Airi I drew for an Instagram megacollab! The host gave me permission to post here before the full thing was done so here you go 👍👍 (transparent version under cut)

got any hcs for bay donnie 😇😇😊😊😊😊😊👁️👁️

Random-

-Even though Raph goes up top the most, Donnie is the one that wants to be human the most. Evidenced by his obsession with the mutagen, yes, but also his smaller behaviors. He wears more human pants and shoes than his brothers. He wears very generic glasses that everyone who's worn glasses has had before. He speaks the clearest imo. I think it's born from the fact that even though he's a turtle like his brothers, he's the tallest and least muscular of them. He doesn't feel like he belongs anywhere, a feeling that's made worse by their teasing.

-He has a really big fear of heights, and that's why he didn't dwell on the plane jump, he just powered through. That's also partially why he has Mikey on top of the truck instead of himself or a camera

-He is absolutely obsessed with racing games, especially those arcade ones where it's the whole seat and steering wheel. That's where he learned to drive, and why he goes so fast.

SFW-

-He's a fucking loser. I know this is the running joke in the movies and everything but I mean he is pathetic. If this boy was a human he'd be on the edge of becoming an incel. Like, the back of the class "devil's advocate" incel. Too many people make him cocky, and he can be, but if he likes you that man is fumbling at every step, every word, until you fan his ego enough to get past his insecurities.

-I don't think Don is an incel though, I think his unconventional upbringing has made him more caring. Despite having low empathy, I think if he can realize he likes you then he'll do things for you out of kindness. Acts of service, if you will.

-I think he's very emotionally dim-witted. As seen in the plane scene, he methodically goes over the plan and then jumps, not even seeing the apprehension from his brothers. You'll have to be direct and honest, he won't take offense to it.

Nsfw below the cut

NSFW-

-He's a fucking loser. If he likes you, this man is horny all the time over any little thing. Even when you're talking, he's entranced by the movement of your lips. He WILL be bad at sex at the beginning, especially because the most he's ever done is watch porn. He knows anatomy better than his brothers, yes, but don't think that correlates to romance or experience.

-A sucker for worship, from either party. He'll give it genuinely, because he's just so surprised you're his. That someone so perfect and human could love and want him and show him their naked body. But he also likes receiving it, he can turn into a cocky mf if you rile him up with praise.

-Does not care how you look or dress. Pizza-stained shirt, basketball shorts and greasy low ponytail? He wants to smash. Dolled up in purple just for a movie date? You won't remember the name of the movie, trust. He'd find all manner of body types, skin colors, hair textures, eye colors, etc very intriguing and beautiful, he wouldn't have a preference(none of them really would, seeing as they'd be lucky a human even looked at them with good intent). Part of it is you being everything he's always wanted. A partner, of course, but a human as well. He'd kill for that kind of opportunity and accepts his lot in life through having you.

-Once the first time awkwardness wears off Donnie gets good really fast. He's very observant when it comes to data, and he's seen that first sex as an experimental moment to help compartmentalize his feelings a bit and grow. He memorized every sound you made and what caused it, even if his memory is a little hazy at the end from all the pleasure.

-You will peg him, or fuck him if you have a dick. There's no debate here. And he will cry pleasure tears.

-Whines into the back of his hand. For all he's overcome, he's still insecure about his looks, especially his O face and his mouth. Partially insecure about the sounds he makes, and partially trying to muffle himself so his brothers don't hear.

-Also talks, but very incoherently. Like only the first half of his sentences and it's very rushed and breathy.

-Will try anything in the name of scientific experimentation(and bc he loves you). Any kink you have, however small, can be communicated honestly with him and he'll try his best. He actually really likes when you tell him these things, because it's just more assurance that you really want him.

How are you able to draw so many Pokémon in so many dynamic poses?? When I draw I rely on skeletons and it can turn out a bit stiff, any advice? (Or not if you don’t feel like it, then just take this as a compliment! :] )

thank youuu!! i think my biggest piece of art advice in general- and it certainly applies to this- is to allow yourself to loosen up a bit, and don't rely on undersketching/construction lines too much. obviously this won't work for everybody, but it's what i've found works for me.

i took a little timelapse of a couple doodles to try and get across what i mean!

i try not to focus on construction lines, instead on flow, and lines and shapes that look good in the context of the whole.

obviously, anatomy is very important! there's a number of reasons ive taken comparative vertebrate anatomy this semester, and art IS one of them! but when doing stylized artwork like this, especially of things so exaggerated and slickly designed as pokemon, don't feel like you're beholden to exact anatomy! if you go back to the archeops&emmet drawing i did today- the legs are a bit off, the stance is too wide for something that's meant to be an archaeopteryx, if i drew in the skeleton over it it would certainly look weird. but the overall image still looks nice, because it feels right, and it flows well! i hope that makes sense/helps.

(also, one of the things ive found that helps with this, if you work traditionally- is to get more flowy/smooth materials. when i draw on paper, i ALWAYS use a mechanical pencil with 2b lead. that's a step softer than the typical HB stuff, and it glides across the page more smoothly and more quickly. i sometimes do doodles in pen as well, and i always use staples optiflow pens for that. this is because that particular kind of pen just OOZES ink, makes light/swift motions still have a nice looking line. it helps to get more in the groove of things, imo.)

Unpopular Opinion: Not all art exists to be critiqued.

And more than that, I thoroughly believe that critique is unnecessary and uncalled for unless the artist asks for it first.

This is going to get a bit lengthy, so bear with me. This is something that has been on my mind for many, many years. After having college art classes where group critiques felt very surface-level and one-sided, I think it’s high time that the art community, and any consumers of artistic media, take a step back and question how critique should be handled.

The immediate response to someone who resists critique is usually “Well you’ll never improve if you can’t handle critique” or “The world is full of opinions you don’t want to hear, so learn to get over it.” But I feel like that kind of callousness, and that need to shove an opinion on someone who didn’t ask for it, is incredibly inconsiderate and selfish. Last I checked, people are not required to tolerate opinions they don’t want to hear. And that’s all that critique is: an opinion. Not an end-all solution to something someone is struggling with. And people need to stop acting like their opinions are the Holy Grail of advice, and that if an artist doesn’t accept it, it means they’ll miss out on the chance to improve.

I feel like online critique is especially harsh, because many artists who start off online are very immature and stubborn. We’ve all seen that artist that uses “iT’s JuSt My StYLe!!” to excuse bad anatomy. We’ve seen newbies use traced doll bases or blatant art theft under the guise of “Well I’m still learning!” We’ve seen over-confident artists who fly off the handle over people who are genuinely trying to help them.  And yes, those kinds of people are very irritating, and give artists a bad name in general. But stop assuming that every single artist that won’t take every critical comment with a smile and a thank you is a whiny stubborn brat that can’t handle critique.  Oftentimes, artists have very valid reasons as to why they aren’t mentally and emotionally equipped to receive criticism in that particular moment. There’s a difference between constructive criticism, and pointing out flaws just for the hell of it. You can’t convince me for a moment that someone coming onto a drawing unprompted and commenting “Lol those eyes look shitty” is meant to be helpful or encouraging. It’s just dickish. And it’s only ever those types of dicks that then turn right around and say “lol learn to handle critique”. It really doesn’t cost anything to have common courtesy. “You should always be willing to accept critique” implies that artists should always be striving for perfection, which can be a very unhealthy mindset to have, especially towards a hobby. Yes, I believe that in some circumstances, aspiring artists should definitely be willing to hear out critique for the sake of improving their craft. If you’re entering art into a legit contest, if you’re planning on honing your craft in order to start selling your work, if you’re wanting to run a professional gallery exhibition, then by all means, you should be willing to reach out for professional opinions and advice. But NOT all art is made with the intentions of being “professional” quality. IMO, artists don’t need to constantly be trying to strive for improvement with every single piece of art they make. They shouldn’t have to treat a quick drawing they’re making as stress relief like a school project or an entry for a gallery exhibition. It really takes away the fun of doing something they love if the pressure is constantly on to do something perfectly. 

Perfection is overrated. It’s also bullshit. If someone spends more time trying to be perfect, they’re going to develop an unhealthy complex rather than just learning to have fun. Not everyone is making art for the sake of winning awards or entering into some professional gallery. So maybe stop trying to put on the pressure that art can only be valid if it is flawless, and winning awards or making money.

Artists are already their own worst critics. Unless someone is going “Yeah my art is great and doesn’t need to be improved”, chances are they’re already constantly criticizing themselves and working to push past their own doubts about their art. So giving an unprompted critique can feel like an affirmation of their insecurities, and may even kill their drive to make more art. Anxiety, insecurity, and other mental health issues can be negatively affected by unprompted critique.

Let’s kill the mindset that people aren’t allowed to shelter themselves from things that can be emotionally distressing, yeah? If something makes someone feel bad, it is not your place to make fun of them for it. And on the flipside, the idea that artists should take critique just because the intention behind it is sincere is laughable. Because regardless of intention, it can still have a negative impact on someone who has been beaten down by these “good intentions” most of their lives.  I’ve always hated unwanted advice; not just on art, but on anything. It brings me back to the years and years I spent being treated by my parents and peers that I was incapable of doing anything on my own. The only times I really started thriving and improving was when I did shit behind their back just to prove that I can do things on my own. And being told “it’ll look better if you do (X) instead” just makes those gross feelings resurface. It makes me doubt my own sense of judgment, even after many years of drawing and improving on my own. And finally:

Artists should be allowed to have agency over what kind of feedback they receive. This is why any website that allows feedback usually has the option to delete comments, or block users. It’s why people can be kicked out of public places if their shitty opinions are causing discomfort to those around them. It’s why people can hang up on phone calls.  Artists can learn for themselves what techniques should be improved on. They’re more than capable of looking up tutorials, finding free classes, or asking for their own advice. I am my own person, therefore I should be allowed to decide if and when I want to receive critique or advice. I should be allowed to trust my own judgment and skill enough to figure out when I’m happy with how a drawing looks, or decide when something looks off and I need a second pair of eyes. Taking away that agency can make an artist feel like their opinion about their own work ultimately doesn’t matter; that they’re incapable of doing something on their own merit, and that they’re only working to impress other people.

So all in all, it should be common courtesy to hold back on giving critique unless the artist asks for it. And it’s very shallow to jump to the conclusion that any artist who resists critique is doing so out of an unwillingness to improve.

ALL OF THEM (someone asked me to do that so I’m passing it along to you)

thank you!! Just managed to finish this before the kiddo woke up :)

1. favourite performance you ever attended

I’ve been to exactly 3 opera performances, and one was technically an intermezzo, and I’d say that one because it was a surprise that my teeny tiny home town that doesn’t even have an opera house despite being the third largest city in the state would do a production of a super obscure piece that I happened to love, AND it was in English with a hilarious translation, AND that translation happened to be by a friend of mine who worked at the theater that put it on (which is also the theater that turned me gay). The intermezzo in question was La serva padrona (which is fantastic look it up) and it was translated to Maid to Marry which I will never not get a kick out of.

2. a performance you would’ve wanted to attend (present or past)

Literally anything Mentzer has done that hasn’t been filmed which is unfortunately a lot (she was Idamante??? And Octavian?? And Adalgisa??? and Rosina?? and Prince Charmant with Frederica von Stade in Cendrillon??? seriously universe get your shit together she deserves more recognition)

3. a piece perfect for your commute

anytime I take a long walk I listen to Hoffmann, almost anytime I drive I listen to my mezzo boi playlist that consists of all my favorite trouser role arias/duets etc. (so, like, every one that I’ve heard)

4. do you have a go-to opera (and version)?

lately Hoffmann and Idomeneo (the latter of which I still think should be called Illia e Idamante or just Idamante but I digress). Versions would be: for Hoffmann, Sher (2009 & 2015), La Scala ‘95, and Brussels ‘85 and for Idomeneo Met 2017 and Salzburg 2006.

5. an opera you loved only on the second listening

as mentioned earlier, Idomeneo

5. a composer you have tried and failed to like

again not really sure bc I’ve liked most of what I heard, but I don’t really vibe with Glass

6. a character you love and definitely never want to meet in real life

Possibly Elizabeth from Don Carlo(s); love her because she’s wonderful and deserves so much better, but wouldn’t want to meet her because we would probably just cry a lot.

7. following up on that: your guilty problematic favourite character

hmmmmmm maybe Eboli?

8. forget anatomy/physiology. which voice category/fach would you choose?

mezzo :D

9. a casting/singer’s voice you’ll defend to the death. (now tell us why)

Nadine Sierra. Seriously people have been so mean to her in comments/reviews lately and it’s just rude because she’s amazing and adorable and talented and definitely one of my favorite divas, reins in my heart as my second favorite Countess Almaviva and is my favorite Illia and I want to see her as everything. People don’t even have anything specific about her to critique, they just say she’s bad. Which, it’s okay to just not like a performer, but don’t bash them because you personally don’t like them. Erg. Her voice and expressions SLAY me and she deserves only positivity.

10. and a production you’ll defend to the death

Sher Hoffmann. People are so mean to it in the reviews! I think it’s utter genius and the sets and costumes are so eccentric and fit the aesthetic of the opera so well, and the casts are amazing--anyone who wants to criticize Lindsey or Calleja can back off and never return. Also to all the critics who complain that it’s too risqué, they have obviously never seen the Geneva 2008 one where the chorus spends a good part of the opera almost fully nude, as does Olympia. Sher’s Hoffmann is my favorite and as the question states I will defend it to the death.

11. something you’re a rigid traditionalist (or revolutionary) about?

I’m kind of a traditionalist for ballet scenes in opera. I get it can be hard to stage those extended musical bits that aren’t as welcome now as they were back in the day, but how is it helping to make the choreography weird and irrelevant? I’d rather just have the ballet removed altogether than suffer through some weird staging. If a production retains the ballet, I would either like to just see some pretty dancing (actually, the Troyens that just streamed last night is a good example of that imo), or something related that’s also kinda funny (like the Wiener 2020 Don Carlos, though I’m not 100% okay with everything in it) or something that makes a statement about the opera (like the 2006 Salzburg Idomeneo, which I wrote a really long thing about earlier). My favorite choreography in any opera so far though is Mark Morris’s super awesome genderfluid choreography for the Met 2009 Orfeo ed Euridice because it’s just some really pretty dancing and also very gay. 

12. an opera that made you have an ~*awakening*~ of sorts (any sort)

Don Carlo(s), you probably know why by now 😉

13. an opera/music debate do you know so much about that people will suspiciously ask “why...do you know this?”

Probably Hoffmann and its various edits

14. rant about a topic/an opera you love but haven’t found a good time to do so on your blog.

I’m not really a fan of countertenors in castrati roles. I’ve seen some countertenor performers that I like, and some productions with them that I’ve enjoyed, but I really need my mezzo bois. I know there’s not really enough to justify one over the other, given the original voice type is now nonexistent, but I will take any opportunity to infuse more sapphic energy into operas. Plus, I just like the sound of the mezzo voice better. And a LOT of my favorite mezzos have played those roles and I seriously don’t know what I’d do without Alice Coote’s Idamante or Elīna Garanča’s Sesto. If a role was specifically written for a countertenor—I see this more in modern opera, Adès in particular—that’s a different story. I enjoy those. But for Baroque/opera seria, I wanna see mezzos.

Survey #320

we on a spree today!

Would you rather be twice as smart or twice as happy? Give me the happiness, please. What happened the last time you cried? I was having a PTSD episode. What happened the time in your life when you were the most nervous to do something? I think the most nervous I've ever been was in elementary school when I won the D.A.R.E. essay contest and had to read my paper in front of the whole 4th and 5th grade in the gym. There may be something else, though, there's just a LOT of instances where I've been an anxious mess. What was the greatest television show of all time? Meerkat Manor, man. I canNOT wait for it to resume, I believe this summer. What one thing would you be most disappointed if you never got to experience it? Maybe petting a meerkat, particularly a descendant of a Meerkat Manor character, Flower Whiskers in specific. I would cry, and that is a promise. I am just... so thankful for those little creatures. Because of them, I've met so many irreplacable friends and developed a hobby that was a way to dump my creativity into since I was what, 10 years old? What celebrity would you trade lives with? BITCH let me be Amy Nelson (Mark's gf) for OBVIOUS REASONS. Haha on a serious note though she is an INCREDIBLE person that I'm so glad Mark found. :'''') What story do your friends still give you crap about? Nothing, really. What is your weirdest dealbreaker? I'unno... define a "weird" dealbreaker. I find mine to be pretty reasonable. What’s the first thing you’d do if you were the opposite sex for one day? Well, look at myself in a mirror? See how I look. What is the weirdest quirk your family has? We have this thing where we say "I love you mostest period" at random to imply we love the other person more than they could love us, indisputably. How old is the last person you kissed on the cheek or lips? On the cheek, it was either my niece or nephew, who are 4 and 6. The person I last kissed on the lips is 22. Do you own a pair of skinny jeans? Not anymore, no. I don't wear jeans. Do you think you could live with your best friend? I would fuckin LOVE to. Do you have someone who you can be your complete self around? I'm most comfortable with myself around Sara. What were you doing when you found out Michael Jackson was dead? I was swimming in the pool while Dad was grilling lunch. The last person you kissed, was it a drunken or sober? Sober. Have you ever introduced yourself with a name other than your own? Online, I've introduced myself with my account name, but generally, I say I'm Brittany. Are any of your siblings married? I don't know about the half-sister I don't know, but two are married, and one is engaged. Do you use an umbrella when it rains? Not usually, no. When was the last time you had a lot of fun? A lot of fun? That's one damn good question. Probably not since I last hung out with Sara. The last time you cried, who was there to comfort you? I was alone. What was your most recent reason for smiling / laughing? I chuckled at something in a John Wolfe video. Are you attracted to the last person you talked to? Um, that would be my mother. So no. Do you like your middle name, or does it embarrass you? It's pretty, but I hate having it. It's one of the most common white chick middle names ever. Are your toenails painted? No; I don't paint my nails. When was the last time you couldn't stop laughing? Why? Probably a funny YT video, I dunno. Any ways in which you're very different from the person you love/like? We have some differing political views. Why did you first kiss the last person you kissed? The timing felt right and I love(d) her. Has anyone seen you kiss the last person you kissed? Yeah. Who was the last person’s voice you heard? Besides via YouTube, my mom's. Who do you get along with best in your family? Mom. Have you ever been kissed in a car? Yeah. Is there anyone in your life that knows right away something’s wrong with you? Oh, absolutely my mother. Has your phone ever gone off in the middle of a class at school? Oh god no, I'd die. The last time you washed your hair, did you use conditioner? I never do. It adds oil to your hair, and mine is naturally oily enough. Do you prefer light or dark jeans? DARK. Do you have an item of clothing that reminds you of someone? Tell me about it, and the person it reminds you of. I have a good handful of those. When you listen to music, do you generally sing along, or just listen? I just listen, usually. Do you have any of your exes as friends on Facebook? Yeah. Does more than one person like you? *shrug* You log into Facebook and see the red ‘1’ notification next to the message icon. Who do you want it to be? I fucking hate that my answer is "Jason." If your hair is long, would you ever think about having it cut short? Or, if it’s short, would you like to grow it long? As far as I'm concerned, my hair will never be long again. I love it so much more short. What if you were told that your life has to stay exactly as it is right now, and nothing will ever change? How would you feel about that? I'd... honestly probably kill myself. I don't know that with certainty, but yeah. I'd be pretty damn devastated. What’s the most expensive thing you own? Probably my snake. Name something you really can’t wait for? MAY!!!!!!! GIMME MY TATTOOOOOOOO!!!!! What do you want in your future? E.g marraige, kids… A great career, a healthy and permanent relationship, lots of pets, adventure, life satisfaction... Got any major celeb crushes? m a r k e d w a r d f i s c h b a c h Do you have any glow-in-the-dark items in your room? If so what? No. Have you ever stalked anybody? Yeesh, no. If you could be on any TV show, which would it be and why? I'll just hypothetically say I WANTED to be on television for this, because irl, I don't. Ummm. I guess That '70s Show, because I love the '70s, and it'd be so cool to have a big group of friends like that. What is your favorite brand of hairspray? I don't use hairspray. What is the last thing you tripped over? Our doorstep, lmao. Do you were glasses or contacts? If so what color are your frames/contacts? I wear black-rimmed glasses. Do you like stickers? If so what kinds do you like? Yeah. I used to collect them as a kid and put them all over my dresser. Do you like coloring? Yes. What is in your backyard? Some bushes and a shed. Maybe a tree. I've been out there like, once. Do you own a globe? No. What is your favorite wild cat? Snow leopards are the prettiest, imo. As animals in general, I find lions the most interesting. How many continents have you been to, and which ones? I've never left North America. How many continents has your best friend been to, and which ones? She hasn't, either. How many continents has your dad been to, and which ones? Same as above. Have you ever been so terrified that you felt paralyzed? Yep. What’s a place you have a strong emotional connection to? The community college I first went to. Particularly where Jason and I took his senior prom pictures. Who was the last relative you visited? Grammy, before she passed away. My uncle was with her, too. Do you ever wonder what kind of person you’d have turned out to be if a certain event never happened to you? Oh, certainly. I wonder all the time what would have happened if Jason didn't leave. I could still be horribly depressed, or dead, considering ultimately, the event led to me finding the help I so desperately needed. Or maybe I'd be perfectly happy with kids and know how to be an actual adult. I was only a teenager, and yet with him, I never felt more mature and just... capable. When you’re home alone, do you still shower with the bathroom door closed? Yes. Have you ever bought something really expensive and ended up returning it? I don't believe so. If you could have anyone’s singing voice, whose would you choose? Amy Lee is the brazenly obvious answer. What are your top 3 favorite genres of music? Metal, rock, indie. Same general category, I know, but it's almost all I listen to. Is there anything you’d like to say to your last ex? We're best friends, and I talk to her regularly, so I can tell her anything. Where did you buy your dishes from? No clue. We've had the same plates and bowls I think my entire life. Do you think Mars will be colonized in your lifetime? No. Have you ever been on a ship? Boats, yeah. I think ships are just the really big ones, right? Sails and all? Do you ever take intentional breaks from checking/posting on social media? No. Who was Van Halen’s better singer - David Lee Roth, or Sammy Hagar? David Lee Roth. He's an arrogant bastard, but boy can he sing. Which fictional character has the most memorable quotes? I don't know. Maybe the Joker. Do you watch The Office? Gossip Girl? Grey’s Anatomy? None of 'em. Name someone you know with a birthday in December: Sara! What color was the last vehicle you were in? White. What is your dad’s name? Kenneth, but he's just called "Ken." When was the last time you slept in a bed with someone else? Not since I last visited Sara. Do you have any indoor pets? Both my pets are indoors. How do you feel about teenagers claiming to be in love? It's entirely possible. I was; nobody could EVER convince me I wasn't. Are you dating anyone? If so, for how long? No. Do you know anyone with Down's Syndrome? I think so? What animal that is endangered is your favorite? Oh yikes, I don't know. I don't really know every endangered animal, y'know, and I love all animals SO much. Maybe elephants or tigers. How do you believe the Earth and life on it was created? I feel like there was SOME sort of ultimate intelligence that created the universe, but I don't know anything about it/him/her/whatever. Then I believe in evolution. Basically, some sort of conscious creation, and then let life do its thing. What’s your religion? I don't have one. You could say theism, but is that even a proper religion? Do you like your teeth? No. During my worst depression, I was very bad at taking care of them, and now they have a yellowish tint. Have you considered getting contacts that change your eyecolor? What color? Oh yes, I've wanted to have more sapphire blue eyes. Do you wish you lived somewhere else? Yes. Living in the suburbs just isn't my jam, but it works for right now. What’s the craziest color you’ve seen on a house? I think I've seen a pink house before? Don’t you hate the texture of lotion on your skin? Yes. What’s the prettiest cat you have seen? There's this brown British Longhair with beautiful green eyes that I adore on social media. Name's Smoothie. What is your favorite doughnut? Chocolate frosted or glazed. Do you have a hot tub? If so, where is it located? No. What is your favorite party game? Man, I don't even know popular party games, haha. Do you or your parents rake your yard? Neither of us do. No matter where we've lived, ever since Dad left, no one rakes. Do you buy drugstore make-up or high-end make-up? We always buy drugstore makeup. What’s the last good love story you read? I don't think I've read a love story since The Notebook. Do you own a lava lamp or disco ball? No, but I wish I had a lava lamp. When was the last time you went to the roller rink? It's been many years. Do you own a kaleidoscope? No. I did as a kid, though. Have you ever made an inspiration board for your room? No, but I absolutely plan to once I get a big enough board to hang on the wall, and my "office" is cleaned out. I want that room to be full of motivation. Who is the best-looking male celebrity? Take a wild guess. Where would you like to travel to next? Yellowstone. I want to spread Teddy's ashes there in an area with wolves to rest in his roots. Less importantly, I want to take looooooaaaaaaaddddddsssss of photographs. Where are three places you go to relax? Just my room, really. If you became famous, would you change your name to something exotic? No. What color is your favorite pair of shorts? I don't wear shorts, ever. List five items on your current wardrobe wish list. I've wanted a black, studded leather jacket since I was in high school. I also really want big, spiked leather boots, too. Then there's tons of band tees I want. Who makes great song covers on YouTube? JONATHAN YOUNG!!!!!!! GO!!!!!!!!! LISTEN TO HIM!!!!!!!!!!! Who is one of the best songwriters? Otep Shamaya. Painting or drawing? I strongly prefer drawing. Painting that shows brushstrokes or painting that looks like a photograph? The latter. The former can be quite stylistic, though. First thing you wash in the shower? My hair, but if you mean my actual body, my chest. Brown or white egg? I don't even know the flavor difference. Favorite time of year? October-December. Do you own a gun? I legally can't due to a suicidal history. Have you ever been in a castle? Excluding the Disney World castle, no. Are you a clingy person when it comes to relationships? I honestly am. Have you ever been bitten so hard that there teeth marks were there after? I mean, I've had hickeys before. Would you ever date a disabled person? (Be honest) Yes. If you found a baby randomly by itself what would you do? Call the cops and stay with it until they arrived. What is the most personal question you have ever been asked? I'd rather not repeat it. When was the last time you wished time would move faster? Literally every waking moment of my life. It's so sad, thinking about it. I'm just rushing my life away. Are there any owls in your room (as decor, of course)? No. If you’re not straight, who was the first person you came out to? Sara. Do you enjoy hearing birds chirp? I do. Have you ever hiked a mountain? No. Where did you meet your first crush? School. Who is your favorite little girl? My sweetheart niece. What is your favorite song by the last band you listened to? Oh boy, don't make me pick. Does your best friend have kids? No; she doesn't want any, either. Where did you go the last time you drove for longer than an hour? The beach, I think. If you were pregnant, would you want a boy or a girl? Hypothetically, a girl. How often do you get fountain drinks from a gas station? Rarely, but every now and again. Who is your favorite character in your favorite movie? Mufasa. What junk food can you never pass up? Donuts came to mind first. But I think that's because I'm craving donuts, haha. Have you ever had a UTI? Yeah, multiple. I don't drink nearly enough water. I've had one so bad my kidneys hurt like a bitch. What's the last color you dyed your hair? Red.

As promised, here’s a little large compilation sort of thing of little moments and memories from SBFP that you folks have submitted. I really appreciate everything that you’ve all submitted, it’s pretty clear that SBFP helped and entertained a whole lot of people - in equal amounts.

Here’s some SBFP moments:

Grand Wizard Wakka

The Shitstorm VII Woolie haunting plan

“What a mysterious game.”

MY HOUSE

“Wait, what’s my objectives?” “You don’t haaave any objectives!”

Qui Gon Chi

“Whah happuh?” “das whah happuh!”

“No, shut up though.”

The Baby

“Shut the fuck up about Face/Off!”

“Bleetzboll...”

The Sadness Trilogy

“KIDS LOVE THE FOCKIN’ DEVIL!”

Pat thinking he’s dying because he sat on a chocolate bar

Kenpachi Ramasama

Shit-kids

“Whut deh fuhk? Is he using duh bät room?”

Mr. Shakedown/Kenny/Quint/Eric Sparrow

TAR-KUS! TAR-KUS! TAR-KUS!

“Love is just chemicals.”

Pat eating candy alone in a closet

Matt throwing the fire axe

“Oh no, I make’da bad game!”

“Hey, is that the script?”

“JAAASON!”

“It’s fine.”

The RE2 valve noise

“Yeyeyeye!”

Woolie’s atomic purple Gameboy

“Eyy, what’s goin’ on, man? You ready to play?”

And some SBFP memories. Some of these may be a bit emotionally heavy so feel free to skip this part:

the sbfp lp of yakuza 0 got me and my best friend into the yakuza series. we watched it together and we still laugh about matt falling to pieces over "never-before-seen results" - Anon

the best friends have had such an influence on my speech patterns that i've infected people who've never watched them before. half of my friend group says super big [x] and porked up now - Anon

SBFP introduced me to so many games that ended up becoming personal favorites of mine, like Deadly Premonition and the Silent Hill series. Their videos became a way for me to spend time with some of my own best friends as well! -  captainofthestars

theres one particular moment that will always resonate with me - in their devil may cry lets play, i cant remember if it was 1 or 3, they talk about someone in the comments who mentioned that they had to beat devil may cry with items due to having a physical disability of some kind, i cant remember which. they talked about how it was awesome that he managed to even beat the game like that, and, personally, as someone who struggles with motorskills issues this made me very happy, as a devil may cry fan. theres a lot of other great moments from the tbfp, both funny and genuine that made me happy, but this one in particular stuck with me a lot. -  krillfingers

I'll never stop making "pull out king" jokes thanks to sbfp - venerabledreadnought

I remember the first Shitstorm that made me actually have to get up and sit in a brightly lit room with other people in it, Anatomy. It's become a Halloween tradition to watch it every year since, though watching a whole bunch of Shitstorm also became one. As someone who started watching at their second machinma ep, it's not a lie to say that they made up the entirety of my teenage years. I will miss the channel dearly, but I look forward to the future. -  duke-nitro

My friends and I have been watching The Zaibatsu for so long that we have accidentally adopted a bunch of their phrases like going “yeahyeahyeahyeahyeah” or saying someone “go down.” Also, despite us not knowing each other when we became fans, we all somehow began with their Man vs Wild let’s play and I even made friends with one of them because I quoted something from it at work. Favorite moment probably has to be the entire Omikron playthrough, I can’t pick a single moment. It was a beautiful trainwreck start to finish and I still put on the playlist from time to time while I’m doing other things. I swear I could gently fall asleep to the sounds of Pat screaming about the shooter segments. shogun-ceanataur

Persona 4 and Kenpachi Ramasama were my favourite. I found the name itself hilarious, but how they kept on referring to him as the full name in different little bits and tones never failed to make me laugh. That “See you later, fuckers!” part from when you see Yosuke was also hilarious. I’m not sure if that video is the oeigin, but it’s why I’ve integrated that phrase into my everyday life. Goddamn what a fun, memorable episode. - whatthehellisthisevenfor

tbfp got me through being homeless in my car twice. every time that I wanted to give up, to just stop trying, i'd turn on whatever new video they had out and it brightened up my life. my mom, who was with me, came to love them to, she used to wait to hear them to relax. i have so many memories of that time, and i don't fully relax or even eat on long days until I've turned their videos on. my favorite quote is still "mistakes into miracles". its a rly motivating quote imo. -  c0l0c4k3s

I always loved the Silent Hill 2 LP. I never played it when it came out - all I knew was that it was a horror game, and I hated horror at the time. But when the LP came around, I knew a bit more about the game and I was intrigued. Seeing the game, meeting the characters, hearing Pat disect the story and themes for Matt, I loved it all. I was fascinated, and still am. I will still watch the LP every few months, and I call SH2 one of my favorite games, even though I still haven’t played it.Thanks, SBFP, for all the great moments and the great memories. I wish you all well. - iamthewanderingbard

The best friends are what got me so invested in the Dark souls games, and what motivated me to get through DS2. Even if I say 'You see what i mean' unironically a lot, and go 'You. Did it.' -  awkwardmuses

I got into Super Best Friends from a post on the Twin Perfect forum, that linked to the Silent Hill Downpour lp, and never looked back. Their let's plays brought me so much joy back when I wasn't in the best living or health situation, and continue to do so. My favourite let's plays have to be Eternal Darkness and the Shitstorms; I always go back to those when depression hits, or for any reasons. I'll miss them together, but I'll always have those delicious delicious memories. -  mrjaffesxeldritchtwin

The Best Friends Play are the reason I end so many sentences with "though". I first found them when a friend recommended the Best Sisters Play MLP animations, and I've loved them ever since. I know it's used as a joke, but I really believe they've earned the title of HYPEST GAMEPLAY ON YOUTUBE. I love all of their David Cage playthroughs, and I adore how many plot-points they guess during Beyond: Two Souls. I love how, when they play a game they really love, they show so much knowledge and care. -  mads-in-zero

It was incredibly amusing and oddly touching that the Zaibatsu created this hate circle of David Cage and his godawful games. Even before Detroit’s release, the best friends AND the fanbase were ready to hate it because as a collective, we just latched onto that one thing to hate/make fun of. And we go all out on it together like some fucked up family, and I love it. -  missinghmmingbird

I can’t help but shrug off every minor inconvenience and major issue in my life with “it’s fine” thanks to Gun Jumper Liam. Thanks to Matt and Woolie supporting Skullgirls like no one else on the internet, I really got into it and fighting games as a whole. I’m not good at them, but oh boy do I love them.And if it wasn’t for Pat, I don’t think I’d ever have touched a Yakuza or Persona game.These guys affected my life more than any other individual or group on the internet ever really has. -  dklordg

The first Best Friends video I ever watched was Portal 2. That short LP had me in stitches. I'd never laughed so hard. I've been a huge fan since then. These guys where the ones that introduced me to LPs and made me realize that you can have fun watching other people bumble through games. TheSw1tcher has been one of my favorite channels on YouTube since I began watching. It gave me something to look forward to. I got through high school, and essentially grew up, watching these videos. There are so many catchphrases and memes I will never forget and will always make me smile. I absolutely say stuff like “whah happun?” and “shit-kids” all the time. The Deadly Premonition and Detroit: Become Human playthroughs are wonderful gems in my eyes. It’s amazing how a group of guys can get so many people to collectively love and bash certain games. We’re all on the same page, having a blast like a huge group of friends at a slumber party. Matt, Pat, Woolie, Liam, Billy, and everyone who involved themselves with the Super Best Friends are the absolute best. They gave me a chance to relax and laugh along with some familiar voices. Although it's sad they are going their separate ways, I totally respect that fact. They have my love and support. I wish them nothing but success and happiness moving forward. I'll be watching! And a note to my fellow fans: This has been a wild ride. I'm glad I got to enjoy it with you. You are all fantastic people. -  fablesamongus

NPoT chapter 270-272 summary

I wonder if I can catch up! Since we don’t have chapters this month, maybe I can!

“There’s no choice but to give up one of the doubles...”

The atmosphere at the front is heavy...

The coaches discuss the lineup for the upcoming matches against Germany, but with Germany’s overwhelming power they’re having a lot of trouble.

“Dankmar and Bertie... The probability of winning against those two German pros is zero,” Kurobe says. Mifune looks rather unamused. Saitou, however, has a different idea. “Supervisor, how about pairing up Byoudouin and Duke?” “Don’t say stupid things!” Mifune says, “If it ain’t Byoudouin then who’s gonna go up against the pro Volk?” “Supervisor... Aside from that, we also have the matter of the one who had participated in the Japanese representatives camp, who departed to Germany aiming to become a pro, Tezuka Kunimitsu... There’s evidence that suggests that in the upcoming matches against us, he will be playing in singles.”

“There’s many that want to fight against that guy,” Tsuge says.

Mifune takes his bottle and takes a few good swigs. “Right now there ain’t anyone of the brats that can beat Tezuka!”

”Well~, we and Germany really have way different cards in our hand,” Saitou says. “That speaks for itself. Our opponents are the representatives of the world champion Germany, after all...” Kurobe says.

“What’s gonna come of you bastard coaches givin’ up, coach Saitou?!” Mifune has his back to the others, looking out the window.

“That’s right. None of that scum has given up!!”

We cut to: Kirihara being horribly lost.

He was following Atobe because he was being all sneaky and suspicious, but lost sight of him and now he’s in the German representatives village.

This is where he spots!

(this is where I went Konomi what the actual fluck is your anatomy doing but that aside--)

He wonder what the hell they have for a business with each other, when he notices Tezuka handing a CD to Atobe... Of course this means they’re

SPIES! (right?)

He received something like a super-confidential file on the German representatives...! Hiiie!

I see! So Tezuka just pretended to have gone to Germany to do an infiltration investigation as a double-spy! Putting his life on the line for Japan’s victory... Huh?! If the truth got out won’t it be really bad?!

(this is of course a very, very logical conclusion to come to, Akaya, and I love you to bits for that.)

...which is when he gets caught by security.

“Was machts du hier?!”

So of course, when it comes down to this...

he makes a big effing run for it.

Meanwhile, Amadeus and Ralph are still duking it out, with the first set score being 6-5 for now.

“You play a nice style of tennis...” Amadeus says, “However, I will teach you all the decisive difference between you and me!”

Taste the baptism of a pro!!

(Amadeus using baptism here when Volk has his Wirbel Taufe (lit. Whirl Baptism) technique is a fun detail I want to point out.)

With Dark Side, Amadeus scores off of Ralph, and it becomes set point for the Swiss.

“Our commander has switched gears...” Henri says. “How scary...” Peter whispers.

Amadeus’ Dark Side exposes the opponent’s greatest weaknesses and draws them out. The mental power he displays as he mercilessly and relentlessly attacks them...

“Your greatest weakness is the response delay of the opposite site of your pivot foot after your shot!”

However, Ralph manages to return it.

“Ralph’s scariness is his ability to fix and overcome his weaknesses,” Ryoma says. “Make him miss once, and the next time it’ll be an easy course for him.”

(so like, Shiraishi but faster?)

6-6.

“Thanks to you I’ve become fond of that weakness, Amadeus.”

And now for something completely different--

Zeus vs the temptation of fluffy fur feat. Tanegashima!

A whole line of men of statu(r)e is lined up to hug the koala! Heracles, Hermes, Vulcan, Davide...

Davide?!

He makes a pun about being startled now featuring koala’s, and of course if he makes a pun, you can guess who’s near to drop-kick him?

Bane!

Zeus addresses Tanegashima. “In the semifinals tomorrow against the German team, we, the Greek representatives, will come to cheer for you.” “Thanks☆”

“Game, set.” We cut back to the match between Ralph and Amadeus.

“Won by...

The American representative, Ralph Rheinhart!”

Cheers erupt from the American team. “Ohhhhhh! We won against a pro!” And with 3 wins and two losses, America advances to the semifinals!

“You could immediately become active as a pro player,” Amadeus says as they reach out to shake hands. “No...” Ralph says, “Participating as soon as the pro tour ended, the skill of unifying your team as a commander to come this far is something that deserves much more respect.”

“Let’s meet again on the court.”

“At least, the veil’s been lifted on the American representatives... This’s become really interesting.”

Spain moves on to the semis with a 3-0 against Russia. (the fun thing about NPoT is that we literally have no idea how the other matches are going to turn out and who the finals opponent will be... currently, Spain seems to be in favour.)

Amadeus closes his eyes and lifts his head to the skies. This year... we didn’t make it either.

“Commander... Nice game.” When he opens his eyes--

All of his teammates, saluting him. He smiles, and closes them again. “Thank you very much.”

Meanwhile, the American team has noticed Ryoma and are shouting elatedly about how he came to watch. Ryoma tells them they’re making too much of a fuss... but that he’s happy to see everyone doing well.

“By the way, where’s my brother?” “Ah, Ryoga, huh,” Dudu starts.

“He’s always had that wanderlust, you know,” Kiko says. “Who knows where his feet led him♪”

“You’ll be able to fight him somewhere... for sure,” Ralph reassures him.

“Let’s meet in the finals, Ryoma!”

(y’all you have audience right below don’t you feel awkward shouting that drthdcrt6uyjcftguyj)

“We gotta beat Germany first!”

Yeah, about that...

Kirihara’s finally been apprehended by the guards.

“Th- That’s why said! I didn’t see anything!” And, in his best attempt at English, “No spy! No spy! I was searching for a friend and I got all dizzy dizzy lost...

Th- This is bad! They don’t understand anything-- Help me!!” (Kirihara you idiot onomatopoeia don’t translate at ALL xdfhcxftghcgh)

“Che che che~” (this is Bismarck’s trademark laugh, more like ‘chi chi chi’ in the original but this conveys the sound better in the English accent imo, don’t question it)

“You can let him go, that guy’s my Kumpan.”

Bismarck leads Kirihara out of there, to one of the courts.

“Thank you... very...” “Heh. Japanese is fine. Just don’t get lost in the enemy’s athlete village again. If you were caught by Volk he’d beat you up like a punching bag (lie)

If it were QP you’d have a court-martial (lie), and if it were Frankensteiner you’d be turned into a cyborg (lie)” (I love what this says about how these guys on the German team are perceived)

Kirihara lets out a yelp.

“Um.. You’re the guy who went against Fuji in the exhibition matches, right?”

“Yeah, I’m Michael Bismarck!

But you Japanese middle schoolers sure are strong, huh!”

Kirihara laughs nervously. "That so? Those guys still got a long way to go.”

(cin game on point)

“However, the German middle schoolers also have a bunch of guys who hate to lose. I’m looking forward to tomorrow. See you then, Kumpan!” “Thanks”

Right when he finishes waving, our attention is drawn to one of those hate-to-lose types. It’s Siegfried, and he looks exactly like he’s unlocked ten’imuhou.

(meanwhile Frankensteiner looks like he’s nnnot gonna be in the tournament anytime soon htxcftgcyhzsg poor guy)

A park, lined with trees and skyscrapers in the background. “Mon amour... It was a bitter decision I made so they would be loved in the future...”

Camus wistfully reaches for his racket as he laments that he had to stop Oswal.

But... If you talked about what I really wanted, fighting with him...

The person who he’d been thinking about, Duke, pops up.

“Camus... Would you like to have a game?” “Even though you appeared just now, you say some funny things, Duke.

Well, it’s not unthinkable that you wouldn’t have understood my tennis in just our mental match.”

“Will you have a game with me?”

“Are you planning on appearing in the Germany matches as well?”

In yet another meanwhile, Tokugawa is going 1 vs 2 against Oni and Irie.

“Should we take a break?” Irie asks, smiling, when Oni notices someone. “Oi Tokugawa... He showed up today as well.”

(it’s him!!!! :D) "Sorry for interrupting your practice! Tokugawa-san... Can I count on you today too?"

Tokugawa nods, and the two of them take off.

“That guy...” Oni looks over them with a certain pride in his eyes. “It seems that ever since they lost against Germany he’s been having practice with Tokugawa every day.

Though they may have been defeated, they are the only pair that has attained a Howling between their skills!”

Highschoolers and middle schoolers alike are preparing for the big day tomorrow, from watching matches of Volk,

(spotted!) to running until the sun sets. It is already late when Atobe knocks on one of the room’s doors. Fuji opens.

“Hey, Fuji. Tezuka’s told me to return the CD he borrowed from you.”

“Thank you, Atobe. Was Tezuka doing well?” “Yeah, much more than usual.”

“Hey, Fuji. Don’t make me run errands for you again.”

It’s the night before the semis. Everyone is gathered in the hall to listen to the head coach. “You bastards! Tomorrow finally is the Big Match! Go take revenge on Germany and shake the world!”

A roar erupts from the gathered players.

“I’ll announce the order for tomorrow!”

(spotted! haha)

“Huh? Koshimae ain’t here.” “Mm. Akaya isn’t here either,” Sanada remarks.

“Can you believe those guys?”

Of course, they’re playing off against each other. Or, well, it looks rather one-sided on Ryoma’s half, with his ten’imuhou.

“Sht... Why?!”

Tezuka-san... and Atobe-san... For the sake of Japan they put their life on the line and cross all kinds of dangerous bridges... I, too...!

“So how about giving up already?”

(I’m yelling because being on top of the game and then telling their opponent to give up is something much more Yukimura than Ryoma in my book... But here we are!)

“Even if I die I won’t give up.”

He, who can’t be called an angel or a devil, when that single man surpasses that wall--

[One day left until the semis against Germany.]

Blech. I’ve pretty much officially finished writing, editing and revising this standalone epic fantasy novel I started years and years ago and only just recently got around to finishing. Which is good, for sure, but also....blech. LOL. Because now I have no more excuses for putting off making a decision about the cover.

Like I always intended to self-pub this particular novel for personal reasons, and I can make my own covers just fine. I’ve done epic fantasy covers before for other clients that turned out well, even working with stock art and photomanipulation, its totally possible to make something that hits all the genre expectations and sells the right tone and feel to readers who come across it. BUT I’ve always loved the illustrated covers of a lot of fantasy novels I grew up with, and always kinda wanted something similar for this particular work, even though I have other fantasy projects I wouldn’t care as much about that one way or the other.

And so years ago when I first started the book and was only about a third of the way in, but still had a solid sense of the world and story and where it was all going, I happened to stumble across a fantasy artist whose work was like...exactly the right tone and aesthetic I’d always been picturing for that novel’s setting and vibe. And he was a freelancer, and open to commissions at the time, and you never know with freelancers if they’ll still be taking commissions a year or two down the line or if they’ve gone to work for like, a video game company or studio or something like that by that point, so even though the book was nowhere near done I hopped on that and commissioned an illustration from him to be used for the cover at some future point when I was ready for it. I just needed the illustration, I was fine doing typography and all that myself when the time came.

And I mean, I’ve literally been on the other side of the author/artist interaction tons of times, lol, so like, I know from my own experiences where its helpful to give an artist or a designer room to breathe and exercise their own creativity, make use of their own particular skillset and interpret the story elements you tell them are most important to see conveyed in the final cover, in like...their own way, like what feels best to them, what they’re most inspired to do with the foundational info you give them to build off of. 

Like I mean, visual design is its own skillset, and often completely separate from the kind of visualization most authors do of their own work while writing it....and with self-pubbed authors especially, as artists or designers you often run into authors who get really hung up on relatively minor details that they feel really need to be on the cover in some capacity and in really specific ways. Which is often to the detriment of the cover in the long run because like....what looks right in your head as a writer, totally familiar with your own world and story and its every minutiae and the implications and context of every single element....is not always going to come across the same way to readers who happen across your cover while browsing. Because they literally have ZERO context for what they’re looking at, and thus it really needs to stand on its own two feet and sell itself, not....loop back around to some hidden significance that will really only resonate with readers who end up buying the book and only once they reach this one scene in chapter 27 or whatever, you know?

So I really didn’t want to do that with this artist. I was only commissioning him because I loved what I’d seen of his work and the style he seemed to default to naturally was the perfect fit for what I wanted, IMO, so I was more than willing to let him take the broader strokes of the setting/themes/storyline in whatever direction inspired him most, as long as he hit within the general framework I provided him.

BUT, that said, for all that I tried to give him as much creative freedom to work with as possible, there are of course always a FEW things that as the commissioning party, are really important to see in the final product, and so yeah, I did have a couple of areas/elements that I did stress were really important to strike the right tone with, or it could make or break the whole illustration.

Specifically, I was concerned that he hit the right feel with the main character. My protag for this novel is a woman, and the one area his portfolio samples didn’t have a ton of variety with and thus had me slightly worried about what visual tropes he might default to...was female characters. He had tons of gorgeous settings, fantasy creatures, architecture, knights and sorcerers and monsters, but not a ton of women in the samples I saw. He did have some, for sure, and like there was nothing super concerning about the way he’d drawn/painted them....there were some priestesses, sorceresses, that kinda thing, and their anatomy and wardrobes weren’t like....glaringly cheesecake-y or anything like a lot of fantasy artists’ portfolios....so I knew he COULD get the character right, the way I hoped he would, I just wasn’t SURE. Like, I wasn’t concerned about specific details, beyond like....not outrageously contradicting the character description and scenes I gave him to work off of, I wasn’t worried about nitpicking minutiae. But my protag is a warrior-magic user archetype, and warrior women is like, the one female archetype he didn’t have any samples of, and I was more concerned about him defaulting to like....the old fantasy standby’s of ridiculously impossible and unnatural poses for warrior women, not to mention totally impractical armor, that sort of thing. 

Not to put too fine a point on it, but this was the ONE thing I stressed, lol. I didn’t really care about the finer details of her armor like in terms of decoration or filigree or even color schemes, I honestly could just adjust my own descriptions in the book to match what he came up with if need be. Stuff like that, so not a big deal to me. ALL I was concerned about was like....she not fall into those trope traps that ensnare so many women on fantasy covers, like....just make her look like she’s a fucking warrior who knows what the hell she’s doing, and I’ll be fine with everything else, you know? I even sent him some covers of published fantasy novels to use as comparison comps, like ‘this is the kind of feel or vibe I’d ideally like to see her capture, something like these women in these covers here’ as well as ‘this is what I really really DON”T want to see, like, I shouldn’t have a better sense of how good a contortionist she is than whether or not I believe she can swing a sword.’

Soooooo.....what happened?

Did he prioritize as I’d really really hoped he would and strongly expressed my desire for him to, and take care to at least avoid the more obvious problems, even if the end result was’t 100% what I was hoping for? Nooooooope. She might as well be mid-yoga pose. Sigh. Like, the guy has a damn near perfect grasp of anatomy and proportions on every other human figure I saw in the many samples I looked through before commissioning him, but somehow, despite this being of utmost importance to me and the ONLY thing about the entire project I stressed about and made sure to emphasize, lol, he ended up painting her in this weird bent at the waist position that throws her lower body proportions off entirely and like, her hip is angled or arched in this weird way that’s incredibly distracting and off, and like also, of course her armor is....pointless, in all the specific ways that happened to be the ONLY details about her armor I was concerned with. Y’know. Like. Its effectiveness. As armor.

And the absolutely obnoxious thing about it all, is that everything else about the illustration? Absolutely gorgeous. Everything I’d hoped for, even as I deliberately tried not to build up too specific an image in my mind ahead of time. Hell, BETTER than anything I’d have come up with on my own, and totally validating my impulse to have someone with different skillsets than my own do this instead of just making a cover out of stock art the way I usually do with my other projects. He absolutely captured the specific MOOD I was aiming for with the setting and general atmosphere, like, the very reason I’d been drawn to his style in the first place, he totally nailed that. Couldn’t have asked for a better fit to the general ambiance of the piece. The colors were just the right shade of otherworldly, a great mix of light and darkness that sold the gloom of the surrounding environs without drowning in dark palettes that make it hard to pick out individual details and differentiate between figures. So on and so on.

EVERY SINGLE OTHER THING ABOUT THE DAMN ILLUSTRATION IS PERFECT LOL.

Except for the only fucking part I was worried about in the first place, lmaaaaaaaaaao whyyyyyyy.

And I mean, because his style was a combo of illustration and painting, there was never gonna be a ton of room for revisions or tweaks to the final piece, I knew and understood that going in. He showed me what he had when he was done with the initial pencilwork, before he painted over it, but with the understanding that it could still change from that point, if he needed to shift things around because of the way the colors and lighting and shadows were all coming out once painted. And the pencil work lacked the finer details that he added into his painting in the final stages, so like, I did see a rough draft before he started painting, and could ask for tweaks or adjustments at that point...except at that point, I didn’t NEED to! LOL. In the rougher sketch, her general position was just shifted enough from what it ended up being that like, it wasn’t my ideal pose for her but nothing I’d say I actually had a problem with, like her upper body was elevated just enough and at just the right angle compared to what he ended up with that at that point, there was no unnatural hip thrust or any of that stuff, and there was only a rough sense of what would come to be the final armor. So I mean, TECHNICALLY I had an opportunity to pump the brakes and be like whoa wait dude, this isn’t what we discussed, can I get you to go back to the drawing board just in this one specific area right here and maybe even just take another look at those comps I sent you, see what I mean about what I’m trying to avoid and how that’s kinda sneaking in here anyway....except, I didn’t think I had to say anything at that point lol, because it all looked on track??

I mean, its not like I think he deliberately misled me with that initial draft or anything, nothing as dramatic as that. I’m fairly certain that like most artists and designers will tell you, in the process of like, the actual drawing/painting/designing, you have to make adjustments as you go to account for the little unforseen speedbumps where you were juuuuuust off enough in your prediction of how this would look when working in your ultimate medium, that you have to like...keep nudging your initial outline little by little as you go to account for the slight shift in direction...with gradually that adding up to a fairly significant departure in the end. Ultimately, I think we ended up with what we ended up with because he was good with focusing on my specific concerns when drafting in pencil and just mapping out a general intent, but the closer he got to finishing up his piece, the less and less focused he was on the stuff I prioritized rather than his own innate prioritizations and so he just kinda figured ‘is it really gonna be THAT big a deal?’ instead of sacrificing a direction or angle that played into what he thought was a more important design element. Stuff like that. Like, you know me, I’m def not saying that makes it A-Ok in my book, lol, I just mean to say I honestly don’t think it was...a willful, conscious effort on his part to leave me with something as far removed from what I was hoping for as what I got.

So again I say blech. Its just super frustrating and obnoxious and I’ve been trying to decide what to do with it for like, months now. Because again, EVERYTHING ELSE is perfect and gorgeous and like, yes, good, this is what I wanted, what I was hoping for. Like, I literally could not come up with a design using my own go-to mediums that would come anywhere close to capturing the general feel and tone and mood of the story and its setting better than the overall vibe of his piece.

Its just the protag, front and center, is absolutely driving me fucking nuts. And I keep going back and forth endlessly because I’m like is it really THAT bad and noticeable or am I hyper-fixating because I specifically tried to avoid this end result and ended up with at least a version of it anyway? And then I’m like psst, remember how much fucking money you spent on this, like yeah thats long gone and doesn’t change your current situation one way or another so it doesn’t really matter except oh yeah its totally gonna fucking haunt you if you don’t use this lol and all that money was spent for nothing lmfao you dumbass. And then I’m like, just to weigh my options, what would I design for this cover myself, if I ended up scrapping this and making my own from scratch, do I at least have anything in mind that’s for sure not any worse than my dissatisfaction with this? Except lol I literally can not seem to come up with ANYTHING, like, total blank, because again there’s just enough that I LIKE about the piece that its like, now that I’ve seen THOSE aspects of it, I’m not gonna be content with any cover that doesn’t contain them and I just literally have no way of replicating those effects via my own design medium.

Ugh. So its really annoying, and I keep going around and around and around in circles and making no progress on what to do about it and like...ugh. I hate being so anal about shit like this, especially when I am usually pretty good about dodging the hyper-fixation tendencies on this front specifically.....but I just got whammied but good by the way all of this unfolded and came together and now I feel stuck and lmao I’m really not fond of the fact that I’m really fucking proud of this book and how it came out in terms of the writing and story but like, covers ARE actually a pretty big deal as they’re literally a reader’s first impression, and I feel like no matter which route I go, a big part of me is gonna be doomed to be like NO YOU FUCKING IDIOT THAT WAS THE WRONG CHOICE, UGH WTF DUDE, TURN AROUND, UNDO, UNDO, U’LL REGRET THIIIIIIIS.

ANYWAY! That’s my much ado about nothing. I was kinda hoping that hashing it all out in a post and working my way through it as I wrote it all down would like....magically reveal the Right Decision to me and everything would click and be so obvious by the time I got to this point in the post, but alas.

Fix-It Machine broke. This accomplished nothing. UGH. RUDE.

ASKS 10

‘less weird hairs,’ pics of me, real life questions, seasons thoughts, kpop stuff, ‘are you a boy’ erhdfnv, tutorial questions, edits, ‘safe’ cc, and umm yeah never go camping in the actual woods ok

Anonymous said: Can you do Less weird hair? I Like how good Mesh You make but all styles look Really Weird I never Would use them. I just want Usual hair? Thanks you            

Firstly, thank you for the meshing compliment, but tbh I think I make pretty simple hair styles? Like I don’t do many crazy things especially recently? Idk, I hope you like some of my hairs and can find something that fits in your liking :/

Anonymous said: Hi I really love you content and I was wondering if you’d ever do a “goddess locs” hairstyle?            

Ok I am gonna be super straight forward about this, making hairstyles like this is really challenging for me. I have tried a ton of times and I just can’t get the meshes to work out the way I like. UV mapping is a pain in the ass, making the hairline match well, and making sure none of the mesh strands are broken is next to impossible for me. Most creators that make hairstyles like this do them from scratch or spend a long time working on them for them to look right. I’m not saying ‘no’ because I am going to try to play around with some seasons meshes (I have hair ideas) but no promises :(

Anonymous said: BLACKPINK COMEBACK

i know omg jennie snapped, I wasn’t planning on buying the physical album but I ended up caving in and getting the pink versions ;-; I hope I get Jennie or Lisa photocards

Anonymous said: i know your theme is by gukthemes, but what is it called?            

PAPILLON by GUKTHEMES

Anonymous said: Are you ever gonna do a face reveal?

I have posted a pic of myself before in one of these ask posts, here are three more from the past few months :P

Anonymous said: Fav kpop group(s)???            

1). LOONA (bias Kim Lip) 2). BLACKPINK (bias Jennie) 3). RED VELVET (bias Joy) 4). CLC (bias Yeeun) 5). DREAMCATCHER (idk their names but the rapper)

Anonymous said: You play pokemon go still?

Yes! I collected cards/figures growing up and watched the show before school every morning. I’m not a ‘game’ fan but the mobile app is fun. Actually I played the Wii U Pokemon tournament game but it was boring so :/

Anonymous said: are you going to buy seasons? do you think it is worth it?

I got it from CDkeys for $25 lmao, so yes :P I can’t run the live mode so I kind of am just getting it for the new CAS assets :/ but I think the pack looks really good. Everyone always says ‘it looks like the best EP so far’ every time something new comes out so I’m not gonna say that but we will see :D

Anonymous said: whats ur skin blend called?            

Fruitpunch! You can get it here

Anonymous said: when are you going to be done camping?

I am back home now lmao I assume you sent this when I posted about not having service there :P but I was camping for 3 days? I know it was 2 nights at least refdbv also omg some camping stories:

► I didn’t have my voice for the entire trip bc I got sick with laryngitis, and now koby (the guy i shared a tent with) has it too erfdbvc

► It was blazing hot like omg I was dying, there werent showers, bathrooms, anything with AC. The tents were boiling hot, the ground fucking hurt, and it was just hell ok this isnt even a story I just need to complain.

► There was a racoon family outside the tents the first night, and we thought it was a bear bc we were literally in the middle of the woods, like it wasn’t a campsite with other people, it was the forest ;-; anyways we were legit so freaked out and up for 2 hours just listening to them walk around the tents and god it was so scary rfbdv

► As I said, I had no service so I missed the larvitar community day in pokemon go -_-

► I suck at cornhole so I was the cheer leader for a team UwU

► A deer jumped out right in front of the fucking car like RIGHT IN FRONT OF IT omg we were so close to hitting it like... it was fucking scary

► We went walking on a trail that was down a mountain and once we got down we discovered that the chairlift up was CLOSED so we had to walk back up and it was a nightmare bc we had all just drove like 30 minutes to shower in crappy no pressure no heat showers and we were all sweaty again by the time we got back to the top ;-;

dont go camping

Anonymous said: Your last edit creeps me out.

LMAO why? It isnt meant to be sexual or scary?  

@achinghearts88 said: I really love Sims 4 cc but I constantly struggle with finding safe sites and have accidentally downloaded a virus trying to get cc before so I'm kinda frightened now. What advice do you have for getting safe cc? Thanks!

Hello! I use an adfly skipper + adblock, and if both of those don’t work then I just don’t download the cc. For some creators (nolan-sims, simduction, isjao, ivo-sims, and others) I will turn them off because I know these creators aren’t ones that use the sketchy adfly stuff, but for others that I don’t know well I leave it on. I use: U Block origin and adfly skipper (both on firefox)

Anonymous said: I couldn't find a "contact me" thing but your AHarris00Britney has a broken mesh I think.            

??? idk what this means im sorry ;-; what hair are you referring to?

Anonymous said: an amazing creator and a loona fan???? i stan            

My mind... your mind... our mind..

@chocooosims said: hey, I love your cc, you are such a good creator! :) I'm not sure if someone already ask you that, but have you ever considered making a tutorial where you show us how you create maxis match hair? I mean, I know that I can already find on Internet  tutorials about frankenmeshing hair. But the thing is that you are one of the only creator who do more than simply merge 2 EA's hair together. So, I would really love to see a tutorial of how you are creating your cc! :) Thx for your time!! 

I am making a BIG tutorial right now of me making a hair from start-finish and it is around 3 hours not speed up. My guardian angel is going to edit it for me tonight and then I will try to have it posted next week sometime

Anonymous said: what university are you going to?

Radford :D it is in Virginia

Anonymous said: Just wanted to let you know you're a king           

thank you lmao I wish it were true, stan loona or be beheaded

Anonymous said: r u a guy or girl or non binary etc. also are you lgbtq+ at all? not to judge, just wondering :)

uuh, I’m a gay guy lmao idk about all the other terms like cis/bianary ;-; i like the anatomy exclusive to the male body

edit: rip so someone messaged me asking what I meant by “anatomy exclusive to the male body” and I was like ?? bc I meant i like d**k, and i explained that i didn't like using cuss words on my blog bc my account got shut down/deleted/reported last year and was completely gone for two days while I emailed my butt off to get it back. Also, I was trying to be funny by sounding proper and using big terms like anatomy/exclusive instead of just saying “i like penis” bc that just isnt as fun to say imo. My anatomy teacher never used words like v*gina/p*nis and would say stuff like that, and I always found it funny and I guess that was another reason I worded it that way. Anyways if you think I was being transphobic, I apologize. I hope you don’t think that I am transphobic bc of that? If you want to message me and talk to me about how I can word stuff better then I am around 24/7 mostly, but I’m not going to fight with anyone who is just looking to argue because that is childish. I am sorry to those that got offended but I got one message about this so if something like this happens, message me like this person and ask what I meant so that it isn’t blown out of proportion. Again, I did not think that it would be taken that way and I am sorry if you felt that I was making fun of a trans person. <3

Anonymous said: What do you see in the corner of your room when you get sleep paralysis  (;            

James Charles with breasts on the beach and im not sharing this photo anymore it is demonic OK

Anonymous said: hi! i installed your non-default eye recolors but i'm having a glitch with them. my female sims lose their face in cas and it's just like an empty spot where the face should be. i have the default eyes installed too so i know it's not an issue with a missing mesh but i'm not sure how to fix it.            

Hello!! I don’t think this is my eyes because I’m not experiencing this glitch? Did you run a S4S batch fix over everything? I think that causes this glitch sometimes but I am unsure. Try repairing your game and if you have the “no EA eyelash” mod then redownload that and replace the old file.

@sephirajo said: I found your sims 4 mods and I love the hairs! They're so amazing and pretty.            

thank you so much!

Anonymous said: In your collab with wildpixel, I F**KING love the Ivy hair; do you have any recolours of it or any of the other hairs in the collab?

all the hairs in that pack are recolored in the anathema and sacharinne palette :) and I reblog all recolors of my cc over on @aharris00britneyrecolors

Looking back I’m super grateful that I had some time to adapt to things before term 1 med-I’ve met a group of amazing people, I stayed with 1 of the same roommates from term 1 MPH, and had a feel for how SGU operates. Term 1 was exciting, but also a grind. I think the best way to go about reflecting on this is to think about the different sections of the curriculum, and go from there, since your life does kind of revolve around that here, haha.

In the very beginning we had our white coat ceremony, which to be honest I rationalized at first as being silly. I thought to myself “why is SGU giving us long coats, we need short coats for our rotations so we can’t use these!” And “isn’t all this congratulatory stuff a little early? We just got here!” The feeling was amplified when a group of us went to the beach to take photos in our white coats and a nice local woman saw us with our stethoscopes and asked us if we could check her blood pressure. “We…don’t know anything yet. I’m really sorry..”

What the fuck is this

I felt pretty bad about that because here I am in the getup but no idea how to do anything. But the point was to ease us into what would become our life more or less. And an important message of the ceremony was to promote humanism-to treat the person, not the disease. To always remember that what you’re learning is important, but making that connection with your future patients is equally important. I came back to this thought a lot when my motivation faltered. So I put my skepticism aside and celebrated a little before the real work began!

I think I bit off more than I could chew this semester, and learned the hard way. I started an online MBA program just prior to starting, took up a treasurer position for the Public Health Student Association, and maintained running my business, which unexpectedly got a lot of press this semester. It started with a story in the New York Times, which has many errors in their depiction of what was actually happening. I had a lot of consecutive interviews for various news networks between class, and even did a “webcam” interview for a local cable station in my scrubs right out anatomy lab because hey, might as well I guess. It was incredibly frustrating to be painted the way I was, but I think the truth is out there now. In either case that’s a story for another day!

How things worked

To start out, we registered and collected our books and Physical Diagnosis (PD) kit. Altogether this cost just shy of $2,000, and is non-negotiable. Everyone gets these same set of books, printed notes to the FTM module and the same things in your PD kit. I’ve since found out that the stethoscope they get you is actually pretty nice so thats a plus. If you’re curious it’s a ProCardial C3 Titanium Stethoscope – Critical Cardiac Care Edition, which runs around $170. So not bad at all, although I have tried friends Littmann’s and they’re significantly lighter and more comfortable in my opinion. The one SGU gives you is really good, but it’s also pretty thick/heavy. Besides that small complaint, I’ve used it for everything we’ve needed to do here and have gotten pretty used to it, if anything it’s probably even overkill. The only other thing I gripe about is that many of these books I still haven’t used or barely used through the first year, and that we have no choice in that 2k upfront cost. And the most important book to have in my opinion, First Aid, was not in attendance sadly.

Lots of books….With printed notes for the FTM module on top

The PD kit they gave us

For us, I thought the format was pretty straightforward. 4 one hour lectures a day with multiple choice questions in the lecture you respond to on a “clicker.” These were used to check attendance-needing 80% to pass, with this rule applying to other things like small group and multiple choice questions. There were 2-4 small group sessions a week which were pretty varied, from histology (discussing slides), to wet lab (cadavers), biochemistry/physiology (discussion), imaging labs with ultrasound and discussion of radiographs, to patient encounters. There were two SIM lab encounters during the CPR module, which were really fun in my opinion. These were done in mock hospital rooms lined up where we as a group see a robo-patient. It can be pretty realistic-the patient is controlled and you can hear realistic heart sounds and feel pulses among other things, and they set it up for us to mimic some cardiac problems. To do these you have to be basic life support certified, which you usually do at the beginning of the term.

There were 5 major tests, each 3 hours long with 131 questions (except the first exam which is shorter, but all with 82 seconds/question), along with 2 anatomy lab exams. We had weekly multiple choice question sessions (where you need at least 50% right to get the point) and weekly 20 question/30 minute quizzes (again need at least 50% right). There was also an objective structured clinical exam at the end. The latter 4 exams all have cumulative stuff too.

Keep in mind that this is just my experience, they change curriculum a lot.

Foundations to medicine (FTM)

Our first block, the FTM module, was probably the easiest one the first year, which makes sense. But you do hit the ground running. It focused on foundation type concepts in biochemistry, the major genetic diseases and inheritance patterns, cell biology concepts like cell division and apoptosis, histology basics (going over various stains) and skin histology. While that’s the gist, there were broad concepts that touched on things from other disciplines we learn in more detail later on. We rote memorized autonomic nervous system drugs and some major anticancer and antibiotic drugs/actions for example. And learned some fluid dynamics things and about action potentials, that we don’t delve more into until renal/cardio. But looking back, genetics and biochemistry were probably the biggest topics (but fear not, no metabolism yet).

  There were two tests in this section, and small group labs that were mainly histology and biochemistry. By lab I mean there are 8 of us and one facilitator, and in histology we spend two hours looking at slides of cells. We each take turns presenting to the group. There is no hands on in histology-you just need to be able to know what you’re looking at. The small groups were pretty useful I thought because it forced you to learn the material, and for histology especially if you spent around 3 hrs prepping slides you were pretty well set for the test.

I admit here that having a masters in biochemistry gave me a pretty good leg up in this section, so I might be a bit biased here. A lot of the lab test and biochemistry stuff was straightforward IMO and didn’t go into much detail. Most of my friends did pretty well in this section. I will say that the first two tests were probably the biggest filters. A lot of people dropped out after these two tests, and MSK (the next block). I did feel a bit cooped up here. It’s all 100% book work. At times I felt more like I was back in grad school than med school, but with no lab time, a little more tedious. But it gets more fun when you get through it, and these basic concepts are seen again and again.

Right off the bat this is where you’ll start learning how to learn. For me this was the most overwhelming part-everyone is throwing around so many resources with weird names. In the beginning you’ll hear things like “You HAVE to try [insert resource]”

First aid

Firecracker

Picmonics

Sketchy

Uworld

Boards and beyond

(Weird name like Brocephalon’s) Anki deck

Osmosis

Pathoma

USMLE rX

MANY, MANY tutoring group resources…there are so many of these unique to SGU with cool names like G’s get degrees and Kahn academy lite

And on… There were so many that people were throwing at me to try and it was difficult not to get bogged down with trying all the things. But I’m glad that I did a “taste test” so I could find a few that worked for me. Some are better than others, some work for various learning styles better. I will say that I’m a huge advocate for Osmosis, which I’ll talk about more at some point because it has some unique features that helped me organize my study time more efficiently, and for any new med students out there, First Aid is an unofficial requirement. The rest of the resources are somewhat similar with each having pros and negatives and covering a spectrum of learning styles, but they mostly link to First Aid in some way. I wish I would have known this going into term 1 or I’d have bought a hard copy then. But fear not! There were enough resources floating around. If you need something, someone would have a copy of it or the various tutoring groups would have some amazing resources to learn from that they compiled/made themselves, which were in a lot of ways much more useful since they are based on what we’re learning at the time and will most likely be tested on. Everything you need is there somewhere if you asked. Learning to navigate all of the resources and get comfortable with some of them is important thought. And If anything, there’s too much.

Ah, one point on books though. You won’t use them. I studied more or less entirely from the slides. Notable exceptions, in my opinion are First aid (your new bible), Netters, and Gray’s Anatomy Review. But even so, I know plenty of people that never use the books and just use electronic copies (which everyone will have anyway). The other books are fine to use electronically in my opinion because you can load it into noteability or onenote and do a search for what you’re looking for. Wheras for those 3 I mentioned, I think it’s just nicer to flip through and anotate as you go. To each their own!

Musculoskeletal system (MSK)

This next block I started to feel more like I was in med school. We were introduced to the anatomy lab, and had our first patient interactions which included learning ultrasound. Coming off of FTM, being stuck in the books for so long memorizing weird words, this was a blessing in disguise. But it was hard, and a pretty drastic change in material, in the sense that whatever you did to learn in FTM will probably not work in this block. Welcome to all the anatomy. So. Much. Anatomy.

I thought I’d be alright with this because I aced anatomy and physiology in college. Boy was I fucking wrong. Med school anatomy is a different beast. Couple of reasons for this. One-knowing the names of muscles is great. But the questions are going to ask something to the extent of like “a man was stabbed near his shoulder and can’t move his arm. Which nerve is affected?” In a nutshell yes you need to know the anatomy but knowing the nerve routes, blood supply and injuries to all the things and how they would present clinically (buzz words like “winged scapula” or “claw hand” to tip you off). Secondly, I’ve heard that med schools have been slowly trimming anatomy. It used to be a pretty major part of the curriculum. But to make room for new things, they’ve had to cram this into less time. At my school, you’ll have just 4 weeks to learn the bones, muscles, nerves, blood supplies, ligaments, histology/physiology, injuries, and what in the hell you’re looking for on radiographs.

But man, it gets real in anatomy lab. It all looks like..meat at first. Is this “noodle” a nerve, vein or artery? IDK! Nothing is nicely colored or labeled in real life, so you have to find some sort of easy to find landmark to know where you are. I’d been used to the smell of formaldehyde after doing dissections on cats in college (couldn’t afford cadavers). But we started learning hands, and…that’s when it hit me I think, that this was a human, with a story, a life, a family….I almost threw up. To make matters worse the facilitator jokingly said “here, let me give you a hand” and gave me a dissected, amputated hand to hold, while proceeding to whip out his tools to point out some nerves on said hand. I wasn’t prepared for that, but hey. It was a good pun. Ultimatly I didn’t actually puke, and we had no idea what we were supposed to be looking for anyway. So…win win I guess?

Complete anatomy pic-actually from the Neuro module (term 2), but found out how to get some clearer images to label things I wanted to point out by then.

View from Complete Anatomy app on Ipad, has a ton of great features! basically labels everything you need to know for the MSK module. I relied on this and Netter’s primarily to figure things out.

Some notes on anatomy lab and what I did to study. First off, there’s no dissections-everything is pre-dissected, and I think this is overall a good thing. We can find what we’re looking for faster. The lab had a series of “loops” set up with say 5ish stations in each loop that has a different area dissected. If we were focusing on upper arm for example, one station may be a whole cadaver with the auxilia/clavicle exposed so you can see brachial plexus, one may be bones of the arm and hand, one may be various dissections to follow nerves to the hand, you get the idea. We’d typically have about 10 minutes per station with a list of important structures to find. In each station I’d say there were usually 4 of us, which I think is a good number without feeling too crowded and gave everyone space to contribute or take turns leading. There were plenty of professors wandering around for help as well, and aside from this the lab had pretty flexible hours. A good amount of people took advantage of this, I didn’t though, but I did come in once for a professor guided run-down of structures. The professor guided one was very useful, we got 2 (optional) of hese per block, and a group signs up for a professors time-slot. I didn’t go to open lab mainly because I eventually found a way to study that translated pretty well to finding structures on a cadaver, which I prepped before lab and then tested myself on he real cadaver during wet lab, and even in the MSK module (the most anatomy heavy by far), anatomy exams are not worth many points at all here.

One of my favorite parts of this was that we saw standardized patients to try the basics of physical exam, like reflexes and various maneuvers to look for injuries to the knee for example. We also learned how to use ultrasound here too, which was more focused on showing us the basics of how to work it and what different kinds of tissue look like. A good setup for the cardio section, where we spent more time learning how to view important heart and lung structures.

I prepped for 3-4 hours before each wet lab so I’d have an idea of what I was looking for starting with the dissection videos the school provided, which were (mostly) well done, but some were pretty old and pixilated or hard to understand. My learning strategy for this was a bit all over the place and I was really thrown to the wall with how to study the first week and slowly figured out what worked for me. I eventually figured that learning the pretty “cartoon” version of a structure and testing myself on cadaver picture atlases worked well. So to learn the leg muscles, I’d open up my trusty Netters atlas (good to know your way around so you can find things later!) and spent a lot of time looking at that. Then I’d mess around with it on Complete Anatomy, which is useful for getting a good 3D image of it in your head. It’s an EXCELLENT 3D anatomy app that does a ton of useful things like showing blood/nerve supply and actions of various muscles, among other things. I’d test myself using Grays dissection guide, and finally McMinn and Abraham’s clinical atlas. McMinns atlas was pretty overlooked by my classmates, but has tagged cadaver pictures with the answers off the image so you can cover the answers and test yourself in a similar way they tested us in the lab exam. That and Grays dissection also note common anatomical variations that are important to know. I basically have done some version of this to learn the rest of anatomy throughout MS1. But everyone learned this in so many different ways. A lot of people relied heavily on drawing things out and watching videos for example. With that said, I survived MSK but it wasn’t one of my better exams. Turns out I focused too much on learning the anatomy and not enough learning injuries, which was more high yield on our exam. I found this was an important lesson though….anything tied to an injury or disease is always going to be super important to know.

Cardio Pulmonary Renal (CPR)

The cardio part of this block was my favorite I think of this semester, while the renal part was probably my worst. From everyone I’ve talked to, you liked one and hated the other. To me the heart made a lot of intuitive sense. You could think through this one! If you knew the basics of how the “piping” goes, and imagine it as one big plumbing system flowing through the lungs, chambers and valves of the heart and to the body, you can imagine what would happen if there was say a kink in a pipe. And just thinking through what would happen saved me some time memorizing. I think some people that struggled with it got stuck on some of the details and memorizing everything. I will say some of the more difficult aspects of the cardio section was the ECG and understanding what’s going on. I can confidently say I was answering the questions mostly right on this because I followed an algorithm to figure it out that we learned. Could I explain why it’s like that or think through it? Hell no!

The small groups for this were pretty exciting I thought, we got to learn some basics of the physical exam like breath and heart sounds, checking blood pressure and various pulses, but my favorite was probably ultrasound. Although we didn’t get a ton of time with this, seeing a beating heart in real time on a real person was pretty amazing. We learned various views on this to look at valves, as well as what you’d see in serious problems like cardiac temponate-when fluid builds up in the pericardium, which “suffocates” the heart with less space to beat.

This was also when we did our SIM labs. I was super nervous the first time, because I didn’t know what to expect, and I think our patient had a form of congestive heart failure. But honestly it was fun and not super high stress at all. We got to apply what we learned in physical exam and hear/see things in an actual person with the disease that a standardized patient can’t replicate. The environment is very similar to a hospital room, and we learned what we should be looking for to assess a patient like this.

Lastly, we moved on the renal system, which is far more complex than I would have thought. While the cardio/pulmonary exam was one of my best tests this term, renal was my worst. The anatomy and embryology stuff was pretty simple, not a whole lot to the kidneys. But the physiology aspect was what got me. Renal physiology is pretty complex, with a lot of hormone and regulation type things going on. By now I was getting burned out too, and looking back I probably could have pushed a little bit harder. I was so ready for the flight home. I was literally counting the hours at this point to when I could fly home and see my wife again. And you know what? It was all good. Made it through.

I reviewed some of the renal things when I got back, but didn’t go too crazy because still had our summer MPH term that started immediately after the renal exam. I stayed on the island a bit longer and attended MPH classes in person for about a week because flights were super expensive right after classes were done. Thankfully, they switched to allowing us to take these classes online so I didn’t have to stay over the summer like I thought I might need to. Thank god for that!

Overlooking BBC beach after finishing up the last exam!

Packed and ready to head back home

Near where we did our MPH classes, overlooking the airport. Was so ready to leave.

Finally got a little beach time before heading home

Term 1 med, looking back Looking back I’m super grateful that I had some time to adapt to things before term 1 med-I’ve met a group of amazing people, I stayed with 1 of the same roommates from term 1 MPH, and had a feel for how SGU operates.

15 questions, 15 mutuals

The lovely @wizzardhowl tagged me. I’ve never done one of these before so I feel very honored, thanks :)

1. Are you named after anyone?

Kind of, yeah! While I’m not named after anyone specifically lol, my first name Elizabeth runs in my mom’s family, it’s been the first and middle name of several of my great aunts and great grandmothers. My middle name Kae is my aunt’s middle name.

2. When was the last time you cried?

Yesterday lmao. I watched Grey’s Anatomy for the first time and it was the shooting episode(s) (both of my sisters are avid fans of the show and wanted to watch that one for some reason? really feeling the holiday spirit). Anyway, Charles Percy’s (i think that’s his name) death was so emotional to me and I cried, even though I’ve been told he was actually kind of a dick on the show. Rough first couple episodes to watch of a show! (If you can’t tell, I am a big crier. yikes!!)

3. Do you have want kids?

Eventually, yeah. Still a couple years off till any of that is coming tho. I’m unsure if I want to actually like have the kid tho? I’m down for adopting, but the idea of having another human inside of me is kinda freaky imo.

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

Definitely

5. What’s the first thing you notice about people?

My gut reaction to who they are as a person and what their personality is like. I’m always uncomfortable meeting new people, so the first thing I notice about them tends to be what kind of person they are and in turn how I should act around them. I don’t consider myself as someone who is two-faced, but I’m not very upfront with people and it takes some time before I feel comfortable getting geek-y in front of someone and will stop holding things back.

6. What’s your eye color?

Blue. They seem to turn different shades in terms of how light or dark they get, but my favorite is when they look kind of sapphire-y

7. Scary movie or happy ending?

Happy endings NO QUESTION. Me and scary movies have a love-hate relationship. I’m never going to go out of my way to watch one. When I watch movies it’s because I want to be entertained, but not in a scary way. I love warm feel-good movies. Sorry guys I’m soft

8. Any special talents?

Eh, idk. I suppose gymnastics, but that’s not really a natural talent so much as a talent I have acquired from doing it for 10 years.

9. Where were you born?

A nice town where my parents’ went to college, about an hour from where I grew up. It’s actually where I go to college now so that’s neat-o

10. What are your hobbies?

Gymnastics of course, as stated above. I did it for a long time and miss it, it had a big impact on the type of person I am I think. Also baseball tho, my family are avid baseball fans, we go to Cubs games every summer and I did softball when I was a tiny little kid.

Also, theatre, music, and film. I love all of them so much and if anyone ever wants to gush about anything related, hit me up!!! If it’s something I’ve reblogged chances are I could hold a full conversation with you about it, and I love having in-depth conversations with people on these topics. I love music so much and even did band in middle and high school (flute player here!), and concerts are literally like heaven on earth. When it comes to theatre, musicals are where its at! It combines my love of music and love of storytelling (ie film), and I love watching any form of theatre, whether its bootlegs, Broadway, or performances put on by my college or other nearby community theatres. And lastly film, I just love visual storytelling. There are so many different elements and when there is a truly great piece of film, I am left awe-inspired.

11. Do you have any pets?

YES! Too many perhaps, but they’re my family dogs, so they live at home with my parents, not with me at college obvs. There are Wrigley and Jack who are brothers. We’ve had them since they were babies and they’re 14 now. Jack is going a little senile, but he seems happy, and Wrigley is his usual needy cuddly self lol. Then there’s Millie, who is about 6 pounds and is the biggest diva of the house, and even tinier is Gus, who doesn’t walk well due to some sort of brain issue but tries his hardest and is otherwise perfectly happy and normal. They’re a ragtag group of doggos and I love them dearly.

12. What sports do you play/have you played?

As stated above, gymnastics and softball, but I don’t play either anymore :(

13. How tall are you?

5′3″

14. Favorite subject in school?

History, but now that I’m in college it’s anything related to my film major, whether its production, writing, or storytelling

15. Dream job?

Film director, and I’m actually one of those people that are shooting for the stars lol (Wish me luck!!). I grappled with majoring in film or theatre production for a long time, but I feel there are parts of filmmaking you can’t do in a live theatre (and vice-versa obvs) so that’s why I settled on film. I would still love to make my way over to theatre someday, even just for a little while.

This was so fun! I don’t know if I have any friends on here, I don’t interact often, yikes (always feel free to reach out, I’m just shy!) If I tagged you I see you on my dash enough to consider you a friend, and/or we’ve interacted at least once.

@writing-like-chuck-shurley @xoxoalterlove @missoptimisticallyhappy  @sunoverthehill @befitandchase @petertheromaniwolf @whatevenno @ginger-mum @theshywendybird @franticphan @awesomelesserpanda @dandelicioushowell @villainsheroes @shelbs011 @prettyinpinkhaz