#and I don't know how to get people to moderate so

[howtofightwrite]

re: the question about stunning someone with head trauma (and how you Should Not unless you're okay with them dying) would knocking the wind out of a character be a better way to have that happen?

Yes, but no.

So, knocking the wind out of someone is a lot safer. I wouldn't say perfectly safe, this is how Harry Houdini died, after all. However, it's a lot safer that head wounds, and usually wouldn't result in any major injuries.

The downside is against a trained opponent, who's ready for the hit, it's not going to work. This isn't called a, “sucker punch,” without reason. If your abdominal muscles are tensed for the punch, they will absorb a lot of the blow. So this works better against the unaware or the untrained.

The other problem is, it's not going to take someone out for the duration of the scene. In a self defense situation, winding your attacker is great, because it lets you create an opening to start your escape. But, it's not going to stun someone for minutes. From personal experience, you can measure the time you gain from winding your opponent in seconds.

There are combos that start with winding someone and lead into more painful blows that can extend that opening. But, there is a continuity of force: Incapacitating someone for longer requires inflicting harm that is increasingly difficult (impossible) to moderate.

If the goal is to escape from someone who means you harm, then yeah, an elbow strike to their stomach, will give you the opportunity to get out of there.

If the goal is to have a prolonged conversation while standing over a defeated (but still living foe), that's not really something you can do intentionally. At the same time, intentional application of lethal force isn't as reliable as you might expect. For example, gunshot wounds to the head are only fatal ~98% of the time.

The issue with this train of thought is that the individual inflicting harm cannot moderate for the desired outcome. Knocking someone out, only for them to recover, is 100% possible. However, you can't do that intentionally. And having a character who does bounce another person's head off the pavement until they stop twitching, is an incredibly violent act, and it's not going to be a casual, “well they're just knocked out.” It's a, “Carl, that kills people,” moment.

If you want a character that is disproportionately violent, and probably scares everyone around them a bit, this will feed into that presentation. If you want a character who's a good person because they don't kill people, then attempting to inflict life altering injuries on someone is probably not the best way to demonstrate their ethics.

(Remember, Batman doesn't kill people, he just shatters their spines; leaving them at the mercy of the American health care system. So, the real moral lesson of Batman is that it's better to be psychologically unwell and wealthy, than economically disadvantaged. You can murder half of the city, and he'll gently deposit you in a padded cell that you can escape from whenever you get bored of the place, but if you so much as imply that you'll resort to less than legal means to put food on the table for your starving family, he will end your existence as a vertebrate.)

And, yes, I fully realize that, by the nature of his character, and comics, Batman (like most superhero comics) is poorly suited to discuss the complex factors involved in street level crime. This this is more of a critique on the treatment of “violence is okay, so long as no one ends up in the morgue,” more than a specific character critique.

There's another part to this that worth remembering, and I know I've said this before, but when you're writing, violence offers diminishing returns. Violence releases the tension you've been building. You can think of it like a rubber band gun. Until you pull the trigger, that rubber band is under tension, and the moment you release it, you hit your audience. Now, getting hit a rubber band is a sharp, and somewhat unpleasant experience, but the second time is going to annoy you less than the first, and if you're constantly bombarded with them, you'll quickly become numb to their impacts.

I'm not saying that you can't, or shouldn't, use violence, however as a writer, you are paying a very real cost whenever you use violence to resolve a scene. It's something that you do need to consider carefully. Part of my aversion to questions like this comes from this structural consideration. A lot of writers make the mistake of using non-lethal violence somewhat indiscriminately. This can absolutely harm the credibility of your characters, and your world.

There is absolutely a place for violence in stories, however, this is a tool that is most effective when used sparingly, or deliberately. (This doesn't mean the violence itself needs to be deliberate, just your use of it.)

A lot of the time when someone says, “I want to use violence to temporarily remove a character from the scene,” that's a scenario that will harm your story. There are a lot of ways to remove a character from a scene, and I don't mean, “alternatives to fighting,” like hiding from them or talking them down. The limit here is your creativity, and in a lot of ways, violence is the least interesting way to achieve your goals.

-Starke

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#how to fight write #writing advice #writing tips #writing reference #starke answers

[forgettable-au]

OKAY

SO

HERE IS THE DISCORD SERVER

Finally I have a place where I can be crazy about this AU and also talk to more utdr fans and share art and make whiteboardss wohoo

Just one thing! You have to be older than 14 to be in the server!

And you get to have these cool emojis I made so yeaah

(Possibly temporary access sooo enter now)

#Please be nice to each other! #I have no moderators yet #and I don't know how to get people to moderate so #just me managing everything rn #forgettable-au #I

[theneighborhoodwatch]

i love franklydear as much as the next guy, but i have to admit i’m always a little thrown off by how much fanwork portrays them as married from the get-go, because part of the appeal of franklydear for me is the prospect of someone having their gay awakening while also experiencing the muppets’ adaptation of silent hill.

#public notice #welcome home #another part of course being that i think they might fall into a tried and true favorite dynamic of mine: #extremely unassuming normal man x man-adjacent thing who is moderately-to-very weird and open about it #except the longer you look the more you realize one of them is almost Definitely hiding something whether they realize it or not #and buddy. it ain't the weirdo. #of course i could just be getting ahead of myself. anyway #i can't really Fault people for drawing them as already married bc there Is cute as hell concept art of them wearing wedding bands #i just like thinking about The Journey #also Another part of the appeal of franklydear for me is like #we know that it Happens. we just don't know how or when. presumably bc that's all Plot Sensitive Information #something about that is very funny to me. a spoiler so out of context that it almost ceases to be a spoiler entirely #anyways that concludes tonight's musings about these two specifically #i saw a post i wanna respond to so if im not Too fucked up i wanna work on that #franklydear

[pseudophan]

i just lost two followers and it's making me laugh because judging by my most recent posts i assume they were diehard royalists? or at least people holding the british royal family in an unusually high regard? cry about it i guess idk, i do find it funny that you give a fuck though

on this note though of my followers holding different beliefs than me - if you're a terf? please kill yourself! i don't usually give a fuck because i just don't have it in me to start a war with everyone i disagree with but like. truly. if you hold any kind of prejudice against trans people whatsoever. fuck off from my blog lol i don't want you here

#ive got the shinigami eyes extension right #and sometimes i see people in my notes flagging up red #but i hate blocking people is the thing like i just don't do that #if someone who flags red reblogs me more than twice i'll block them though #but mostly i'm like. i don't want to block people. so i don't #but it's still like ohhhh my god. how are you reblogging my posts about dan and phil as a full on transphobe!!!!! #and dont be worried cause i vet all of these blogs #bc i know shinigami eyes isnt fool proof #sometimes someone gets marked red and they aren't actually a terf they just said one thing at one time that got misconstrued #like the bot isnt all that moderated #so any time i see a red url i will investigate to make sure they are in fact a terf #but man. MANNNNNN #my main point is like #do yall know dnp would fucking hate you lmfao #even if you somehow ignore the part where dan doesnt give a fuck about gender and none of it is real #and hes happy with all pronouns #like u can refer to her by he she they #doesnt matter #even if you ignore that #and all of the rest of it #how do you hear the things dnp say. frequently. all the time. and go. yeah i think me. a transphobe. should keep watching them #MAN IDK #youre all fucking weird

[gerryrigged]

people who claim to be Dick stans but who hate Tim and people who claim to be Tim stans but who hate Dick make NO SENSE TO ME

like do they realize how little sense they make??

how much these two adore each other??

'Red R0bin and/or fanon mischaracterization soured me on that character/relationship!' WEAK. INVALID. PLS EXIT, PURSUED BY BEAR.

#LORD knows I hate the Dick-bashing that goes on from Tim fans #who don't read or know Red Robin in context of their longstanding close relationship #but I also can't follow most of the Dick-stan blogs I've come across because of the TIM bashing that happens so SO regularly #how can you stan either character without at the very least moderately liking the other? #Dick and Tim are LITERALLY near the top of each other's 'Favorite People' lists #regardless of the disagreements they may have or the hurts they may cause each other #haters can't even get inside the boys' heads properly bc they're too full of love and admiration for each other #and that gives the haters hives probably :/ #....also as always I'm sure the new 52 and its wild egregious mischaracterizations are partially to blame #*shakes fist at the sky* NUUUUU FIFTY TWOOOOOOO #gerryrigged #keeping this OUT of the tags hopefully lol

[colecxre-17]

now i can truly live knowing i have someone who will mourn for me

#ramblings #personal #last year has been tough #i want to talk to more people #i want to make friends #i'm sorry if we're mutuals and we don't talk i just have a hard time personally talking to folks without seeming like a boring person #just know i really want to talk to you guys okay #i just don't know how to #so please bear me with me #but anyway #i've been participating in my school's newsletter recently #my moderator is a really sweet teacher who manages the lower grades #and she also doubles as my coach for when i get drafted to journalism contests #so for the past couple of months she's been basically my mother #somehow more present than my actual one but i digress #everytime we see each other in the school hallways outside of journalism work she always has a big smile on her face #and once when i had to dress up fancy for a filming session she saw me and complimented my outfit saying i looked lovely #that meant a lot to me yk? to be acknowledged #to be remembered #she says all the right things #especially when it comes to my writing #apparently she speaks highly of my writing skills to other people #and it just hit for me #this woman remembers me outside of the work we do #she talks about me to other people #she has the capacity to mourn for me and the work that i've done when i'm gone #and that #made me cry at like 3 in the morning #so i kind of wrote this down to look back on when i wake up #so uhm. yeah hi guys wassup 👍

[elytrafemme]

you know i oscillate between appreciating and resenting this fact about me (which is VERY maretypical tbh) b/c of how complicated it makes things but in this moment i must step back from my emotions and say. holy SHIT i am so glad i do not possess a drop of impulsivity in me holy fucking shit oh my God.

#nightmare.personal #haha. bites my lip and looks around alluringly. I would ruin my life so fucking fast actually. #and that's why it's kind of shitty because i don't have uh. that many outlets? for how i feel? #which doesn't? exactly end well? sometimes i don't know how i survive this #but also i am very glad that i am not impulsive and further i am REALLY glad i have chronic exhaustion #because the way that i mentally feel right now is only being held back by the fact that i'm reigning myself back #and am too tired to even like. get up to brush my teeth #also this makes life easier on everyone who knows me because they know i won't try risky shit #i just remain Moderately Concerning to people which is how i'd like to fucking stay thanks #not to my family though. everyone in the world be worried about me but i don't want my family to even perceive me #... my mother and sister can. but they know my happy moments first and foremost #my father and brother will learn about everything a step too late and that's how i like it #it's the younger brother instinct in me what can i say!! i've got to fucking prove myself somehow!!! #God i do not feel good right now huh.

[welcometoteyvat]

. windblume

#3.5 spoilers #windblume spoilers #genshin spoilers #this is my first windblume haha i missed weinselfest too bc school so its neat to see a festive mond! #ive already seen festive liyue at least 3 times haha so its an interesting change of pace #anyways not to be like the umpteenth person to say this but cy.no lore???!!! #getting gradually more and more interested in him mostly bc he seems to be another case of 'poor desert student gets taken in by akademiya b #beneficiary and [etc etc]' and hm. on one hand idk how to feel about that! there are a variety of implications of that some of which are ver #very 'hm!. this could go very wrong!' #on the other hand i like his puns <3 the serious way in which he tells all jokes is so good #seen some people talking about col.lei's change from angry girl to uwu shy introvert #haven't read the manga AND don't have strong opinions on her but i suppose it is kind of tiring for a large portion of the female chars to b #be. like that rip #also al.bedo lore?! i am fully on the cynobedo train rn theyre so ?!?@??!? idk good pls put them in a room more #also that cutscene. and the lore??? girl why isn't this a main quest a) funny as hell b) literally drops hints about actual main quest c) en #endearment factor and mild to moderate character development d) funny as hell see point a #ngl i got lowkey turned off by su.crose and col.lei bonding... it might be because of the shy introverted female thing ... im sorry mond fan #the npc romance tho lmaoooo. truly the only characters getting bitches in the game /hj #also . bedo blowing through the rankings of 'characters who don't let on 90% of what they know' every single quest with some lowstakes myste #mystery mond gimmick he's ALWAYS the one who figures it out and says fucking nothing #shaking him what do you know #ok bye i hope everyone has fun playing it the quest is good <3 #ramblings!

[anaalnathrakhs]

i want IMMEDIATE GRATIFICATION i’ve done the small talk i’ve done the compliments i’ve done the optimism i’ve done the kindness and understanding, i want irl friends NOW or i’m gonna start biting

#i'm tired of waiting for my life to start i want to GO OUT and i want to DO THINGS and i want to have goddamn friends for once in my life #i'm doing my best with what i have but i havent had a close friend irl since i was 11 and i don't like. do things. #i have no idea what i'm doing and i'm TRYING i'm being nice and making small talk and inviting people to do thing on the rare occasion i can #and it doesn't motherfucking work i want a refund i want to start over roll everything back to my birth #everyone already has a friend group and i'm just flailing around like a fish being a moderately nice accquaintance to people #it was so nice out tonight and i would cut off my own arm to have a kinda sucky night under the rain downtown with friends #rather than to be in my mom's car #i can manage it easier now that i'm not depressed anymore and that i have friends online and get along pretty well with people #but it fucking hurts so much seeing people out having fun I WANT THAT I WANT TO GO DO THINGS AND BE SOCIAL #some of my acquaintances have stopped answering some of them stay kinda cold and don't talk much #i was friends with one for a while but we never did anything it sucked and she deleted and stopped talking so there's that #and i have a bunch of numbers or discords and i don't fucking KNOW how to talk to them. i don't have things to SAY #which i guess means ''work on yourself instead of being an empty shell of a person jerkass'' but i have no idea how to do that #and my therapist kinda. didn't help me when i asked. #so fuck me i guess #i'm fine it's fine i had a moderately annoying evening #vent #broadcasting my misery

[ms-demeanor]

So You Need To Buy A Computer But You Don't Know What Specs Are Good These Days

Hi.

This is literally my job.

Lots of people are buying computers for school right now or are replacing computers as their five-year-old college laptop craps out so here's the standard specs you should be looking for in a (windows) computer purchase in August 2023.

PROCESSOR

Intel i5 (no older than 10th Gen)

Ryzen 7

You can get away with a Ryzen 5 but an intel i3 should be an absolute last resort. You want at least an intel i5 or a Ryzen 7 processor. The current generation of intel processors is 13, but anything 10 or newer is perfectly fine. DO NOT get a higher performance line with an older generation; a 13th gen i5 is better than an 8th gen i7. (Unfortunately I don't know enough about ryzens to tell you which generation is the earliest you should get, but staying within 3 generations is a good rule of thumb)

RAM

8GB absolute minimum

If you don't have at least 8GB RAM on a modern computer it's going to be very, very slow. Ideally you want a computer with at least 16GB, and it's a good idea to get a computer that will let you add or swap RAM down the line (nearly all desktops will let you do this, for laptops you need to check the specs for Memory and see how many slots there are and how many slots are available; laptops with soldered RAM cannot have the memory upgraded - this is common in very slim laptops)

STORAGE

256GB SSD

Computers mostly come with SSDs these days; SSDs are faster than HDDs but typically have lower storage for the same price. That being said: SSDs are coming down in price and if you're installing your own drive you can easily upgrade the size for a low cost. Unfortunately that doesn't do anything for you for the initial purchase.

A lot of cheaper laptops will have a 128GB SSD and, because a lot of stuff is stored in the cloud these days, that can be functional. I still recommend getting a bit more storage than that because it's nice if you can store your music and documents and photos on your device instead of on the cloud. You want to be able to access your files even if you don't have internet access.

But don't get a computer with a big HDD instead of getting a computer with a small SSD. The difference in speed is noticeable.

SCREEN (laptop specific)

Personally I find that touchscreens have a negative impact on battery life and are easier to fuck up than standard screens. They are also harder to replace if they get broken. I do not recommend getting a touch screen unless you absolutely have to.

A lot of college students especially tend to look for the biggest laptop screen possible; don't do that. It's a pain in the ass to carry a 17" laptop around campus and with the way that everything is so thin these days it's easier to damage a 17" screen than a 14" screen.

On the other end of that: laptops with 13" screens tend to be very slim devices that are glued shut and impossible to work on or upgrade.

Your best bet (for both functionality and price) is either a 14" or a 15.6" screen. If you absolutely positively need to have a 10-key keyboard on your laptop, get the 15.6". If you need something portable more than you need 10-key, get a 14"

FORM FACTOR (desktop specific)

If you purchase an all-in-one desktop computer I will begin manifesting in your house physically. All-in-ones take away every advantage desktops have in terms of upgradeability and maintenance; they are expensive and difficult to repair and usually not worth the cost of disassembling to upgrade.

There are about four standard sizes of desktop PC: All-in-One (the size of a monitor with no other footprint), Tower (Big! probably at least two feet long in two directions), Small Form Factor Tower (Very moderate - about the size of a large shoebox), and Mini/Micro/Tiny (Small! about the size of a small hardcover book).

If you are concerned about space you are much better off getting a MicroPC and a bracket to put it on your monitor than you are getting an all-in-one. This will be about a million percent easier to work on than an all-in-one and this way if your monitor dies your computer is still functional.

Small form factor towers and towers are the easiest to work on and upgrade; if you need a burly graphics card you need to get a full size tower, but for everything else a small form factor tower will be fine. Most of our business sales are SFF towers and MicroPCs, the only time we get something larger is if we have to put a $700 graphics card in it. SFF towers will accept small graphics cards and can handle upgrades to the power supply; MicroPCs can only have the RAM and SSD upgraded and don't have room for any other components or their own internal power supply.

WARRANTY

Most desktops come with either a 1 or 3 year warranty; either of these is fine and if you want to upgrade a 1 year to a 3 year that is also fine. I've generally found that if something is going to do a warranty failure on desktop it's going to do it the first year, so you don't get a hell of a lot of added mileage out of an extended warranty but it doesn't hurt and sometimes pays off to do a 3-year.

Laptops are a different story. Laptops mostly come with a 1-year warranty and what I recommend everyone does for every laptop that will allow it is to upgrade that to the longest warranty you can get with added drop/damage protection. The most common question our customers have about laptops is if we can replace a screen and the answer is usually "yes, but it's going to be expensive." If you're purchasing a low-end laptop, the parts and labor for replacing a screen can easily cost more than half the price of a new laptop. HOWEVER, the way that most screens get broken is by getting dropped. So if you have a warranty with drop protection, you just send that sucker back to the factory and they fix it for you.

So, if it is at all possible, check if the manufacturer of a laptop you're looking at has a warranty option with drop protection. Then, within 30 days (though ideally on the first day you get it) of owning your laptop, go to the manufacturer site, register your serial number, and upgrade the warranty. If you can't afford a 3-year upgrade at once set a reminder for yourself to annually renew. But get that drop protection, especially if you are a college student or if you've got kids.

And never, ever put pens or pencils on your laptop keyboard. I've seen people ruin thousand dollar, brand-new laptops that they can't afford to fix because they closed the screen on a ten cent pencil. Keep liquids away from them too.

LIFESPAN

There's a reasonable chance that any computer you buy today will still be able to turn on and run a program or two in ten years. That does not mean that it is "functional."

At my office we estimate that the functional lifespan of desktops is 5-7 years and the functional lifespan of laptops is 3-5 years. Laptops get more wear and tear than desktops and desktops are easier to upgrade to keep them running. At 5 years for desktops and 3 years for laptops you should look at upgrading the RAM in the device and possibly consider replacing the SSD with a new (possibly larger) model, because SSDs and HDDs don't last forever.

COST

This means that you should think of your computers as an annual investment rather than as a one-time purchase. It is more worthwhile to pay $700 for a laptop that will work well for five years than it is to pay $300 for a laptop that will be outdated and slow in one year (which is what will happen if you get an 8th gen i3 with 8GB RAM). If you are going to get a $300 laptop try to get specs as close as possible to the minimums I've laid out here.

If you have to compromise on these specs, the one that is least fixable is the processor. If you get a laptop with an i3 processor you aren't going to be able to upgrade it even if you can add more RAM or a bigger SSD. If you have to get lower specs in order to afford the device put your money into the processor and make sure that the computer has available slots for upgrade and that neither the RAM nor the SSD is soldered to the motherboard. (one easy way to check this is to search "[computer model] RAM upgrade" on youtube and see if anyone has made a video showing what the inside of the laptop looks like and how much effort it takes to replace parts)

Computers are expensive right now. This is frustrating, because historically consumer computer prices have been on a downward trend but since 2020 that trend has been all over the place. Desktop computers are quite expensive at the moment (August 2023) and decent laptops are extremely variably priced.

If you are looking for a decent, upgradeable laptop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:

14" Lenovo - $670 - 11th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 512GB SSD

15.6" HP - $540 - 11th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 256GB SSD

14" Dell - $710 - 12th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, and 256GB SSD

If you are looking for a decent, affordable desktop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:

SFF HP - $620 - 10th-gen i5, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD

SFF Lenovo - $560 - Ryzen 7 5000 series, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD

Dell Tower - $800 - 10th-gen i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD

If I were going to buy any of these I'd probably get the HP laptop or the Dell Tower. The HP Laptop is actually a really good price for what it is.

Anyway happy computering.

[agelenopsis-potteri]

there's so many things i'm gonna do When I Get The Money but one of them is to get weirder. i need to indulge my 12-year-old self and wear the fuckin mlp shirt. wear plastic jewellery and dye my hair rainbow and buy myself dog collars and cosplay in public and most importantly diy that shit, but if i can't/don't want to i'm going to raid hot topic and claire's. i need to i need to i need to

#does hot topic still have cool stuff?? #i made myself a bunny hat with ears that go down to my. waist?? #i usually drape them over my front it's SUCH a cute hat and i get compliments on it all the time #i'm so so so proud of it. but like. god i have got to get weirder so that the people i actually WANT approaching me do so #somehow i get less self conscious wearing the hat in public than i do wearing a fox tail. they're like the same thing #it brings me a great amount of comfort to wear both but i feel so scared of wearing the tail in public #because it's the only thing i get negative attention for #i was gonna say harassment but i've never felt unsafe so it's not like... a huge deal it just makes me nervous #maybe this is just an extension of me caring about what others think too much but i feel like people just like me cuz i'm cute #i THINK i'm attractive and that's why i get away with being like this. but i gotta know. where do people draw the line with me #how weird can i be without people reacting negatively. i'm doing this for me and if the people i hang out with don't like it... #but they DO. and it baffles me. i feel so incredibly lucky. why are people always so nice to me. is it conditional? #if i looked 'ugly' would they treat me differently?? #everyone in this group is like. moderately attractive. am i overthinking this? if it's conditional i don't want it #i need actual freak friends #txt

[pibsboots]

I've always had chronic fatigue. I remember being twelve, and an adult mentioned how I couldn't possibly know how tired they felt because adulthood brought levels of exhaustion I couldn't imagine. I thought about that for days in fear, because I couldn't remember the last time I didn't feel tired.

Eventually I came to terms with the fact that I was just tired, and I couldn't do as many things as everyone else. People called me lazy, and I knew that wasn't true, but there's only so many times you can say "I'm tired" before people think it's an excuse. I don't blame them. When a teenager does 20 hours of extracurriculars every week and only says "I'm too tired" when you ask them to do the dishes, it's natural to think it's an excuse. At some point, I started to think the same thing.

It didn't matter that I could barely sit up. It was probably all in my head, and if I really wanted to, I could do it.

When I learned the name for it, chronic fatigue, I thought wow, people that have that must be miserable, because I am always tired and I cannot imagine what it would feel like if it were worse.

Spoiler alert, if you've been tired for a decade, it's probably chronic fatigue.

Once I figured that out though, I thought of my energy as the same as everyone else's, just smaller in quantity. And that might be true for some people, but I've figured out recently that it absolutely isn't true for me.

I used to be like wow I have so much energy today I can do this whole list for sure! And then I'd do the dishes and have to lay down for 2 hours. Then I'd think I must gave misjudged that, I didn't have as much energy as I thought.

But the thing is - I did have enough energy for more tasks, I just didn't go about them properly.

With chronic fatigue, your maximum energy is obviously much smaller than the average person's. Doing the dishes for you might use up the same percentage of energy that it takes to do all the daily chores for someone else.

If someone without chronic fatigue was to do all the daily chores, they would take breaks. Because otherwise, they're sprinting a marathon for no reason and it would take way more energy than necessary. We have to do the same.

Put the cups in the dishwasher, take a break. Put the bowls in, take a break. So on and so forth. This may mean taking breaks every 2-5 minutes but afterwards, you get to not feel like you've run a marathon while carrying 4 people on your back.

Today, I had a moderate amount of energy. Under my old system of go till you drop, I probably could have done most of the dishes and wiped off the counter and then been dead to the world for the rest of the day.

Under the new system, I scooped litter boxes, cleaned out the fridge, took the trash out, cleaned the stove, and wiped off the counter and did all the dishes. And after all that, I still had it in me to make a simple dinner, unload the dishwasher, and tidy the kitchen.

It was complete and utter insanity. Just because I sat down whenever I felt myself getting more tired than I already was.

All this to say, take fucking breaks. It's time to unlearn the ceaseless productivity bullshit that capitalism has shoved down our throats. Its actively counterproductive. Just sit down. Drink some water. Rest your body when it needs to rest.

There will still be days where there is nothing to do but rest, and days where half a load of dishes is absolutely the most I can do. But this method has really helped me minimize those, which is so incredibly relieving.

#chronic illness #chronic fatigue #chronic pain

[fairuzfan]

the reason i shared my great-grandmother's story on here a few months ago is not for sympathy or anything, its to illustrate to you just how deeply, deeply anti-Palestinian the idea of zionism is.

i remember my grandmother, the one who watched her mother die in her home, she called us with a plain tone of voice, and she said "she asked to be buried in [her village] but of course the the zionists wouldn't let that happen." the thing that will not leave my head was the way my grandmother said it, the way it just seemed so natural and so obvious to her. my grandmother is *not* a quiet woman, she yells everything she ever says, whether happy or sad but this she said softly. like she was resigned to this, she expected this.

this woman was exiled once from her village, then again from Palestine, then again and again and again and eventually forced to live in poverty in a refugee camp, she knows the 'israeli' state more intimately than anyone i know, she knows what it will and won't allow in its genocidal apparatus and to her it was obvious that they would not respect her mother's body or last wishes. she knew that.

and i always go back to it when i see discussions on here or on twitter or in academia, like you guys (the moderates, the apologists) have never ever spoken to a nakba survivor or a naksa survivor. you don't know just how deeply its affected our families.

so when we ask you to completely reject zionism, when we demand it from allies, we aren't saying this to be stubborn or nonsensical, we're saying it because we know where zionism will lead us. we've been through the "we just want peace" and the "we need to just talk it out" phases already, how can you not think we've been through those phases after 75 years. we've had our meet and greets and our appeals and now we're at literally the worst stage of genocide against our people and you're still insisting on "talking it out" or some variation of it.

the truth of the matter is that we don't have patience for zionism anymore because look where it got us. look where we're at. even soft zionists, you need to stamp those people out from pretending they've got good points, or that you need to build community with them or whatever. we are literally at the worst part of Palestinian history ever, we need to stop pretending there are grey zones to this. Zionist apologists and the like are creating ambiguity that literally gets our families killed under the guise of "complication". I'm sick and tired of watching these same discussions over and over again about how "Israel is a result of antisemitism" when it very much is not. I'm sick of seeing people who know NOTHING about colonization push their own agendas and provide cover for zionists to do whatever they want. Just stop talking about things you don't understand because I promise you, you're directly contributing to the violence you claim to abhor.

#palestine #zionism #going theough my drafts to clean stuff out

[willowchild]

It's actually so sad to see more and more people in your country becoming far right, hateful and either violent or a violence apologist.

#its scary and disappointing and angering. can you guys just be normal??? #and some moderate right wing People will pretend its not that bad because they can't handle the truth of our side having bad people #they think it has to be black and white #settler violence and right wing/far white wing racism feels like its been growing faster. look at how many ppl voted 4 ben gvir and smotrich #ugh!!!! i hope the people who are responsible for the things in umm safa huwara all these places are heavily punished #i hope people become more moderate. like kahana had like 1 mandate and otzma yehudit got tons wtd #i fucking hate this. people feel comfortable saying stuff graffitinh stuff and going out to harm Palestinians and their property #how can people be so hateful... #rant #israel #אם יש פה ישראלים: היי #I'm not right wing but you can be a right winger anf not an evil maniacm #I've heard ppl recently saying they think ppl r getting more moderate but I don't see it! #these ppl wouldn't listen to a Palestinian talking abt Israeli crimes. doesn't support their narrative and would make it hardrr 2 harm them #i hope 2 see changes by next elections. who knows maybe non voters will vote. maybe 18 yr olds are more progressive idk #it speaks

[sexygaywizard]

I've been seeing a lot that people are really surprised and upset that pissvortex got banned, and while I think it's fucked up and shitty that he did get banned, I also don't think it's very surprising because- and here's something I think a lot of non-TERFs don't understand- TERFs navigate this website very differently from the rest of us. The standard reaction to any non-TERF encountering a TERF is to block them, and generally not engage. You know, we have block lists of TERFs that go around. TERFs themselves, they don't really do this shit. They don't have huge block lists of trannies- I mean that would be like 80% of the fucking site- what they do is they keep watch of accounts that they really fucking hate and they hang out in their little discord servers because they're petty and vicious and have nothing better to do than fill their lives with poison and venom, and they harass you to provoke you, and when you say some shit about how terfs should kill themselves or be scalped, they share it around between themselves and mass report it. And absolutely no large social media website, not Tumblr, not Twitter, not Facebook, is going to see a post that received hundreds of reports where you said that somebody should be scalped and think, "Oh but was the other person being like a real huge asshole though?" That's not how they work. They just ban you. Whatever moderator is managing that shit does not care enough to look into the larger societal wide context of why you said that. I'm not saying this to say that you should be kind to or play nice with TERFs, I'm just saying this so that you can perhaps have an awareness of how some of your posts may look to a moderator who's received hundreds of reports about them. They're playing a different game, so play smart

#and maybe get together with your friends and report their posts where they viscerally describe how they want to castrate all penis-havers #i talk

[evilminji]

You know how... world leaders can't just? SAY stuff? Because when they DO it's the Offical Stance(tm) of their Country?

That makes their Fuck Ups(tm) all the more serious. It's WHY they have press teams.

But!!!

WHAT IF?

They said something, PUBLICLY, on LIVE TELEVISION, that? Can not be taken back? Full on "masks off, behold the horrors you have payed for" moment?

Sure, they could SAY "that wasn't me" and "I was brainwashed" etc etc. But? If it's BIG enough? UGLY enough? TRUE??? People WILL find it. Dig and dig and dig like termites in the walls. Hunt like bloodhounds.

Riot in the streets.

Because? All it would TAKE? Is ONE half ghost, a few too many long nights trying to balance college classes and his internship, a bigotry filled call from back home, and staring down that empty fridge with just one box of moldering take out, because he's been too busy and stressed to remember to get GROCERIES AND-

Ah.

So this is what "so stressed you feel calm, I have run out of Fucks too give" feels like. Neat. *picks up phone* Hey, Sam? You still at that protest? Outside the presidential speech? Neat. Don't move.

One Phone Line Express later. SAM is telling him to breathe. Maybe... maybe calm down. Think about this. Others around her can see the same "spark of madness" glint in his almost zen like smile.

It Fiiiiine, Sam.

He's just here to Talk.

He disappears. Sam's freaking out. President stumbles but catches himself on the way to the mike. Up in the watch tower, various Magic users choke on their lunches, because a ghost just possessed the United States President.

ON LIVE TELEVISION.

He taps the Mike, smile, leans in real close like he's gonna Tell You Folks A Secret.... Aaaaand~

"The second you Die, you no longer have human rights. Doesn't matter how brief. Heart stops? You're sub-human scum! Non-sentient by American law. We here in the United Stares PROUDLY desecrate the bodies and graves of the dead. Tear apart the immortal souls of the innocent. And condemn you to oblivion crying, begging, and screaming for mercy! Why, obviously, is an act. Because souls don't have the RIGHT to feel fear or pain!

And YES. We do mean EVERYONE'S. Atlantian, Kryptonian, Martian. Canadian, Mexican, Russian, AND Chinese! I could keep going! Once you die? You belong to the United States to experiment on as we see fit! You're PROPERT now! So turn your nonrights having, nonsentient self in to the nearest GIW! For the good of AMERICA. Ectoplasmic Scum!"

*drops mic*

Jaws are on the floor. This was VETERANS DAY. Dead military Heros and smile for the cameras. A cake walk. Do a patriotism, rah rah. There.... there are DIPLOMATS in the crowd. Sure as SHIT, were more then a few foreign nationals WATCHING. Religious leaders looking on in fury, grief, and horror.

Reporters. Oh sweet Jesus the reporters.

The press secretary faints.

PANDEMONIUM. The president, still dazed and confused from being possessed, gets PUNCHED on live television be his VP, a deeply religious if moderately shady man. Take bribes? VP is cool with that. Bootstraps, peasants, and all that. But how DARE you fuck with the Souls of the dead. How DARE you!

Phones are blowing up, questions are being shouted, the JLA Dark FEEL like they should tell somebody about the ghost kid... but also this feels VERY "Call for help-y" so they might throw their weight around instead and pretend they know nothing. World leader are meaningfully staring at their Dear Beloved Dead Grandmother's photos as they send LIVID assistants to hound the American into answering the DAMN PHONE-!

And Danny?

Danny feels calmer now. He has stolen like....700 bucks from secret security's various wallets. He's going to buy himself BOUGIE groceries. Some...some NICE take out. Maybe a little cake. Yeah~ Cake for Danny~

If anyone needs him? No you don't. He needs to go do some shopping, eat, lie on the floor of his shower and just... vibe for a bit under the spray. In the dark maybe. Sleep for a week. Have his food. Yummy little treats.

Or he's gonna fuckin LOSE IT, man.

(Tucker is actively hacking his college schedule as they speak. He KNEW it. Called it! Too many classes! But does Mr "I can handle it" listen? Noooooooo! Now look what happened! Holy SHIT, Danny!)

@hypewinter @hdgnj @ailithnight @nerdpoe @the-witchhunter

#dpxdc #dp x dc #dc x dp #dcxdp #dc x dp prompt