draw your own hands. Bad at backgrounds? Study landscapes, trees, perspective... etc. Trying to do different things and work with different styles is good too, things like palette challenges can be great for helping things stay fun and inspired. Sorry, I got a little rambly, and I guess its more a general list of things I learned then the things that sparked my own specific growth, but hopefully it's helpful!

What’s your process? Where do you find inspiration?

I like changing things up. Sometimes I'll sketch thumbnails or even the base sketch on paper, then draw from there in photoshop. Sometimes I'll play with pure color or light and shadow and sort of carve out images. I like to play with art a lot, and how much prep I do varies depending on what I'm drawing; usually if its a commission or illustration with something more in mind I'll do more thumbnailing and have a more structured approach. Inspiration varies. Music can be great for it, Homestuck is hugely inspirational. Games, stories, movies, etc can also all be great. Also I love having themed events, or drawing gift art for people. (Bonus, I love making people happy so I find that particularly satisfying.)

What kind of impact has Homestuck had on your life and art?

It's become my favorite piece of media. I could (and have) gone on a multi page rant about why and everything I like about it. But in an attempt to be succinct, its an interesting complex story with great characters and the perfect balance of humor and serious moments. Seriously, I love every character. It's also, like I mentioned, got me drawing for myself again. I've been drawing much more and improved a lot thanks to Homestuck in the few years since I got into it. I owe a lot to it, and for all people speak bad of the fandom, I think there's much more good then bad, and try my best to be part of the former, trying to help it be a place of encouragement, growth and happiness for everyone involved. :3

What advice would you give to a younger you?

Oh man. There are so many answers I could give here. I'd encourage more introspection. There's a lot of things about myself it took me too long to discover, or things I did because I was following someone else's definitions of success. Teaching myself art with some of the fantastic resources available and focusing on my own goals could have spared me ridiculous amounts of student debt.

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#homestuck #Hiveswap #artists on tumblr #forfansbyfans #tarot #queen of pentacles #four of wands #page of swords #illustration #fan art #what pumpkin #sburb #interview

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savevsfacemelt · 3 years

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Crowmurder essay #3 - Education

Alright, so we’ve talked about how I conceived and prepared for Crowmurder, and how that concept and preparation changed during play.

Did that work? Oh yeah, it was a great campaign, both for me and for the players. But that doesn’t mean everything went perfectly, and there are lessons to be learned from what fizzled or didn’t really click.

So refresh your memory about the game if you need to, and then come back for the last GMing essay in this trilogy of posts.

Failure! It’s how we learn!

When prep goes bad

I do a lot of prep for some games, barely any for others, depending on the system and the group’s style of play. I’ve done more and more for the last few campaigns, and if I’m being honest, much of that is just needing something to do during these interminable lockdown, something that feels creative even if it’s ultimately just brainstorming things that only matter to me, a light to briefly push back the dark emptiness threatening to hollow out everything around me.

...I digress.

I did a lot of prep for Crowmurder, and as mentioned, I ended up changing much of it during play. I’m 100% fine with that; a lot of that prep helped me get a strong enough grip on my ideas to be confident changing them on the fly. There were also sections of prep, such as a few NPCs, that never came into play, but that’s just how GMing works; you draw 10 rooms in your dungeon, even though the PCs will probably only visit five or six. What makes that work worthwhile is knowing that they could engage with that prep and enter those rooms.

What I realised, as the campaign ended, was that some aspects of my prep didn’t serve an actual function because there was no way they could come into play. A timeline of backstory events, the alien mindset of the daeva, a set of images about 19th century Mardi Gras in New Orleans... I pinned these (and more) concepts down before we started, but never came up with a way to work them into play, whether at the start or as we continued. These concepts were ultimately worse than wasted efforts, because I had to do additional mental labour to move beyond them to create content I could actually use at the table.

The lesson here is not to do less prep - do whatever amount works for you and that you find useful. Instead, it’s to make sure that that prep can actually be used in play (probably by also prepping avenues for introducing it) rather than just sitting in your notes folder and getting in your way.

Respecting ransacking your sources

Adapting other material is a time-honoured tradition in gaming; everyone rips off bits of Star Wars and Lord of the Rings, after all, and I’m a big believer in reskinning Shakespeare for your own ends. Adapting/reimagining one game’s adventure into a different setting/system isn’t as common, but it’s certainly not unknown. But as with all adaptations, you need to know what to lift and what to leave behind, and I slipped up a couple of times with my Ravenloft homage.

Of all the RL references in the campaign, the weakest was the Tarot reading scene. This was a homage to Madame Eva’s card reading, which is a cornerstone of the original module. Here it didn’t serve anywhere near as strong a purpose, it slowed the session down and made it less interesting, and it felt out of place given that the NPC giving it was the head of a drug cartel rather than an ethnic-stereotype fortune-teller. Another iffy inclusion was the zombie fight at the church. This was a hugely fun scene, don’t get me wrong, but as the game progressed it felt increasingly out of place to me, setting up expectations about the game’s feel and tone that didn’t properly pay off.

On the other hand, I wish I hadn’t just handwaved away all of the dungeon-crawl aspects of Ravenloft. The final sessions in the Plantation House felt a bit underwhelming to me, too prosaic and too easy for the big finish. It might have been more fun if I’d populated the House with a few weird dungeon rooms, maybe with shadowy psychodramas and oddball monsters for the PCs to overcome. After all, the one RL castle monster I did keep - the ‘Meld Monster’, which became the grotesque Rougarou - became a really compelling part of the game.

The lesson here is kind of like the last one - it’s to think about how concepts, especially those drawn from another source, might work and feel in play rather than in a vacuum. Will the tone of this idea match that of other game elements? Will it be cumbersome to unpack for the players? Will its effect be the same as it was in the source material, or pull the game in a different direction? The question of how will this work is at least as important as is this cool.

Too many moving parts

From conceptual issues, let’s move onto mechanical ones, such as the level of cognitive load I felt in busy scenes, specifically fight scenes with multiple opponents.

MoTW doesn’t require much detail for NPCs - harm taken/given for minor enemies, a couple of moves for major ones - but it’s tracked separately for each one, and the numbers are granular enough that handwaving them felt unsatisfying. Add to that the various abilities that players/PCs can bring to bear, and the amount of mental effort I had to apply to fight scenes became problematic - especially in an online environment.

The first group fight scene, with zombies and gators and snakes, wasn’t so bad, although I was losing energy by the end of it. The second involved four bikers, four cultists, an undead wizard and a shadow monster, spread across multiple locations, and by the 2/3 mark of the session I was exhausted and couldn’t keep proper track of what was happening. From that point I only ran combats with 1-2 opponents, which made them more manageable but also less interesting.

There were other issues with cognitive load, mostly due to the complexities of managing four players, with four sets of mechanical/narrative abilities and agendas, in sessions run over Zoom where I couldn’t use most of my in-person social and management skills.

The lesson here is that running a game is... not hard or special, sure, but it’s demanding in ways that aren’t always obvious. You need to be aware of the mental overheads of both your game system and your play platform, and not develop session plans that push too hard against those parameters.

Adapting for short sessions

Speaking of which, I think we’ve all learned by now that online play demands more energy and focus than face-to-face play, although I still struggle to explain why that’s the case. A two-hour Zoom session on a school night can be more challenging than playing for 4-5-6 hours in person - and part of that is working out how to adjust pace, and GMing, and mechanics, and so on. You have to deliver more story beats in a shorter period of time, make sure fights are fast and don’t flow into another session, compress and/or extend scenes to make sure they fill up the right volume... stuff like that.

And in some cases, you need to check mechanics, which I didn’t do. Like most PtBA games, Monster of the Week has start-of-session/end-of-session moves and rules, and I didn’t examine these enough when we started play. Specifically, I didn’t consider that the end-of-session hand-out-experience rules would trigger about twice as often as expected, meaning that the characters quickly became more effective and powerful than I had planned. The final sessions thus lacked tension because the players knew they had enough safety nets and Luck points to be challenged by what I brought to bear. (I compensated by drilling down on emotional beats for the ending, but it was still a little weak.)

The lesson? Session length can have both narrative and mechanical impact on your game, in ways that aren’t obvious, so think about that before you start play and adjust accordingly. That’s a basic tip, but one that affects pretty much all of us while we’re stuck with shorter, online, socially distanced play.

I did this to myself

There are fewer pop songs with ‘Boys’ in the title than you might think, and finding an appropriate one for each session’s writeup was a pain in the hole.

Okay, I think that’s everything.

I hope folks found this series interesting and/or useful! I don’t think I’m going to do anything this in-depth in the future, or any session-by-session writeups. The era of long-form RPG writing is coming to a close, and shorter, simpler summaries and articles at the end of a campaign seems like the way to go from here.

Well, like they say - if you gotta go, go with a smile.

#Crowmurder #Monster of the Week #ravenloft

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whichwitchami · 6 years

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Let your path guide you

This is a bit of a rambly rant that hopefully will have an important message for baby witches.

It’s okay to label yourself, but please keep your options open.

When I first started out in witchcraft about 2 years ago, I noticed a lot of lists floating around tumblr that all talked about “what kind of witch are you?” they said things like Kitchen witch, Divination witch, Green witch, and Water witch. Seeing those lists I became very overwhelmed and a little obsessed with trying on each hat and finding which label worked for me.

That got annoying real quick. Sometimes I didn’t have access to things. I live in Ohio (Iowa when I started) how could I possibly truly know if I was a Sea witch? I don’t have access to the ocean. (Side note: there are ways around this for you landlocked souls who are in love with the sea.) I don’t think blood magic is for me so I don’t even wanna go near that. Also, at the time I had very little concept of Cultural Appropriation and could have quickly gone down a path that wasn’t for me.

Eventually I gave up trying different hats, looked at the list and said: “These ones sound like me. I like these ones.” Thus, I became a kitchen/ cottage witch who was also a green witch. I wanted to work with plants and do a bunch of kitchen magic.

I held on to that label for a looooong time. But here’s the kicker: I hate cooking. I really do. Especially since I usually only cook for myself. It’s too much effort to cook and clean and plan and prep and....ugh. Also, I kill a lot of plants. I love them dearly, but I do not have a green thumb.

So that led to some serious cognitive dissonance for me. I didn’t know how to practice magic because I was so concerned with giving myself a label and only practicing witchcraft that fit said label. Needless to say, I didn’t practice much and I gave up on magic for several months. I didn’t touch my tarot cards, didn’t cook anything special, didn’t do anything.

Shortly after I moved to Ohio I found an amazing little shop (affectionately known on my blog as “fave shop”) and I fell in love with their crystals and stones. I slowly started buying a few at a time (or you know...20 at a time if I had no self control that day.) and now I have over 200 tumbled stones, plus two shelves worth of spheres, points, palm stones, and so on. I taught myself how to use those crystals in grids and taught a class at fave shop. I became known there for being the ‘expert’ on crystal grids. So whenever I’m in the shop and someone asks about grids, I get called on to answer. At this point, I’m starting to self-identify as a crystal witch. (disclaimer, I’m not an expert. My sources are one physical book and all the posts i could find on tumblr)

I’m comfortable with that label. It fits me, but I didn’t force it on myself. My practice guided me there. I didn’t look at a long list and randomly point and say “that’s me.” (I mean I did but it didn’t work and I had to rethink that method.) I let myself find the path in my own way, in my own time. I can tell you I’m a lot happier with magic now, and I haven’t given up on it since I moved to Ohio a year and a half ago. I still identify as a cottage witch as well, but its more of a secondary label and I use it as a broad definition of my desire to keep my home safe and happy by using magic. I don’t confine myself to the crystal witch label either. I love using crystals to enhance my craft, but I don’t shy away from candle spells, or bath spells, or potions either. I do whatever makes me happy.

The overall point of this: be flexible with your labels. It’s okay to use them, its okay not to use them, just don’t limit yourself and your craft because of them.

#crystal witch #witch labels #witchcraft #beginner witch #beginner witchcraft #witchcraft 101 #personal rant

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you-got-yourself-a-bad-witch · 6 years

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Now I’ve gone and done it

Whelp. I finally caved and created a separate blog for my witch things. I suppose it’s part of my new years resolutions? I’ve been lurking, watching, and liking things for a little over a year now in the witch community, and since I’m practicing I figured I might as well share my practice with everyone. And I got a sweet new camera for Christmas so now I can take bomb-ass photos of everything A bit about me... Right now I’m living with a roommate on the 3rd floor in a city, and I’m trying to keep my craft from being found out by her. It’s made things... Difficult, but I’ve managed so far. The plan I have right now is moving out to a bigger city in about 6 months. I’m stoked. Finally being able to practice in a place I can call my own? Perfect. So far my witching has been around celebrations with teas and baths, because those are easier to hide. I mostly do spells focused around self-love and healing, but once I move out I’m expecting to do a lot more. I’ve practiced with tarot cards and tea readings, but my favorite area of practice is dream divination. I work graveyard, and I sleep a lot and have more vivid dreams than most people I’ve found, to the point where they’re almost their own adventures every night. I’ve had a lot of fun digging around and seeing what the dreams mean, and I’ve done it a few times for friends too. Still have a lot to learn, and I’m thinking about offering a few dream-readings later on this blog just to practice more, but that’ll be down the road <3 One area of witchcraft that’s never spoken to me much is ... crystals? I bought some when I first started, and I got some crystals from another witch to help me out, but I’ve never felt drawn to them, so if that’s your cuppa tea, you probably won’t find it here. About four months ago I found and became acquainted with a local coven. They’re so nice and have been super helpful with a lot of things, but other than that, my only experience with witchcraft has been here, though tumblr, so needless to say... I have a lot to learn. This blog is just going to be my experience through it all, and I’m looking forward to sharing with you and getting to know you all better. Right now everything is under construction so please forgive me while I prep and rework everything to my liking. Pretty much everything set up so far is temporary. It’ll look better I promise! Well. Didn’t mean to write so much, so I’m sorry if you’re still reading this. I promise my other posts won’t be so lengthy (maybe), but I wanted to jot everything down to get the ball rolling. So, let’s have a little fun, shall we?

#witchcraft #witches #witchblr #witch #spellcaster #about me #yes hi hello i'm new here #there's a good chance I'm already following you

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miss-tilney-tarot · 7 years

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Rough Week

It has been a crazy week. It was supposed to be a vacation, and I got sick for all of it! So all of the cleaning went down the drain. Unfortunately, I also had to reschedule a job interview. I took like four showers a day to attempt to clear my sinuses, and it didn’t really work. I have only just started feeling better. I also had a panic attack for the first time in a long time, which sucks a lot. I thought I was over them. But a nearly empty box of fries snuck under the coffee table and got filled with ants, and apparently, that warranted a full blown panic attack. But I did end up deep cleaning that whole room with a fever, so that’s cool?

In happier news, I go full time at my office job next week, and have a job interview for a really cool job. I also have my first day for a job that is a few hours a week to boost my income and look good on a resume, so I’m excited. I interview prepped all day today, which was pretty fun actually.

Finally, check out my post at Magical Mavens! I am writing a tarot column called Tarot with Miss Tilney!

Next week’s post will be an answer to this letter:

Dear Miss Tilney,

I recently started a new job and have been trying to connect with my co-workers and build a circle of people I can work well with. I have been placed in a smaller group with two others. These two, let’s call them Nancy and Shelly, are both around my age and are friendly people. However, I have connected more with the outgoing Nancy more so than the more reserved Shelly. Shelly does engage with others, but she does seem to have an interest in talking to or involving me unless absolutely necessary. The three of us have been assigned a single project that requires to work closely on. How do I get Shelly to reach out to me instead of me always being the initiator?

Sincerely,

The Invisible Coworker

I hope everyone had a good Sunday!

#tarot

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trentteti · 5 years

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Predictions for the March 2019 LSAT

It’s only six days before the March LSAT, so it’s time for us at Blueprint to dust off our crystal ball, unpack our tarot cards, and focus our powers of divination. That’s right. It’s time to make some predictions for what’s going to be on the March LSAT.

Now, we don’t have any insider information about what’s going to be on the LSAT. We don’t even have especially keen powers of divination — our crystal ball is completely ineffectual (we bought it on sale at CVS) and we can’t read our tarot cards (we just think they look cool). I, for one, am wrong about all sorts of things. For years I thought Bill Pullman and Bill Paxton were the same person. I’m aware of the harm of perpetuating this belief and the social stigma it caries, but I’m sort of willing to entertain the idea that at least part of the moon landing was faked. One of my core, guiding principles is that no name (first and last) should have more than four syllables.

So I’m wrong a lot, and maybe not the most trustworthy person in general. But I do follow the LSAT very, very closely (perhaps more than any sane or healthy person should), and have a pretty solid grasp on where the test is trending. And that, I think, is ultimately more helpful to someone about to take this test. If I made a bunch of a specific predictions, I’d be wrong about most of them (as would anyone trying to predict exactly what’s going to be on the test) and that would be of little use to you. If instead gave you a more general sense of what’s likely to appear on the test, you’d at least have some general guidelines that would help you prioritize certain concepts in your studies during the waning days before the big test.

For March test, then, I’m only going to make one specific prediction, and then I’ll try my best to give you a general sense of the types of questions and concepts that will probably appear on the exam, based on how this test has been trending for the last few years.

So, first up, the specific prediction: They’re going to re-use an old, nondisclosed test for this one. Probably a test that they used for those test takers who observe the Sabbath and cannot take the exam on a Saturday.

Why do I think this? Well, there will be way more LSATs in 2019 than there have been in any previous year. The exam used to be given four times a year. In 2019, it will be given seven times. So LSAC is responsible for making three extra LSATs in 2019, a (check my math) 75% increase in its output.

And if you think taking the LSAT is hard, think about how much harder (and expensive) it would be to write the LSAT. Not only do you have to come up with all the insane topics that show up on these questions, you have to rigorously test the questions to make sure they produce predictable, standard responses from test takers. It is, to put it mildly, a whole thing.

So LSAC probably can’t afford to make three more LSATs every year. Instead, they’ll use an old nondisclosed exam that never got released to test takers or test prep companies. There’s some precedent for this, too. In 2018, LSAC reused the nondisclosed February 2014 LSAT for the then-brand-new July LSAT.

LSAC could theoretically use an old February test again. But I sort of doubt they’ll do that. By using an old February exam last July, LSAC drew quite a bit of ire from test takers who, rightly or wrongly, felt that this gave people who took the February 2014 exam an unfair advantage. (I, for reasons discussed in this old post, thought those test takers were overreacting). LSAC probably doesn’t want to incur the wrath of angry pre-law types again, so I don’t think they’ll use an exam that was seen by as many people as a previous February test.

So I’m thinking they’re going to use a test that’s only been used for an international LSAT administration or a Sabbath-observer administration. An old Sabbath-observers test feels right to me, since the March exam will be given on a Saturday, and Sabbath observers — by both religious custom and LSAC fiat — cannot take the test on a Saturday. So there will be no one — law-school-bound recent Sabbath-observing religious converts aside — who takes the test on March 30th who had seen the test previously.

This is a prediction I make sort of reluctantly. It’s not one I mentioned to any of the classes I taught. I didn’t want anyone to have the idea that the last week before the test should be spent scouring the internet for information on Sabbath observer exams given between the years 2014 and 2017. Since those exams weren’t disclosed, these searches wouldn’t yield anything helpful. And trying to figure out whether an exam was previously used as you took it could be, at worst, a distraction that most test takers can ill afford.

But, I figure if you clicked on a blog called “Predictions for the March 2019 LSAT,” you’re already on that search. So I’m willing to make that prediction for you. I’m nothing if not a people pleaser.

Other than that though, I think can be of more help giving you a general sense of what to do study in these final, fleeting moments before Saturday. In Logical Reasoning, Strengthen questions have been the most common question type. And an increasingly high proportion of Strengthen questions have been of the Principle variety. So study up on those. Other than those, expect somewhere between six and eight Flaw questions, four and six Necessary questions, three and five Weaken questions, and a handful of Soft Must Be True questions. Get lots of practice with each of those questions. We’ve seen fewer and fewer questions that ask you to identify the formal aspects of an argument — like Main Point, Describe, and Role questions — and almost no Must Be False questions, so those questions aren’t worth prioritizing in your studies.

Also, in Logical Reasoning, the two most important concepts have been, and will certainly continue to be, conditional statements and the common fallacies. Recent exams have had a lot of questions involving conditional statements — the average is about ten questions per exam. However, very few of these exams involve making long, ornate transitive deductions. Most just require you to know whether a condition is sufficient or necessary. So study up on the language of sufficiency and necessity. Of course, knowledge of the common fallacies helps you on a ton of questions. But there are a few common fallacies — particularly causation fallacies, comparison fallacies, equivocations, and exclusivity fallacies — that you appear more frequently that you should spend some extra time studying. Recent exams have been positively replete with causation fallacies, in particular, so make sure you study how to identify causal relationships.

Over on Reading Comprehension, I would expect to get a passage about science, a passage about the arts, a passage about the law, and a passage about history or the social sciences. Passages recently have been structured around a few different organizing principles recently — like trying to prove a cause and effect relationship exists, or attempting to answer a question. I wouldn’t be surprised to see most or all of the passages organized around one of those. The relationship between the comparative passages on recent exams have generally been a little oblique (such as, one passage discusses a general problem, and the other discusses a specific instance of that problem), so make sure to practice identifying the big picture relationship between the two passages on the comparative passages you do this week.

Finally, on Logic Games, you will almost certainly get one basic ordering game, one tiered ordering game, one grouping game (probably what we call an “unstable grouping game”) and either a second grouping game, or a game that combines ordering and grouping. The odds of getting a truly bizarre game is fairly low. But it’s possible that they’re going to draw an old exam from the years in which they briefly got super into weird games, so the odds are, unfortunately, not zero. But nearly all or all of these games will be a lot easier if you construct some scenarios before the first question, so make sure to review all the rules and deductions that are commonly useful for making scenarios.

If you place emphasis on these concepts during this last week, then I will make one final prediction: you’re going to do great.

Predictions for the March 2019 LSAT was originally published on LSAT Blog

#LSAT #March LSAT #predictions #trent teti #lsat

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silence-ion-om · 6 years

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Dead or Alive 2.0

Today I asked my clients what makes them feel dead and what makes them feel alive. It is a version of an exercise I posted about here 5 years ago that just reemerged into my consciousness when I was planning my art therapy group. Isn’t it wild how cyclical things are?

One thing I have learned about this “dead/death” concept, both from tarot and from life experiences, is the element of ending and letting go that it entails. I elaborated on the original exercise by encouraging my clients to consider what is holding them back that they need to let go, and what they would like to nurture and cultivate. Life-Death-Life cycle all around. Here is what I came up with:

ALIVE:

My relationships. I am co-cultivating a great love with a wonderfully supportive, understanding, patient and kind partner. Seriously, he is like a living wishlist of things I didn’t know I needed (and some I did) that I put out into the Universe and man, did the Universe deliver in a big way. I wish I could go back in time and tell me from 5 years ago to be patient and wait and ride out a lot of heartbreak because this is worth it.

Reconnecting with a dear old friend who is walking a similar life path to mine right now, and feeling some divine alignment in that reconnection. I think it is seriously cool how people from our past can come back into our lives exactly when we need them so we don’t feel alone, and her badassery inspires me.

Living with my aforementioned travel buddy best friend, still pulling each other out of funks with perspective taking. I also have a diverse and resilient team of coworkers that I can count on, which greatly contribute to feeling alive at...

Work. Yes, I have days when I feel less than lively here but overall, my work gives me life. I get to help people for a living. I get to hold space for folks who don’t always have it and hear secret stories that beg to be brought into the light and teach families how to talk to each other. I am in a more open place lately where I can intuit what my clients are trying to teach me. My boundaries are feeling fortified after A LOT of work building. I got that license, which seemed to mean everything to my baby therapist self and I have learned that being an MFT doesn’t help with credibility as much as my confidence. (Because I AM a B.A. MFT y’all!) Work is the kind of “life” thing that vascillates between dead and alive all the time. Up until very recently, it was starting to feel heavy and uninspired but I did something about it instead of staying stuck. And now I get to make art with teenagers.

My tarot practice. I am learning so much and seeing things manifest. It feels meaningful in a way I never could have predicted, like I am tapping into Jung’s collective unconscious every time I read. A different type of spiritual experience for sure.

Writing, art and this flow of creative inspiration I got going lately. Two days ago, I woke up from a dream and decided to write a young adult novel. (NaNoWriMo, here I come!) Two months ago, I submitted several art pieces to an online art magazine. My brain feels abundant (sometimes a bit overabundant) with ideas and I am enjoying it to its fullest potential.

My dog. I call him Cyrus the Great for a reason. Sometimes if I am really still, I can literally feel the dopamine rush to my brain when I stroke his sweet little face. This dog has kept me from going to the dark places and I am beyond grateful that I got to keep him.

The smell of this rain right now and the season of fall. Summer sucks for a myriad of reasons, so fall is my time of rebirth.

DEAD:

(Still) worrying about money, student loans and bills. Having a scarcity mentality of “never enough” when it comes to the end of the month or I’m between paychecks and anxiety sets in. Five years later, the difference is that I’m doing something about it by budgeting and consolidating and generally trying to be more mindful of where my money goes. Baby steps, people.

When I feel like I don’t have enough time. Still feeling rushed, like there is not enough time in the world to possibly accomplish all I need to do to a lesser extent. More scarcity mentality. I am learning patience the hard way. This is directly connected to…

Future-fucking myself. So many (Fakebook) friends seem to be getting married and having babies and somehow managing to buy property despite the Denver housing market’s madness. It’s killing me in a very specific way because it fuels jealousy and comparison and makes me lose sight of my values. Yes, I desperately want all those things but I also want to do them on my time, without feeling rushed. I’m hitting snooze on that stupid biological clock.

Work (certain aspects). Told ya it could be both. What I used to feel was a really inspiring and unique opportunity to do school based therapy is leaving me feeling underwhelmed and disconnected. It’s taking longer than it has in the past to get into the swing of things. I am giving myself some time to figure out why this doesn’t quite fit before I make any decisions.

Sedentary lifestyle. I no longer ride my bike or exercise everyday. I miss that. I also eat a lot of crap when I don’t carve out the time to meal-prep. Some of this is also related to recovery, learning to think about the things I put in my body and why I am choosing to at that moment.

Sobriety. It’s just existing, which is entirely my choice. This one exists in the middle. I’m feeling like A.A. doesn’t fit the way it used to but that does not negate its usefulness or mean there is no space for it in my life. I am understanding my relationship to alcohol and the label that entails differently, and it’s complicated. One of the perils of a know-it-all sober therapist I guess.

Unhealthy or old relationships that no longer serve me. I keep coming back to this one, and I think it is one of those curious cycles that will keep repeating and teaching me no matter how old I am. Cliche as it sounds, losing my Mom has taught me that life is too short to put up with unnecessary bullshit from people. I get to chose who I let in my circle as family, including blood relatives and old friends, which is a radical concept I still grapple with.

#dead or alive #therapy #tarot #sobriety #griefjourney

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ulyssessklein · 6 years

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Becoming a full-time musician: How one artist took the leap

Going pro. Quitting the day job. Taking the plunge. Living the dream.

A year ago, Laini Marenick (of the band Laini and the Wildfire) quit her day job and became a professional musician. Like the first year of any new business endeavor, there were many ups and downs.

Laini was kind enough to answer questions about the challenges and rewards of her new life as a full-time musician. I think her story will be useful for any artist who’s considering taking a similar risk.

An interview with Laini Marenick

When did you decide to quit your job and pursue music full time?

It was a slow process that involved me testing the waters first before I committed to the idea of being a full-time musician.

In the summer of 2015, I had a catharsis of sorts after spending two weekends in a row at what I guess you can say were “life-changing” concerts. One was the Newport Folk Festival, and the other was Lake Street Dive. I felt so alive and so real and authentic—it was like I rediscovered a part of myself that I had buried for so long—more than 10 years. I came home, and the next day our song “Newport” spilled out of me which described that exact experience.

We were already in the process of writing our debut EP, and now I was really questioning what I wanted my future to look like. Those cathartic moments at the concerts solidified the fact that I needed music to be a bigger part of my life.

That Monday morning, I told my boss I had to step-down to part time, and I was part-time for about a year and a half before I finally left my job completely in August 2017.

What pieces of the puzzle had fallen into place where you felt like it was time to make the leap?

In the year and a half that I was part time, I adjusted to making less money. I consolidated my debt. I started “budgeting.” I cancelled a bunch of monthly services. I lowered my car insurance payments and my student loans. It all adds up. You don’t realize how much money you’re wasting until you don’t have any money to waste! I also picked up a few private piano lessons for extra income.

But even with my financials in order, things were still unbalanced with work and music. My work was suffering. I was trying to direct a program for kids with severe emotional problems on a 3 day/week schedule, and it just didn’t work. And my music was suffering too. I was completely drained trying to push forward with the upcoming release of my album Wandering. Things were falling out of place rather than falling into place. I guess you can say it came down to one of those cliché “shit or get off the pot” moments.

So like any normal human, I drank some wine and asked my friend to give me an impromptu weeknight tarot card reading, which pointed me in the right direction (and inspired our song “Wandering”). Deep down, I already knew the answer was to quit, but leaving a job that I loved and had devoted 7 years of my life to (plus 6 years of school for my master’s degree in social work, a clinical license, and all of the accompanying debt) was terrifying. But at this point, I was already functioning with a lot less income, so I had some confidence that I could figure out how to make ends’ meet when I left my job completely.

How do you self-manage your workload as a pro musician? What’s an “average” day look like?

I make sure I always set aside time to schedule out my week, and that whatever I’m working on is related directly to my goals—which I create every 3 months or so. It’s so easy to become overwhelmed with the all things you have to handle as a DIY musician—social media, booking, writing, rehearsing, making videos, marketing, publicity—I mean the list goes on and on.

I usually start the day with something that makes me happy and excited to get out of bed. It often involves walking my dog and listening to a podcast, or cooking a breakfast I really like. Then I block out my day according to my goals/tasks. If I’m writing, I do that first since that’s when I’m the most focused. I spend 15-45 minutes on social media talking to people and posting content, followed by 2-3 hours on music business related tasks, which could be any number of things depending on what my goals are.

Around lunch time, I take care of any personal calls/errands, followed by a short break. In the afternoon, I usually rehearse on my own. By about 4:00, I’m headed off to teach piano for a few hours. I have band rehearsal a few times a week in the evenings. I also try to do as much food prep, cleaning, laundry, and social media at night so that I wake up with less on my to-do list.

What’s generating the most revenue for you?

It fluctuates. Generally, live shows are where we make the most money, especially when we’re able to get on any festival shows, as opposed to clubs/venues. Merch/CD sales are a close second.

That’s regarding the band’s income. A lot of my personal income comes from teaching private piano lessons. I know many people might feel like that’s a “day job,” and teaching may not be for everyone. But for me, the fact that I am doing something related to music every hour of the day—whether it’s teaching, writing, booking, etc.—is inspiring. It feels effortless and fun. It doesn’t feel like a chore. I don’t feel drained. It’s a stream of income that feeds me emotionally (and physically!), and it feels good to know that I’m helping these kids discover something that has been such a guiding force in my life.

What do you wish you knew a year ago that you know now?

I let the beliefs of the general population get to me. I questioned myself often. “Am I too old to be doing this? I’m over 30. I should be focused on having a family, not pursuing some crazy dream.”

No one was saying these things to me really, but I felt like the world was judging me. And I think a lot of women who are over 30 and not living the typical “have a family and settle down lifestyle” feel the same way. So that pressure I felt fueled some anxiety for me. I had to get the album out as fast I could before it was “too late.”

Now, I’m more focused on just writing the best song I can and not rushing anything because my biological clock may or may not be ticking. Our music attorney said something once that stuck with me: “You’re not a loaf of bread, you don’t expire.”

And though I still have my moments, I believe that most of the time now.

What have been your biggest successes in your DIY marketing efforts?

Twitter has been really great for us. It’s unusual, I know, since Twitter is typically just a black hole of politics and random people DM’ing you to “check out their latest song.”

We developed a method that helps us connect with like-minded people, and we’ve made friends and fans all over the world, which is really cool. Anyone we follow usually will check out our page, and see our music video (great video content is important) which is pinned right at the top. Usually, they’ll start engaging with me right away.

I talk to everyone who talks to me, and I ask our Twitter followers personal questions. I know a lot of them by name, not just their Twitter handle. Lots of people have impressive numbers in terms of Twitter followers. But the fact that a lot of our followers feel connected to us and have become fans of our music is a big win.

The other thing I’m really proud of is all the press coverage the band received for Wandering. Doing my own press campaign was grueling work— 50 different blogs, tons of research, some harsh rejections, and Excel spreadsheets that seem to go on forever—but still, I’m so glad I decided to DIY it. I got a ton of features for the band and ended up on the cover of the entertainment section in a major local newspaper that’s sold statewide.

How about your biggest failures?

The Spotify playlisting company we worked with when we released Wandering didn’t quite give the impact we hoped for. We got added to a few playlists, and the increased plays were cool to see, but nothing ever materialized. We were hoping for exposure to a larger audience than what our results showed, and that some of those listeners would become fans of the band (not just the song). That didn’t seem to happen.

I will say that the team we worked with was GREAT, and we may try it again in the future. But for this particular release, it was disappointing, especially since this was where almost all of our album marketing money went. It felt like a huge failure since we kind of banked on this to help “take us to the next level.” It didn’t.

Besides streaming promotion, there some piece of the puzzle that’s still missing, that you think could take things to the next level… next time?

I think we have yet to create that undeniable song that becomes the trademark for the band. I love all of the music we’ve created so far and I’m extremely proud of it. But, we’ve been a band for less than 3 years, and the songs that we’ve put out are literally the first songs I’ve ever written.

Our EP and album were definitely experimental in terms of us figuring out our sound and who we are as a band. I think now we’re a lot clearer on that, we play better together, and we’re better able to blend the guys’ hard rock roots with my love for 60s soul and powerhouse female vocalists.

So, the focus as of right now, is to write the best songs we can write. We’re also working with a producer this time around, who produced some gold and platinum records. Up until now, all our songs have been self-produced, and I think having that extra set of ears is going to be huge for us in taking our music to the next level.

Your “Live from the Lake” video series is really cool. How did it come together?

One thing we’ve learned is that video is king when it comes to engaging people on social media. We thought doing a cover series would be a fun way to engage our fans and maybe get some new fans, but we wanted to make it a little more exciting than your average cover video.

We are lucky enough that our drummer, Rob, has a boat and we usually all hang out on the boat in Lake Zoar anyway, so it felt like a natural fit. Our bass player, Mark, brings a small recording device for the audio that he later runs through ProTools, and we film using an iPhone on a tripod.

People loved the first one so we rolled with it! They are SO much fun to film, but never without challenges. The wakes, the camera falling over, bugs, the shaker falling IN the lake (shakers float by the way)—we have more outtakes and blooper reels than you can possibly imagine!

[Editor’s note: Release ALL those blooper reels!!!!]

What’s next?

We are currently in a writing phase and hope to have some new songs out by Spring 2019. Other than that, I’m diving deep into social media marketing so we can expand our following and hopefully by the time our new songs come out, we’ll have some really excited fans.

What would you tell someone who’s ready to take the plunge and tackle music full time?

The stories you hear where someone just impulsively “quit their job” one day so they could pursue their dreams are misleading and make all of us feel like being a full time musician is impossible. Maybe that technique works for a small portion of the population. But for the majority of people, including myself, becoming a full time musician means months and maybe even years of planning.

Take one small step at a time, until you’re financially and emotionally ready. You’ll be surprised at how your motivation increases and opportunities open up as you gradually start spending less time on work, and more time on music.

And when you do take the plunge, have a routine in place and specific goals/tasks that you work on everyday—some related to the actual music making part and some related to the business side of things.

What are your go-to resources for your career?

The DIY Musician Podcast is my favorite, and one of the early sources that I credit to giving me the courage and knowledge I needed to figure out how to pull off being a full time musician. I also really like the Break the Business podcast and I find the Song Exploder podcast very inspiring for writing.

I also own some of Tom Jackson’s Live Music Method DVDs. Totally worth the investment for any live band who wants to up their live performance game. And if there’s something you’re really confused by, but know you need to do it to move your career forward (like licensing, or social media marketing) take an online course. I’ve taken courses with Dave Kusek’s New Artist Model and Bree Noble (Female Musician Academy) and have had positive experiences with both.

Thanks to Laini for all the info. You can hear more of her music HERE.

If YOU recently took the leap to full-time musician, I’d love to hear your story. Holler in the comments below.

The post Becoming a full-time musician: How one artist took the leap appeared first on DIY Musician Blog.

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athousandsouls-blog1 · 6 years

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⚜ atsco: part three

“Someone died here.”

Summary: Bonnie’s first night in New Orleans does not go as planned.

When the bus pulls away there is a sense of finality. She is in New Orleans. Stuck (well, until a return trip can be booked).

She can’t very well stand there all night (though there is part of her that thinks it is not such a bad idea). The strap of her bag is pulled to rest on her shoulder and she begins to walk. She does not check to see if Kol is behind her. In her head she sees the map she has carefully studied. Turn right at the end of this block.

“Where are you going?” He asks. He is not behind her. Rather he beside her, slowing his gait so that they walk in unison.

“Creole Inn,” she answers. “Approximately twenty minutes from here.” She glances at him expectantly, as if to indicate he should use the time to explain why she is here in the first place. Thus far, she has avoided asking him straight out why it is he wants to see his family. But now that she is actually here, she thinks she deserves a heads up (in fact she will get a heads up before she goes anywhere near Klaus Mikaelson).

Instead of taking the hint, Kol makes a face. “Why would you want to do that?”

“What? Check into a roof over my head? Walk?” She retorts. “In case you haven’t noticed, I am not exactly rolling in money. This is the cheapest place I could find and I am not splurging on a cab. This is not a vacation, Kol. This is me going whatever it takes to get you to leave me alone.” She stops on the sidewalk which forces him to mimic her movement and narrows her eyes. “Start talking.”

He cocks a brow. “Here? Where anyone can bear witness to you speaking to thin air?”

“I don’t know anyone here.” Only that is not true. She knows the Mikaelson’s — she just wants to be fully prepped for when they came face to face once again. “I don’t care what people think of me. I just want to get this over and done with.”

“So eager,” he chides. “In the midst of a historic city and already looking to leave.” He begins to walk again, his hands stuffed in his pockets. She watches him for a moment, wondering just what it is that he is doing. He has backed her into a corner in the name of getting her here. Wouldn’t he want to get straight to business? Right now, he looks calm, cool, without a care in the world. She might hate him just a little bit more because of it.

“Kol,” she says and that hatred is evident in her voice.

He glances down, nonplussed and gives a jerk of his hand. “I believe you want to take a right here. If my memory serves me correctly.”

Because she has slept on the bus, she is not tired despite the late hour.

Bonnie lies back on the bed (too soft for her tastes) and stares at the ceiling. The inn was just as advertised – a roof over her head in the heart of the Quarter. There is nothing extravagant or ornate. Instead she has four walls, a place to lie down and a shower. Her jacket is tossed and her bag is shown the corner. She will not unpack. Unpacking means she is settling for a while.

He is at the window, glancing down at the street below. He hasn’t said much since arriving, merely quipped about the ‘hideous’ wallpaper before taking his perch. She has a feeling if this keeps up it will be a long night.

Her fingers drum a beat on the comforter as the silence stretches into uncomfortable territory. She is tempted to speak but there is no point. Unless Kol is going to confess everything, she is just wasting her breath.

He on the other hand has no problem wasting his (non-existent as it is).

“This city has so much history. Even before we came, though we have certainly left our mark on it.” There is a wistful quality in his voice that stills her fingers. She sits up, her gaze falling on him. He is still at his post in the window. He turns his head so that they lock eyes. “Political intrigue, battles, storms that nearly swept the city under — yet it has always endured. I think it is fitting that we chose to come here. Though, admittedly, I had no say in the matter.”

She thinks it over a moment. “You were daggered.”

“On account of my bad behavior,” he commented wryly. “I missed the first few decades in this city. Of course when I had served my time I was able to enjoy the fruits of my brother’s labor. A prince of New Orleans.”

He needn’t go on. She can picture just how he would enjoy his ‘title’. Bodies pile up in her mind. The look on her face must be one of disgust because he is grinning. She sits up a little straighter on the bed. “And just how long before you were returned to your coffin?”

His smile falters.

She counts it as a victory. Admittedly, she will never understand the dynamics of the Original Family. She lacks their age and experience. However — daggering, shoving one another in a box for decades; there is absolutely no logic to that. Not that she is going to point that out to him though. He already looks like he is smarting a bit and no doubt she will pay in some manner for her pithy remark. Despite her earlier comment that this is not a vacation, she’d rather not sit around and wait for him to decide how.

Bonnie stands, stretching out limbs still cramped from the bus ride. She reaches for her jacket, which has landed on the dresser. He doesn’t speak until she is buttoning it up. “Where to, little witch?”

She turns, her fingers fumbling with the top button. “Like you said, there’s too much history to be seen. And considering I am not about to fall asleep — carpe diem.”

She could just follow the crowd as it were. Apparently nighttime is as good as any to explore New Orleans. Bonnie is tempted, for a moment, to slip into the line that is slowly shuffling into one of the many bars. Even from her vantage point, she can hear the alcohol infused laughter. Considering how her life has so easily unwoven in the past few weeks, she could use a bit of that.

“Do remember that I will not hold your hair when you are sick in the morning, darling.” His voice is low, spoken directly in her ear. She shivers and then sends a glare over her shoulder. He is grinning again.

Apparently Kol can shuck off a barb easily. Or at least appear to have done so. She steps around the line with a sigh. “Throwing up in front of you is taking our relationship a step too far, don’t you think?”

“I sincerely forget that you have some bite to you until it is almost too late,” he states and she thinks he sounds a bit proud of her. She can do without that — she can do without Kol Mikaelson beaming with pride in her corner. “Do you speak that way to my brother?”

She doesn’t hesitate. “Yes.”

“And you still live. I would venture to say that you and he have some sort of unspoken understanding.”

Bonnie scoffs. “One that involved my ability to scramble his brain in such a manner that he didn’t have the luxury of killing me.” She presses her lips together and then turns toward him. “The night…the night you died I trapped him the Gilbert house. With your body. That was the last time I ever stood face to face with Klaus. He is not going to be welcoming when he sees me again and I can’t hold him back.” It’s a scary thought. She has seen Klaus possessed with anger and fury, has seen the aftermath.

“Ah, but you forget. You are the anchor. Immortal. He can’t kill you,” Kol points out, seemingly nonplussed that she has just admitted to pinning his brother in with his remains.

“No, but he can hurt me.”

Without any sort of spoken arrangement to the fact, Kol becomes her tour guide. There had been a few tense moments after her correction of his statement but then he had broken into a cheery grin she is coming to know quite well and announced they were so close to Jackson Square that they may as well venture on over.

It’s nearly deserted at this time of night. There are few people, wandering in packs (no doubt under the influence) but she is the only one that appears to be alone. She realizes that this sets her apart should anyone think of ‘relieving’ her of her belongs (they will be disappointed as it were). Still, her lingering nerves can’t take away from the beauty of this place altogether. In fact, she finds herself sinking down on a bench and just watching.

“If we had come earlier in the day, you would have found this place much more alive. Music of all sorts, tarot readers — most full of it but a few with the actual gift, people looking to sell you homemade charms and potions…” He trails off. Bonnie gets the feeling that no matter how short his time in New Orleans, Kol has formed an attachment to this city.

“It sounds like a tourist trap,” she tells him and decides she likes Jackson Square better like this.

“Be that as it may, there are hidden gems among the peddlers. I once found a powerful witch not far from here. She did not even know what she possessed. It was something to see…how she came into her own, how others to grovelled…”

Bonnie closes her eyes, her head dipping. That is not what magic is to her. Reveling in it, using it to force others to cower. Though it would be hypocritical for her to point it out. Her use of expression (and how she had enjoyed it) keeps her silent as he prattles on about his little protégé. Finally she looks to him. “You like them. Witches.”

He grins as if she has unlocked one of his secrets (though if she thinks on it, it is poorly kept). “I have always maintained a healthy respect for those who practice magic.”

“Your hands around my neck could speak to the opposite,” Bonnie tells him and her chin is tilted up now, as if she has gotten the better of him.

Kol shrugs. “Collateral damage I am afraid. We were at war, on opposing sides and at the time you were the key to everything. Removing you from the situation seemed the best option.”

Bonnie’s lips quirk at the memory of him on his knees in front of her, his face twisted in pain. “Seems like you chose wrong.”

Kol’s brows push together and then he too smiles. “That I did.”

It takes her a moment to realize that this isn’t right. Him waltzing them around memory lane instead of getting straight to the point. Her relaxing as she takes in the sights. The two of them sitting side by side on a bench, laughing as if they are old friends (that one seems worst of all, especially since the memory they are caught up in started with his desire to kill her).

Has she really forgotten, even for a second, just why she is here?

She stands abruptly and he looks caught off guard. She doesn’t owe him any explanation (in fact it is the other way around) so she starts walking in the general direction that they have come. He waits and beat or two and then falls in line with her step. Though she doesn’t owe him, the silence gets to her. “Look, I am not here so you have someone to relive your glory days with,” she begins. “I have a life. Things…people I am rather attached to. I’d like to get back to that.”

His features darken and whatever camaraderie (as twisted as it may seem) they had experienced moments before is gone. “Think about what you said — you have a life. I don’t. Your friends decided that my death was worth that stupid cure that got them no further ahead in the end.”

“Collateral damage.”

She regrets the words the moment fall off her lips. It is said with none of the humor that was found in Kol’s explanation. Instead it appears very much as she meant it to: a chance to throw his words back in his face.

It comes as no surprise to her that his hand snakes out so that his fingers can wrap tightly around her arm. Not really here, she tells herself immediately as if she needs a reminder of the reality of the situation (perhaps she does because she can feel his thumb digging into her skin). He appears just short of seething, eyes glittering as he dips his head in. “You’ve been here, Bonnie. Where I am now. Alone and in the dark, wandering. Tell me, would you wish that on anyone?”

A year ago she might have said she would. A year ago she might have thought it a perfect ending for monsters like Kol and his family. But she has experienced the reality of the Other Side. Near the end, her mind had practically caved in on itself. If it wasn’t for Jeremy, if it wasn’t for having someone to cling to she would have gone mad. “No.” Her voice is shaky, her eyes wide with memories she’d rather forget. He seems satisfied with her answer and his hand falls away.

“This is not a leisure trip, little witch,” he tells her. “You have real purpose for being here. However, if I want to take a moment to remember what it is like to be alive and walk these streets, surely you will not begrudge me that.”

Bonnie doesn’t respond. Instead she takes a deep breath and begins to walk again. Though she is still headed for her room, her steps are slower now. She thinks if she lets him get the nostalgia out of his system then maybe, just maybe, he will finally divulge whatever it is that has caused him to drag her here in the first place.

He follows, giving her some much needed space. For a moment or two she forgets he is even there.

That is, until he launches into a story of his dalliance with a lady of the night.

Turns out she was a werewolf.

Of course.

She skitters to a stop as she turns a corner.

It takes her a moment to realize why. Bonnie’s hand is on her chest and she takes a shaky breath. Death. There is death here — or there was. She sees no one in the empty side street but she can feel it. The remnants hangs heavy in the air, like a fog threatening to choke her. Behind her Kol is speaking of what a hairy situation he found himself in but she is no longer paying attention. Instead she wanders into the thick of it, each step cautious. Finally she can’t force herself to go any further so she stills.

“Bonnie?”

Her head turns to find Kol standing at the end, regarding her as if she has lost her mind. She thinks he is a few years too late to be looking at her like that. “Someone died here.”

“In this city, someone died everywhere,” he tells her.

“It’s more than that,” Bonnie retorts and she swivels as if the reason is going to make itself apparent.

It does.

Her features knit together as she sees it. Etched onto the side of a red brick wall in white chalk. A circle with a symbol dead center — hastily drawn but one she knows. She moves toward it just as Kol finally decides to follow. He is muttering something about detours. She is too busy reaching forward to trace her finger over the edge of the circle. She hisses, pulling back as if she has been burned. He stops beside her and eyes the creation with an untrained eye and a scowl on his face. “What the bloody hell is this?”

“Magic — and not the good kind,” she answers and she suddenly wishes she had opted to stare at the ceiling of her hotel room instead. Her hand drops and she turns toward him. “I would have thought someone who knows witches as well as you —-”

He is not there.

Bonnie spins her head in the opposite direction expecting him to be standing there. Instead she finds nothing but emptiness. There is a split second glance at the symbol as if it is somehow to blame. Then she hears footsteps.

“Very funny,” she spits.

Only she is not talking to Kol. Her eyes widen as she takes in the man standing there. He, too, has a look of surprise on his face. They eye one another for a moment too long.

Then she finally finds her voice.

“Elijah…”

#{atsco: chapter}

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