#but this time was just. extremely extremely solid

[cripplecharacters]

What are possible ways an autistic character can recover from a shutdown/meltdown. And how can other characters help them recover without possibly making it worse?

Meltdowns and shutdowns are a possible brain response to overload/overwhelm. That overload comes from not being able to handle stimuli, and that stimuli can be external (like sensory input) or internal (like with emotions), or a combination of both. They're kind of like a fight (meltdown) or freeze (shutdown) fear response.

How an autistic character recovers from a meltdown or shutdown can vary, because what sets people off is different, but also because the cause of the meltdown or shutdown also varies a lot.

For example, once I had a meltdown because there was a helicopter flying very close to my apartment for almost two hours. I was already tired, and the noise was loud and constant and completely out of my control. Ear defenders were not working well. To help me during and after my meltdown, my boyfriend hugged me (because I enjoy physical touch, and especially if it's 'solid' it calms me down, got my weighted blanket for me, and talked to me only when I seemed to respond well. Then he made sure I drank water and got some rest.

These things helped because they generally are already calming to me: pressure, solid physical touch, and affection. But someone who doesn't like physical touch won't have that help them recover.

Universally, though, a meltdown or a shutdown is draining and does not feel good. It can feel a bit relieving, because usually once it's done you feel like you have less tension, but having it doesn't actually feel good – it often feels like completely losing control, and that feels awful. Things that make self-regulation harder, like being tired or frustrated, will make a meltdown a bit more likely, but they also make it harder to recover from one.

Which means that what helps people recover has a couple different elements:

One, that they are no longer in the same situation or environment that caused the shutdown/meltdown, as much as possible. This can mean physically leaving the space, or that a triggering sound is gone, or that a stressor is no longer active. Generally this is part of creating an environment that feels safe, which can often means a space with as little external stimuli as possible at least for the time being. (So quiet, sometimes dark, without asking for a lot.)

Two, that they are doing something that helps them rest and recover. Sometimes this can be a nap, or drinking some water, or having some food, or lying or sitting down as comfortably as possible. If someone's helping, they can say "Hey, I'm here for you,"

Three, that they have or do something that makes them feel good. And just like for non-autistic people, this is the most variable factor of them all. A common one can be pressure, whether that's with a weighted blanket or vest, or with another person like a hug. Having a comfort item or fidget/stim item can help as well. For some people talking can help; for some talking might be difficult or impossible after a meltdown or shutdown.

Four, just straight up time. This can be an hour or three or a whole day. It really varies. Imagine spending a huge amount of mental energy in twenty minutes, on top of being extremely stressed out. Exhausting, right? You might want to take the rest of your day pretty easy to recover.

As to other characters helping, creating a low stimuli environment is a safe bet. A partner, family member, or friend would also likely know what makes your character feel better when they're stressed — a meltdown or shutdown is an extra stress response. They can generally help by staying calm and showing their support.

Hope this helps! :)

– mod sparrow

#autism representation #meltdowns & shutdowns #mod sparrow

[bubbleddisasters]

Since Y’all liked the last one, heres something somewhat similar:

TWST Characters as funny / random ass moments with my friends/family

———-

Ace : A good friend of mine made an entire Cards against Humanity Deck including us, and we played it at like 4 am.

Also, one of my closest childhood friends of now 11 years, the way we first met was he insulted me, and then thirty minutes later I peeked at his notebook while he was drawing (our beds were next to eachother) recognized Sans from a meme, and then managed to bullshit through an entire conversation about Undertale without him suspecting I didn’t know what the hell I was talking about.

I made a joke about it a little less then a year ago, thinking he knew by now, but no. He looks at me and the conversation goes:

“Are you telling me our entire first interaction was you just fucking improvising through a discussion of a fandom you didn’t know shit about?”

“Wait you didn’t know?”

“NO?!”

“You genuinely believed that I knew what I was talking about then for 10 years?!?”

“Surprisingly, yes.”

Deuce: I was biking with my sister, and she accidentally biked straight into a fucking lake. Also when my dad looked me dead in the eye after receiving one of my graded tests and goes

“How the fuck do you answer Maine four times on different questions and be wrong for all four times.”

Bonus Adeuceyuu combo: Me and two of my childhood friends once linked together to grab something we saw in a river, turns out it was just a broken fishing rod.

Also another on me and the above two friends meeting: The first thing one of them did was insult me, and I genuinely have zero memory of how I met the other.

Basically, we met at a sleepaway camp as kids, and for some reason, our sleepaway camp had some wackass shit, but one of them was this game. I don’t remember the name of it, but you had to go in groups of 3-4 and tie ribbons around each staff tent/cabinside without getting caught (and keep in mind each campsite and Cabins were very spread apart) at midnight, and the first to return to the cafeteria, where the staff were waiting, and did so after tying them all, on won.

Kids age 12-17, in the middle of fuck knows where in the woods Long Island, running around in the dark unsupervised with only any light bringing items they brought themselves.

So me, and we’ll call them C and M, teamed up. It’d take too long to go into full detail, but it was a very Prologue Mines fused with Camp Vargas core adventure.

Bonus First year gang in general : Me and three friends were waiting for something I genuinely don’t remember in an abandoned dorm area and got extremely bored, and one of them could do a perfect Donald Duck impression, and another a really good goofy, and this somehow led to us having a fake reality tv show verbal bitchfight as Donald, Goofy, Mickey and Minnie for a solid hour. We all regretted not recording it.

Cater: My friend from Wales entirely forgot about the existence of timezones and called me in the middle of my history class. Her ringtone at the time was just a clip of her screaming “Bread”.

How my teacher didn’t figure out who’s phone it was is beyond me.

Trey : Made Russian Roulette Spilt Cupcakes for a large group of my friends, and one is allergic to strawberries, while another’s favorite is, so I very specifically placed the strawberry filled one on the complete other side of the table with the intention of slipping it in after she picked her two.

Some fucking how, she ended up with the Strawberry one, which I had tied with a bow (basically the ones with bows mean they contain an allergen, and the color is the allergen. Ex: Strawberry was BRIGHT FUCKING PINK.) I’m to this day not exactly sure how, but my best guess is she traded hers with whoever originally got the Strawberry one before we ate.

Luckily, I told her partner, who had been my baking partner in crime and convinced me to add in the strawberry after I said it might be a bad idea, to bring two epi pens just incase.

Riddle : I am around 5’3, and I had a friend (?) who was 6’2-3 in middle school. We had almost the blatant definition of a Floyd and Riddle Dynamic, but he’d out of the blue be extremely sweet to me (kinda like that comic in the anthology), only on days I was going through shit. When I tell you I genuinely thought I was hallucinating when he did though-

Also, I yelled at him for nailing, yes, NAILING, a flag on the ceiling reading :”el sábado es para los chicos” (Saturday is for the boys) In the fucking Spanish classroom. Since nobody was as tall as him and the janitors didn’t notice it, it was there for like a week.

Che’nya : My friend and I have an ongoing inside joke where whenever we spot the other through a window in the hallway, we text the other “behind you” or “to your__”

Leona : I brought a pillow with a silk pillow case (gift from my mom) to a sleepover once, and my friend went “You trust leaving me in the room with this?” and I genuinely responded “Its a pillow, why wouldn’t I trust you.” entirely forgetting that Silk can be pretty expensive.

I felt so bad bro.

Ruggie : My friend once dared me to get a one plate of everything during a party. I misinterpreted this and brought a mostly to full plate of each thing, including water bottles.

Turns out they meant balance one of everything on a single plate.

I did not, infact, return the seven brownies, four cupcakes, two cookies, twelevish tangerines, popcorn and god knows how many grapes, but everything else was returned or snatched by friends.

Jack: My friend was throughly convinced she knew where she was going when we got lost outside at one of the biggest malls in fucking America, and we ended up walking a good 4/6th of the perimeter before finding the target (the store, we were still fucking lost) , which we called her mom to pick us up at.

Bonus: My friend, a few dormmates and I were at Starbucks and this random woman comes up to my friend and goes “Hey, they got my order wrong, want my drink?” and I was literally trying to give him this face of “BAD IDEA”. Yea so he ignored the obvious and drank the whole fucking thing and was bouncing off the walls for the rest of the day. (This one could also work for Jamil I suppose.)

Floyd : I was once walking with a friend of mine and jokingly said Trees are giant salads.

This motherfucker breaks off a branch of the nearest tree, takes a fatass bite, drops it, and goes “I want a refund.”

Jade : Randomly got interrogated my mushroom hunters—-

(I kind you the fuck not, MUSHROOM. HUNTERS. Basically, they go out to hunt/find/ forage for rare mushrooms. Atleast thats what they told us?! I wasn’t paying much attention, I was busy petting their dog tbh)

—While camping, my friend and I had zero clue what they were talking about, so she just pointed in a random direction and they thanked us and left.

The same friend also introduced me to mica, but always called them Mermaid Scales, and we more than once walked around in the water looking for them, I was the only one that would literally stop mid-trail to pick some up though. I have a massive collection.

Also she never let me live down the fact I once trapped myself in my tent with fucking dental floss overnight just to see if I could, then couldn’t undo it in the morning, and our adult / guide / trying to keep us alive person had to cut me out with a knife.

Azul : This one very specific time as a kid I was talking to two identical twins, who were standing on each side of me, wearing the same outfits but color reversed, and nearly had an internal breakdown trying to remember which was which, so I just did verbal gymnastics around using their names.

We later literally spent two hours fighting for ours lives together and I shit you not I STILL COULDNT REMEMBER THEIR FUCKING NAMES.

Kalim : Went shopping with my badass grandma and somehow left with a Second Hand Valentino (the brand) dress for $50 and a free bracelet one of the employees gave me because ….I actually don’t know.

Also, I got trapped on a really high up indoor water slide with my sister because the water entirely stopped (we learned later the water machine tied to that ride blew up) , and where we were was like a weird slope like between two drops. We couldn’t get back up, and going down was too risky without water bcs we could go splat.

There was like a window ish on the ride, so like a smart 8 year old, I start calling for help at the top of my lungs. My sister (10) also did this. There was this guy who I guess heard us that we nicknamed Chad because he looked like the most stereotypical 2000’s beach movie love interest lifeguard and was dramatically looking around for where the voices were coming from but NEVER LOOKED UP??

Anyway, My sister got us out in the end because she found a hatch and managed to open it, and I shit you not there was a spiral staircase with a gigantic fucking sign reading “DO NOT CLIMB STAIRCASE.”

So obviously, my sister chucks me across the gap onto the staircase and then jumps over herself, and we end up spending another 40 minutes after that fiasco trying to find our parents while i’m pretty sure Chad was trying to find us.

After the 40 minutes we just assumed we were now orphans and went back to where we left our keycard and low and behold our parents had just come back from wherever they had fucked off to.

Also Chad found us and felt super bad, and bought us a smore cake?!? Someone throw him back in time to be his destined role as an extra in Teen Beach Movie. The cake was great though, but that was one hell of an 8th birthday lmao.

Jamil : My friend from India (jokily) Divorced me after my dumbass asked her if Chai was an ingredient used in Chai Tea.

Spoiler Alert : Chai IS THE TEA. Apparently, asking for Chai Tea is the equivalent of saying “Can I have some Tea Tea please.”

Yea safe to say I felt real stupid in that moment.

Epel : My sister once locked me in the bathroom so she could test her new makeup on me. She left for one second and I kid you not I snuck out of the window.

Random bonus : Me and my cousins for some reason ended up roughhousing outside after one of our older cousins weddings, and I judo flipped a whole ass 17 year old man at age 12 and I felt so powerful in that moment.

Also If you saw about the ranch in the previous post, me that gang had an anonymous cookie provider who would leave us two tins of fresh cookies every day around 12ish pm, usually behind the kitchen or outside the equipment shack.

Yes, we tried to catch them once, No, we didn’t succeed. Also nobody wanted to risk loosing cookie privileges, so we didn’t try again.

Rook: Once scared the living shit out of my online friend by texting him “I am now several miles closer to your location.” . He lives in South America, and I happened to be in Florida with a friend, so I thought i’d be funny.

Vil : I was going to a cosplay convention with a friend, and instead of bringing like a normal amount of makeup, my indecisive ass brought basically a whole suitcase worth of it.

Also won a costume competition at my boarding school for Halloween, and wasn’t even aware there was a competition until the year after, when a good half or more of my dormmates asked me to do their makeup because they’d heard I was really good at it.

Idia: Ok, so, long story, but my friend invited me and two mutual friends to see Sweeney Todd on Broadway w/ the og cast. However, I was the only one who didn’t know we were going anywhere, because he thought his mom told my dad we were going to see Sweeney Todd, while my dad thought my friend told me, but also he was suspiciously alluding to it, maybe unintentionally

So I show up in a blue hoodie with a bad pun on it, mildly ripped sweatpants, mismatched socks and bright rainbow crocs. Not very “going to watch a musical about cannibalism and Serial Killers” attire. But it gets worse.

So around the 3/4ths into the first act is when I usually get snacks at musicals or plays, since they’re usually just finished setting up and theres no line, so I’m in and out and don’t miss much.

Well, I did that as usual, and its important to know we had front row balcony seats, because…

I slipped on my friends playbill on the way to my seat, and my fucking left croc went flying down into the seats below us, and hit an older woman in the head right at Sweeney did the first oofing, and the stage lights go red for a moment in this scene.

I felt so bad, and was literally too embarrassed to go get the shoe myself, so one of my friends got it for me. Apparently the lady thought it was somewhat funny (thank fucking goodness)

Ortho : My sister and I were biking once, and found out some reason the coats we had (school merch from field day I think). had the biggest fucking hidden pockets known to man.

So the next time we went out, she for some reason decided to put our dads entire laptop in there.

Also bonus: My friend once invited me over to their house to help with their costume, and when I came over, the costume was literally a gigantic trash can. No, not the actual object, They were literally making a giant trashcan costume.

I helped but still remained mildly confused in the process.

Malleus : I had a good friend who lived next to a graveyard, and sometimes we would just go on nice walks in the graveyard.

Lilia: Another Wilderness one: We were making Pasta, and one of the guys in our group was playing with a large thing of moss, tripped, and the moss got into the fucking pasta.

One guide said “Nature Consequence, we can still eat it” while the other screamed they were going to get fired.

Also, me and a friend were singing bo-burnham on a hike, and for some reason we had this stupid ass idea of making a fake fishing rod called…..

“The Child Catcher.”

(The irony ony of us both being 14 at the time so technically we were children)

We found a good fishing rod like stick and a vine, tied a vine on, and I kid you not we carried that thing for MILES. We also made a fork with a flatly shaped stick and a rock named Reddie.

Yea living in the woods does somethin to ya I gotta say.

Bonus: One of my childhood friends had a very giant dog, and one time we had a sleepover, she was laying infront of the other side of the door when we woke , and because of the way the door was, we couldn’t get through.

So my genius solution was to climb out the window (this was on the second floor) , Cha-Cha real smoothed to the nearest other window, go through there, and lure the dog away with a treat.

It worked.

Silver: Went to this make your own dipped popsicle thing with a good friend of mine, and watched in pure horror as she got a mango popsicle dipped in dark chocolate and rolled in fruity pebbles.

Another one: I was at a Sleepover and there was this tent like thing that was meant for tiny people (aka me, not really it was for toddlers but I was small enough to fit at the time), and at some point in the middle of the night, someone tripped on the tent and it entirely collapsed on me, and not only did I sleep through it, I ended up being the last person to wake up because they all saw the tent collapsed and assumed I was already awake.

Also I was camping once and I rolled away from my tarp and somehow down a road, and my friend said when she found me there was just several butterflies and caterpillars on me. I originally didn’t know but I found a caterpillar on my head that morning and apparently it was poisonous (I was fine and I named him Bob)

Sebek: I was in an escape room with some friends, and I discovered that a key we had gotten in the very beginning worked on another lock, so I did that, and later one of my loud friends finds a key and is SPIRALING because she can’t find what it unlocks for like 30 minutes, and after several minutes I realized, unintentionally slammed my hand on a desk and screamed “OH SHIT.” with zero context.

That experience was actually my first time in a escape room with friends, and not my family or a bunch of drunk strangers in suits + my concerned mother.

Second years : My friends in the priorly mentioned group consisted of who I’ll call N, who was doing 70% of the work, we had R, who was angrily searching for the lock to the key, we had T, the birthday boi, who was randomly making jokes about the 1930s, S, who genuinely forgot he had a key item in his pocket, and A, who dramatically serenaded the paintings after misinterpreting a clue and me, who kept accidentally unlocking shit ahead of time.

Third Years: Prior to the other mentioned event, we had gone to a small improv event that ended up being just us, and the poor guy running it kept giving us scenarios and random conditions which we would absolutely make the craziest shit from.

If I remember correctly, one of the skits was we were supposed to be a school board, and the condition was when someone said an idea, you had to say yes.

The result? a organ harvesting business thats front was a school, and everytime someone got detention, one organ of theirs was sold, and the funds went into funding the biogenetically engineered creation of Hatsune Miku and Cat Boys.

For some reason this skit also led somehow into atomic glitter and cocaine missiles, selling souls on Ebay with express shipping, using Sephora Products and Instagram to spread our propaganda, making meme complications of our crimes, and nuking the Bermuda Triangle.

Ask no questions because I have no answers.

——————————-

Yea thats it for now! Enjoy!

:3

#twisted wonderland #twst #twst memes #diasomnia #lilia vanrouge #ace trappola #cater diamond #leona kingscholar #silver vanrouge #sebek zigvolt #malleus draconia #twisted wonderland incorrect quotes #riddle rosehearts #vil schoenheit #rook hunt #epel felmier #kalim al asim #jamil viper #floyd leech #jade leech #azul ashengrotto #idia shroud #ortho shroud #ruggie bucchi #che’nya #trey clover #deuce spade #neige leblanche #jack howl #nrc

[salemoleander]

Dear lord Iskall is SO FAST. He seemingly has a magic ability to deter Ravagers from noticing him, and his parkour is even better than Hypno's, esp under pressure.

...but he's just as greedy as Etho, and he drives up his clank extremely quickly from sprint-jumping like a bunny everywhere.

Until he gets better cards Hard or Deadly runs won't be very feasible, and he's coming in from behind a little bit. However, I think once he gets a few better Clank block cards, he's going to be a dark horse candidate for overall winner.

#iskall85 #iskall #decked out 2 #i was SUPER surprised bc his last runs were fun but chaotic #but this time was just. extremely extremely solid #his cool head + speed + parkour skills are really working well here #he just either needs to be more careful OR he needs the clank block and regen/porkchop cards to make caution irrelevant #salem tag

[essektheylyss]

I know I joked about DVDs but in all seriousness, I'm really glad that there's an option for watching VODs that isn't on Twitch and YouTube. It's been mentioned a few times today, but both of the interfaces of these platforms have been increasingly enshittified. I simply do not use YouTube anymore because of how horrid the interface is. I caught up on campaign 2 entirely on YouTube (and sometimes via podcast) in 2019 with no issues, but it is straight up maddening trying to use it now, and I don't know that I would have made it through the campaign if I was trying to catch up today.

I absolutely understand being tired of additional streaming services and I am absolutely in the same boat, but I also don't know how many people really recognize how gutted media distribution has become in the last ten years in the name of convenience. We all kind of realize it, but it's hard to grasp just how extensive it is. We can talk about independent business choices separately, and we should, but when the only platforms on which you have the option to distribute your work are at best frustrating to use and at worst hostile to human life, when monetization services can censor anyone they please with little explanation and have been cracking down on any content they arbitrarily deem inappropriate, when it is not clear that centralized conglomerate social media sites will continue to exist in the next year let alone decade, it is genuinely crucial for independent creators to start building alternative avenues of distribution that they control now.

#this is not about discussing the independent business choices but just for the record #i do think the way this has been handled thus far is solid and extremely reasonable. #and also i do think people would've lost it if dropout had not started largely subscriber-only and made that decision later. #just saying. I 100% think dropout's model is reasonable but they are STILL more restrictive in subscriber-exclusive content than this is #frankly at this point I do tend to favor creators who actually exhibit some business savvy cuz like #I don't necessarily presume that others will be in the space long term and i just don't have that much time to get invested in things #also cuz imo those people also tend to understand format better which is my vibe lol so there are other reasons but #i did work at a digital media company for five years and felt like fucking cassandra over literally this issue exactly so like #I'm not here to claim that I'm an expert but I do get it #the current situation SUCKS and trying to get through it is like threading a needle during an earthquake. while you're on fire.

[yourlocalguardian]

Man. The fear of just being so incredibly wrong about everything you think you are is so strong sometimes

Like especially as someone who’s always had to “prove” everything about myself my whole life in order to be taken seriously, It. Sucks.

#I’m always so desperate to get some sort of proof but I know I’ll never get it #I’ve desperately wanted proof of many things to know they’re really real but every time I’ve come close there’s always something in the way #I’m an extremely logic based person so not being able to ever have “solid proof” of anything I am or think I know really hurts sometimes #like what if I’m nothing I think I am and am really just some dumb guy #kinnity isn’t always as cool or swag as it seems sometimes #otherkin #godkin #alterhuman #dragonkin #nonhuman #caninekin

[blujayonthewing]

thinkin about how if gnomes are partially insectivorous and also live underground in the woods then Cicada Emergence is 1000% a huge cultural event, probably with religious significance, and cicadas would hold tremendous cultural importance both literally and symbolically

#<- in areas that have periodical cicada populations of course #me whenever nature does something cool: hey you could make a religion out of this #you COULD though!! #and once every 13 years happens a lot more often in a gnomish lifespan so they can more easily build solid traditions around it #it'd be a solid monthlong festival at least #observances for various stages of emergence; parades/ feast days/ festival days; lots of time spent gathering and cooking and preserving #harvest festival on steroids. extremely specific harvest festival #joy amd abundance IN ADDITION to any cicada symbolisms (life/ rebirth; perseverence; the primal need to stand up and scream sometimes; etc) #uh anyway I don't have a Good Post about this right now lol I'm in bed and should be asleep just rotating the concept in my mind (again) #about me #gnome stuff #worldbuilding

[orphiclovers]

me and 1863rd rounds han sooyoung got rizzed up at the bus stop today.

I was drawing her because my phone was dead and I was bored, thinking of the kind of bdsm sex she would like, when this old guy came up and started doing small talk. called both me and hsy beautiful women and said I was a great artist like 10 times. thanks man, this was the drawing btw

not my best work, but maybe he's into armless anime women who look dead inside

#personal tag #my art #going through today without my phone to look at orv and suffering real life felt extremely kdj coded #i got rizzed up by two seperate men while drawing today (the other time i was drawing yjh) #with the power of intense social ineptitude from all sides with a dash of billingual fail I too can make it through the day #this guy at the bus stop kept talking to me for 10 whole minutes. impressive considering i understood a solid 8 words he said. #and just nodded and said uhuh for all of that because i dont speak the other language of the area i live in. and the type of people to #speak to strangers on the street speak the other language 100% of the time #maybe i Would be good at small talk if i ever actually spoke the language the convo is happening in. alas #apparently that's optional though because no one has ever noticed i have no idea what is being said to me 92% of the time

[aroacettorney]

dont mind me. im simply just putting together a ludgercasey angst collection.

252

265

203

268

271

283

310

356

492

497

#aro ludgercasey propaganda #''why cant u be normal abt them'' how can i be normal abt them when solid 80% of their interactions is either angst or stemmed from angst. #even their ''fluff'' moments were also angst. #literally no one does angst like they do. #ludger prefers to keep most of his connections extremely impersonal/professional. #but whether or not he wants to admit it theirs on the other hand simply does not... fit in that category. #he'd even tried to convert it that way but it just didnt stick bc neither of them could help but be themselves around each other lmfao. #ludger is seemly still oblivious to caseys attempt to mend their personal relationship. #which is not too surprising considering he was also oblivious to the existence of their past relationship. #after all there was no reason for him to believe that casey would want to have anything to do with him. except maybe putting him in jail. #so pushing her away seems to be the most logical decision right? personal relationship is a luxury to him anyway. #alas casey who wanted to believe in their past friendship takes it as a sign that ludger has no interest in maintaining it. #she now has to take a step back because ''if you force a relationship it may become more estranged.'' #so unless he takes the initiative they are likely stuck in this limbo. #(casey might use impersonal excuses to stay around but rn its all up to ludger to change the nature of their relationship) #casey girlie forget him i would have treated you so much better... is what i would have loved to say. #i wouldnt be suffering this much if ludger wasnt clearly holding himself back most of the time / if it was completely one-sided from casey. #i dont know if this is a slow burn or hurt no comfort but if casey gets no closure im gonna commit arson 😔

[pandora15]

okay I've sat with it for a few days so here are my thoughts on tales of the empire

morgan elsbeth's episodes were interesting! I'm glad they added context to her backstory, but I just didn't connect with the episodes themselves very much. part of it is because I'm not really intrigued by her character, but…yeah. loved the visuals and animation, everything looked and sounded amazing.

barriss' episodes left me frustrated at the end. I'm trying to work through why exactly. I'm very glad that she became a Jedi again and redeemed herself. she seemed to have worked to overcome the darkness within herself which is amazing to see especially in modern sw. I do wish we got to see more of her redemption -- like how did she reconnect with the other jedi? did vader try to find her after she left? did she reconnect with ahsoka (is that who she was referring to when she mentioned an old friend)?

I'm especially frustrated that they left her fate on a cliffhanger again though. like we waited for over a decade to find out what happened to her, only to get. an answer but still uncertainty about her ultimate fate? I would've loved to see a character who redeemed themself and turned back to the Light Side get a somewhat "happy" ending (as happy as you can get considering. the galaxy at large and everything), but keeping her fate unknown is just. hngggggggggg I'm frustrated

but also like I really like what they did for barriss in the first two episodes and I love where she went in that third one. I'm just. frustrated about the way they left things hanging. and part of it could be just general cliffhanger-related frustrations, but I guess I was just hoping that things would end well for her. but instead we just don't know? which in a way feels worse than things ending badly for her.

#tote #tote spoilers #it's very possible that the barriss episodes will ease in my mind a bit as time passes #i might just need to time to process them a bit more #but I feel like they had potential to give us a lot more but because of the story / format they had to keep information extremely limited #and in this case the story suffered for it #her story needed more time to be fleshed out. more details. #it felt like we finally got her back and then they immediately snatched her away without any solid resolution #that being said lyn's arc was super interesting! i hope we see more from her later on #and who knows? maybe they'll resolve barriss' arc in a book or something idk #but i just wish they could've given us a better resolution here #barriss offee #morgan elsbeth

[outeremissary]

Having one of those weeks of "is this the monthly Malaise or am I about to have a real mental health rut"

#I think I feel a bit bad for not having seen success for a bit on a large project or one for other people #my to-do list... I'm trying #think I just feel socially weird too. as usual I would benefit from touching grass #I know I've been on more than is good for me lately and I'm just trying to distract from not liking how creative projects are going #or feeling lonely but not very socially confident for a while #for me social media is generally an extremely poor substitute for other forms of interaction (including other online interaction) too #it's like candy. it's fun in moderation but the more of it making up your diet the sicker you feel #and socially ambiguous in a nerve wracking way with how uncertainly part private/part public it is #especially on tumblr where so much interaction is indirect and one way. it's not how I function best I fear #it can be fun! I enjoy it much of the time. but it can also be very stressful and confusing. #a solid 'touch grass' (or touch snow) time is likely approaching if I feel weird a little longer haha #but jeez! I should knock some stuff off the list first. #I'm up too late tonight. I know that. lack of satisfaction on projects I know #okayyyyy I'll maybe prep one last thing (sunk cost fallacy) and go to sleep properly like I should've ages ago. morning will be rough. #I do miss the ways people interacted on Twitter #rambling #you should know half the time I have some way too long tags it's because I meant to say one thing and then just kept going without thinking #I think I talk too much online because offline I don't talk very much. not many people to talk to.

[fatmaclover]

i think so far the gang solves the bathroom problem may be the most ive actively laughed at a iasip episode. it was really fucking good. definitely up there with the highschool reunion ones

#still havent seen mac finds his pride #wanna binge all of s13 tonight #hopefully #but im extremely confident that that episode will take the cake as my favorite #so far any time an episode focuses on macs queerness its been a highlight of the series to me #sorry. hes just really really solid gay rep i adore him

[blujaydoodles]

@opportunity-strikes​ HI HELLO I’m gonna answer this heeere because I just realized I did a couple of sketches of them way back but never posted them aaahah

Indigo "Skylights" Asterix Pollux Kosjisk Ankabut Fatespinner is my pirate!! Quite awhile back one of my friends mentioned the idea of an all-gnome pirate crew whose ship’s name is comprised of the names of all the ships they’ve successfully raided and/or destroyed, and long story short it ended up being a one-shot and hopefully an ongoing series of one-shots :D

Indigo is the ship’s navigator and lookout; they’re a circle of stars druid, and their star map is a gold false eye etched with constellations, with a Gem of Brightness core that can project the stars outward-- which is, not to brag, the coolest idea I’ve ever had about anything (it’s an admittedly low bar; I’m not a very creative Ideas Guy lmao)

also their Archer starry form gives them a flintlock that shoots comets, and their Primal Savagery cantrip is flavored as a cutlass that’s formed from an extension of their starlight :D

#dnd #dungeons and dragons #gnome #druid #character art #heroforge #imagine the treasure map from treasure planet. that's sorta how their eyeball is (they pop it out to do readings and stuff) #in starry form their eye is the only thing that remains solid and opaque and you can see the whole thing floating and shining #I never got an opportunity to blind someone with my eyeball when we played 😭 hopefully next time lol #I default to they/them because I personally prefer consistency but they use any pronouns and their gender is 'none for me thanks' #they're an astrology bitch and constantly saying things like 'the stars predict you're gonna see a bird today' #but they also have like you know... Actual Portents and stuff as class features but they straight-face all of it #so it's hard to tell when they're being serious about astrology and when they're bullshitting you #similarly if you ask what happened to their eye they'll give a different answer every time including 'this IS my real eye?' #also we've talked about doing rotating DMs for Pirate Gnomes but my friend who ran it first had us explore a mysterious ghost ship #which was extremely cool AND we managed to grab her nameplate off her before she sank forever into the depths HELL YEAH #their roll20 bio is just 1) the 'look at the sky-- it's not dark and black and without character' bit from the van gogh ep of doctor who #and 2) the bridge from weird al's 'that's your horoscope for today' #so that's The Vibe lmao #anyway they're cool I like em they've got a handful of features I didn't get to use that I'm excited about in a theoretical future adventure #altho I'd want to better dial in how to actually roleplay them lol their voice and manner of speech was all over the place :'D #my OCs #Indigo

[scyaxe]

so i recently started classes at Real College, and idk why i expected it to be like the community college i went to, but they just threw us in the deep end. classes started monday and i've already had a 1 page paper due. but also all of my professors have been like "call me by my first name" which i think is very funny, but also, respectfully, that is scary.

#well okay. 2 of them explicitly said to call them by their first names #the other two introduced themselves by their full names but did not specify if they want to be called professor or not #so i have been calling them professor [last name] #also the department head is a woman #one of my professors is nonbinary and from china #one of my professors is jewish and uses ''partner'' for his s/o #one of my professors is an argentinian woman #and like a solid percentage of my class is trans or gay #and we have a ton of exchange students mostly from japan and nepal #i am absolutely in love with the diversity #esp since the community college i went to was extremely white and cis #i just feel a lot safer at this university #also??? free period products and contraceptives and there's a food pantry on campus for students #a ton of events all the time as well #and theres a bowling alley and a movie theatre on campus?????? #this is a state university btw this isn't a private university #it's just extremely wild to me #forgot theres also an islamic center on campus so thats really cool #(our city has a large muslim population though so it kinda makes sense)

[unproduciblesmackdown]

forsooth reread the first part of lackadaisy and just a few excerpts, particularly w/a visual focus

like i said, that i started reading this in '07 (which, consulting the copyrights, means the end of this section was still Currently Updating at that time, very fun for me, i do also remember A Break b/w the end of that section & the first page of part two b/c i remember being so [oouhh hell yes] when that updated)

mentioning the off the shits quality right from the start and like, around this age maybe already starting to draw a bit more / beyond like doodles to pass the time at school or at home largely; not being at all very Online yet to know abt what the hell people post anywhere so like my god people not only just make their own comics, not only are they essentially ongoing graphic novels, someone can also just be making something this high quality....intriguing and just holistically inspirational on the artistic front, that people just Were out there able to just do this kind of stuff, nonprofessionally, b/c they wanted to. and just the intrigue of like, i loved keeping up with it as a whole then & since, the historical element is fun, the drama & mystery elements, the dynamic adventure aspect, the slightly lighthearted playful nature of the work overall (jellicle...), the constant relevance of Character and the constant progression of Story

but also it sure occurred to me that a big like Artistic Illumination & Motivation element of it is how immediately effectively quasi three-dimensional the art is, especially with the figures: the realistically consistent geometry in changing perspectives / characters being consistently constructed out of would-be three-dimensional shapes, the Lighting/Shading doing a ton to define the 3D shapes, the use of fabric wrinkling adding not just visual detail but following form & movement....middle school / would-be high school years as sure a particularly transformative time for my drawing like, hey, i can just do stuff, hey i can make & post niche fanart so that i'm motivated to draw just a lot more b/c i really am hardly moved to do it outside of that lmao....and i imagine that having This dropped in my lap and like, its feeling pretty immediate was this inspiration of like, organically selling this approach of Constructing Figures / to be thinking of things very three-dimensionally even when it Wasn't actually like, animation or an elaborate still life. like evidently my own art is very Line focused but i would say i'm also definitely thinking of figures as 3D like this / striving for the linework serving that too, or just generally striving for more [the Geometry works "realistically" despite obvious stylization, as it clearly does w/lackadaisy]

#can't readily think of something around that time that would've been making me think like oh hm yeah how do you Build a figure like that #not b/c nothing else was doing it but just b/c it wasn't so like. emergently clear to me as part of the process / its results? #and i have to imagine for real the shading and like so evidently present fabric folds and the lighting/shading; again; for emphasis; was a #significant factor....very Noticeable #and the artist doing this shit in traditional art / in pencil....with digital touchups / shading as well but like good god #actually saying most of what i could say in the body of the post lol imagine but yeah #lot of Wow Dynamic and Looking Like Solid Three Dimensional Figures going on #long post /// #i've also remembered one of those moments where it's like. the memorable combos of [Dismissiveness but w/some funny remark] #in some discussion w/my roommate at the time i was talking about this comic like boy it's really good & keepupwithable; great times #and their [i'm not going to read it] response being an extremely rhetorical ''But Why Are They Cats.'' lmao alright #lackadaisy

[sysig]

Baby’s first successful molt under our care ♥

#Spider #Nhandu Chromatus #I'm extremely relieved hhhh #There was a bit of a scare and I was kinda really stressed out for a solid hour or so afterwards #I love ma to bits but she's not someone who always thinks through her actions very well #So like I said before I knew Baby was in premolt and I fully intended to leave them alone outside of feeding and watering #Well turns out feeding day had to be incredibly postponed! I didn't even get a chance to see them during molt #Which tbh it probably a good thing I wouldn't want to have stressed them out #Unfortunately because of that tho I also didn't have a chance to let ma know that they'd molted and would look weird #She wasn't aware of how spiders look when they're freshly molted so she got worried - normally not a problem #Except that she then proceeds to Pick Up Baby's Enclosure and tilt it to try to get Baby to move to make sure they were still alive #Like! That!! Hhhhhphew I know she didn't know but of all the things she could've done in that moment hahaaa #Spiders do look kinda dead when they're in molt and I guess I should've sat her down to explain or come with her or Literally Anything #But - luckily - Baby was stressed but seems uninjured from the spook #I'm just glad this all happened /after/ the molt because Baby could've straight up died if she'd tried that while they were doing that #Hhhh anyway!! Baby looks to be in good health!! #Still soft as you can see from the red fangs hehe ♥ But an absolute beauty! #That's not a trick of photography either btw :D Those are actually blood-red fangs! They're currently see-through and will darken over time #Aren't they a gorgeous colour ♪ Once they harden up back to black I can finally feed them again they're surely super hungry #The molt is also in great quality! I accidentally tangled the abdomen and separated the thorax cap ouq But aside from that! #Baby did an amazing job I'm super proud <3

[wantonlywindswept]

Skybird abandoned sequel ficlet

for @lucdarling <3

So Skybird is a fic I wrote many many many years ago, back when fandoms were still on Livejournal and we had writing kinkmemes (which were honestly only like 50% kink/smut tbh) where you could post story ideas and invite people to write something on that idea. I had been on an Inception kick and was current up to like, 2.5ish? seasons of White Collar, and found this prompt:

Arthur and Eames adopt a kid and raise that kid into Neal Caffrey.

Thus began a descent into a fevered writing fugue that involved far too many hours of researching art and resulted in 30k words of fic written in the space of a month.

This is a snippet of what had been the vague idea of a start of a sequel to that fic. Looking back at it, it’s actually a surprisingly coherent/self-contained little story intro, so I don’t mind posting it. Unedited b/c I cannot be bothered, please have pity and remember that this was written *checks* thirteen years ago jesus god i am so fucking old

---

They tricked him the first time.

Neal came to his senses by way of a hand slapping across his face, jolting him out of a bleary haze. He squinted up through the gloom of the—basement? cellar? something underground, at the very least—into angry brown eyes that stared out from two cut holes in a ski mask.

Neal resisted the urge to groan.

Amateurs. And even worse: clichéd amateurs.

“What do you know?” demanded the blurry figure. Male, middle-aged, hint of a foreign accent covered up by years of playing at New York posh. Unfortunately, the question held no ground with Neal, not without context. He could think of a hundred—a thousand, really—things that he knew, locations and names and numbers and faces and plots and conspiracies, all of which he was fairly certain he wasn’t going to talk about.

So he collected that information and buried it away, pushing it into the furthest reaches of his mind as he affected a serious expression.

“The earth revolves around the sun,” he replied, nodding decisively.

The punch to the mouth was hard and disorienting, but disappointingly predictable. It also made Neal realize he was sitting tied to a chair as it tipped dangerously beneath him.

“What do you know?” the man gritted, grabbing a handful of Neal’s hair and yanking his head back, pressure put on the exposed line of his throat. Neal let out a huff of exasperation.

“It would help if I knew what you wanted, wouldn’t it?”

The man scoffed and dropped his head.

“You know what we want.”

“I really don’t,” Neal replied mildly. He craned his neck around as the sudden whir of power tools echoed through the stone room, trying to catch a glimpse of the noise. He knew that noise. He knew it like he knew New York, like he knew the feel of lockpicks in the dark. That was the sound of a drill, and it was going through a Class TXTL-60 grade safe.

“Robbery?” Neal asked, perking up instantly. “Where are we? Some old bank vault? An old heiress’ abandoned wealth?” He waggled his eyebrows. “I’m going to go with the heiress.”

“Shut up,” the man snarled, and this time the punch sent Neal toppling back onto the floor, the chair and all his pressure on it landing atop his bound arms. His head smacked against the floor and he bit his lip against the pain, the room spinning and a low rumbling in his ears.

“What is that?” a new voice asked. Also male and younger, maybe twenties, rough and unpolished. He walked upside-down into Neal’s line of sight, wearing the same boring black outfit that every small-time thug had grown attached to ever since Hollywood decided to buy stocks in ski masks.

“This wasn’t in the plan,” Middle Age snapped, because apparently Neal wasn’t the only one hearing things. The younger man just spread his hands as the noise grew louder, looking around the room in a decidedly nervous fashion.

“Don’t look at me, I had nothing to do with this,” Twitchy declared. Middle Age snarled and stalked over to Neal, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and hauling him up, chair and all.

“What have you done?”

“Bees,” Neal replied at once, a little groggily. “Thousands of honey bees migrating—”

And then the far wall smashed in because there was a bulldozer driving through it, and at the wheel of the bulldozer was Arthur.

“Huh,” Neal said blankly, even as he was dropped back down. The chair stayed blessedly upright this time as both Middle Age and Twitchy grabbed for their guns. Arthur leapt out of the bulldozer in a smooth motion that was almost inhumanly graceful, a pistol in each hand and a murderous look on his face.

Two shots took out Middle Age and Twitchy. A third, aimed at a point Neal couldn’t see, stopped the sound of drilling.

“Pѐre,” Neal sighed as Arthur strode toward him, relief warring with embarrassment in his chest. But when he looked up he saw the guns still in Arthur’s hands, and a look on his face that sent a shiver down Neal’s spine.

The look on his face was wrong. It was all wrong. His eyes were cold and his face was a blank mask and he wasn’t Neal’s father. He was something else, something inhuman and wrong and bad and he wasn’t Arthur.

“No—” Neal struggled to scoot back, to break free, to do anything to escape the implacable force moving toward him. But all he could do was stare, helplessly, as the not-Arthur came to a stop in front of him. He squeezed his eyes shut as one of the guns rose, turning his face determinedly away.

“Wake up, Neal.”

Neal’s eyes snapped open in understanding just as the bullet entered his skull.

#lucdarling #skybird #god that fic is so old it predates my tumblr tags #white collar fanfiction #inception fanfiction #i have never again reached the frenzy of writing that skybird inspired #that was a solid month of just WRITING #frenetically slapping words onto paper #doing research on art and both media in question #think 'huddled in a cave gnawing on a bone' kind of vibes #it was great! #extremely unsurprised that i did Not do well in college that semester #(or any semester tbh but that was an entirely different problem) #the fic was posted in snippets on LJ #as you did at the time #so there was a lot of interaction in comments and stuff #eventually i shoved the whole thing onto AO3