#since people seem interested I think I'll make more charts

[thewertsearch]

Asks Comp - 16/4

I literally did not know The Baby Is You was a thing. To be welcomed back into the comic like this after four months is very on brand for Homestuck.

... and wow, its outro really does match the end of this song, doesn't it? That's even funnier than if he'd snuck some of Megalovania in there.

Ooh, that's another liveblog I'll want to check out when I'm done! I've never actually seen a Worm liveblog before. Adding it to the list myself!

Nothing's really changed since I've been gone! I make a conscious effort not to do much Homestuck analysis off-blog, since I want my journey to be fully documented here.

It's good to be back! I'm looking forward to a full reread when I'm done.

Would you believe I didn't even know there was a book?

I also didn't know the movie had two (allegedly) terrible sequels, which is very funny. Neverending story indeed.

Thank you! I can't take too much credit, though - most of my tagging system has been crowdsourced from askers!

At some point, before we reach the end of the comic, I'm going to have to formalize my approach to liveblogging Homestuck's side content.

What I'll probably do is give each of them the 'lite' treatment initially, but if they turn out to be more canonical than I thought, or particularly interesting to liveblog, I'll 'zoom in', and analyze them properly. We'll see how we go!

Could you imagine the relationship dynamics in your average troll soap opera? The shipping web for a single season would make our heads explode.

It's a fun question. What sort of object symbolizes everything?

The first thing I'd try would be a star chart, Dave's magnifier and a literal planetful of Grist.

Added to the list! Not until later later on, though - I'd worry that the opinions and theories of another liveblogger could interfere with my own, especially if they're talking about it with someone who's already read it!

I would find it hard to disagree.

Do people think Act 1 is pointless?

I mean, it is the slowest Act in terms of pacing, but slow pacing isn't always a bad thing. You sort of have to take it slow when your readers have this much to get to grips with.

...okay, maybe we didn't need quite as many Sylladex mishaps as we got. But we still needed some. Homestuck has a lot to introduce you to.

I always pictured an English accent for Hass - although, interestingly, I didn't picture one for Jade. As a headcanon, I like the NZ one better.

Where did Grandpa grow up again, actually? He was raised by Fake Mark Twain, who was from Missouri - but I don't have a clue what a Missouri accent sounds like, let alone one from a century ago. I have a funny feeling that it's not the accent I'm imagining coming from Jade.

Now that's a ship I'd never have seen coming. Props to Hussie for coming up with something more controversial than my Feferi<>Equius.

All four kids, with four endgame weapons, might be able to challenge Jack's current incarnation - but they're not going to get the chance. You've hit the nail on the head - he's semi-perfect Jack for a reason.

I have several theories for Jade's prototyping, and every single one of them would make Jack even more dangerous than before. It's just barely possible to challenge him now, but things will only get worse.

Read the room, Serket!

Would Vriska have tried to negotiate? She feels like the type of person who'd rather take a beating than admit they're outclassed. Plus, I'm not sure how much she'd have to offer Aradia, who seemed entirely motivated by revenge (and, possibly, secretly motivated by timeline stuff).

All that said, I would have loved to hear Vriska trying to worm her way out of this.

I love it! Please send in the completed house, if you get the chance. That's going to look so cool with a moving meteor.

And they're both easily distractible! This feels like two people who might actually get on surprisingly well, if they were in, say, the same high school class.

It's hard to say what's a rarepair, since I don't know what ships are rare in the fandom - although I'd have a few guesses about the most common ones.

If we're going for a ship with very tenuous connections, I will submit Rose x Feferi for your appraisal. They're both fans of the Noble Circle, and their signature colors are pretty close.

You know what, I'll just review all of your ships. Tavros/Gamzee - PB&J - is pretty cute. [] I'd recommend Miracle Child for a number of reasons, but it does include a well-written Gamtav. Jack/Droog is more <> to me than it is <3. Like One Sundered Star might be influencing that? I'm not really sure. Somewhere I think I saw a Jack<>Droog. Your pre-shipping chart post isn't in the chrono; also, I'm pretty sure the A6A6I5 ask is one of mine. Gamzee/Eridan is a rarepair; I've seen it, but not often, and it's a <> in the fic I'm referencing. Kanaya<>Terezi and Feferi<>Vriska are strange enough that I've never seen them anywhere, really. [] And finally, Vriska and Tavros. These two are the textbook example of why the ashen quadrant needs to exist, and they're a perfect pair for it. [] ~LOSS (8/1/23)

I don't even know if Carapacians have moirallegiance - but those two would definitely work if they did.

Out of all my ships you flagged as rare, I think my favorite is Feferi<>Vriska. I just think they'd gel weirdly well together!

#asks #full liveblog #act 5.2

[sizzlingpatrolfox]

I’ve been thinking a lot about how sensitive tae / jk / tkkrs are. Like the thing you said about JK solos thinking the company and army are against him. Like if jimin had the fan base numbers and company support they had I would be thrilled and simply keep my mouth shut.

It’s especially interesting that they drag jimin so much when he poses no real threat (numbers wise) to them. Tae literally has 10 MILLION more followers than jimin on IG. And JK probably would too if he was still on IG.

What i keep coming back to is that can’t fathom jimin having the large amount of success than he has (even if it’s less than tae/jk) when he doesn’t have the traditional qualities that tae and jk have that make them the most biased. Like tae’s perfect face or JK’s boyish charm / masculinity / both of them being conventionally attractive overall, along with JK’s natural talent and Tae’s “confidence”. Jimin has all this success without those things. And I feel like that’s what bugs them and threatens them. Idk just thinking/rambling!

Here's the thing about Instagram followers... I've written about this before but I can't seem to find that post, so I guess I'll have to do another post (this one) about it.

Instagram followers are not a measure of talent or success. They never were, and never will be. I can only think of like Messi and Ronaldo who have 600 million followers as people who their instagram followers are *sort of* a reflection of how well known they are.

Armys live in a bubble; taekookers, Taehyung and JK stans live in an even smaller bubble, tho this could be true for every solo out there. They think BTS (or their particular bias) is the center of the universe, and they forget that there actually are other celebrities and musicians in the planet. They forget too that not everything that looks like success, is actually success.

Harry Styles doesn't get half the likes any BTS member gets. Harry has had several billboard 100 singles, many of them were #1 and As It Was is still charting. Yet he has even less followers than Jimin, I think. Harry has been touring non-stop for more than a year, now. You'd think he wouldn't have fans to attend his shows when you look at his posts with 1 - 2 million likes. He sold 500k albums the first week on the US. BTS sell ~200K. Beyonce gets less likes than any BTS member, too. Yet she's on a sold out stadium tour around the world right now. Coldplay has less than 20 million followers yet they've been active as a group since 1996, and they also are on a stadium tour right now. The same stadiums that BTS played in two or three times, Coldplay has had up to 8 sold out dates in those stadiums.

Now, for the final bosses. Taylor Swift gets around 7 millions likes on her posts. She's also on a stadium tour right now. Her albums that were released 15 years ago and she's re-releasing now, are still getting one million preorders in the first day, only in the USA. She gets 80 million streams on her spotify profile, DAILY. Everyday.

BTS right now has 73 million followers on their bts_bighit account, and it was a smaller number before but in 2021 they were already getting 100 million views for butter in the first 24 hours.

For Christmas 2020, Jimin released Christmas Love, unannounced. Literally they just posted a link, and the youtube audio got I think 10 million in the first day. Later that day, Taehyung went on weverse to announce he'd be releasing snow flower that night. It debuted with less views than Christmas Love, even if it had been announced. The members opened their instagram accounts on December 6th 2021 (I'm just going by memory here, so I might be slightly wrong on the date). Taehyung immediately was "on the lead" regarding followers, immediately gathered a few million more than any other member. Taehyung then released Christmas Tree in the end of December 2021. Debut streams: roughly 1.5 million. If even half of his followers had tuned in (on Spotify) for his song, you'd think he would've done better than 1.5 million streams. With you was released four months later and, despite having only half the tracking time and despite "unpopular" Jimin having less instagram followers than Taehyung, with you got a better first day streams. To this day, it still gains streams faster than Christmas Tree.

As a sidenote, I don't think it's a small detail that instagram followers and likes are way easier to fake and fraud than streams. In the end, Jimin is a musician and the only way he can "prove" anything about himself, or his popularity or success, it's through his music and his performances. I think it's clear he himself doesn't even care that much about his instagram profile.

The same goes for Jungkook's lives viewers, which was something I was thinking about the other day. He released music last year, and last year he was already getting 15, 20 million viewers (which his fans claim are unique viewers), but his songs debuted with not even half of that. And we know how streams work; one person could stream the same song 10, 20 times. So how come he doesn't get 40 million streams a day? Or at least one day in the year? If we were to assume that 20 million different people watch his lives, those 20 million could also play his song once or twice at least one day in the year. But that doesn't happen.

So that's why I could never be bothered about instagram followers and likes... it really never mattered to me. Records in general don't matter to me, and I've said it plenty of times. There are some Jimin "records" and numbers that I wasn't even aware of until FACE was released. I didn't know that with you was more streamed than stay alive or christmas tree, for example. There's some stuff I'm finding out only because other people post about it, not because I'm constantly checking up on Jimin's and other member's numbers.

I can only go with Taehyung's old releases numbers because he hasn't released anything in a while. Also, a random OST is not the same as a proper debut, so I am aware that nobody really knows how well he could do with his debut. But the truth is that -IN THE PAST- his streams and singles sales have always been lower than Jimin's; the only member who's on par with Jimin on that, is Jungkook. Maybe for his debut Taehyung will finally release a fun song that people actually want to listen to.

On the other hand, now that Jimin has "set records" with his debut album, when Taehyung and Jungkook's albums come out, they will try to out-do Jimin's numbers, and when the next Jimin album comes out, people will try to out-do taekook's numbers and so on and on. So unless it's a really extraordinary thing that could hardly be replicated (like Jimin's BB #1), other than that, records of numbers are a really fickle thing to hold on to. The only reason I talked about them in this post was to make a point that instagram followers really do not always correlate to how "successful" or loved, or supported someone is.

As for your last paragraph, firstly I'm really uncomfortable and tired of the backhanded "compliments" like Jimin is doing great, but not as great as Taehyung or Jungkook. Like what is the actual purpose? I know they will do well, but the undermining of Jimin's achievements is insane and so unnecessary. The day Jungkook's and Taehyung's albums were announced too, it was "the most successful kpop soloists in the world" when Jimin is literally right there, being exactly that right now. Why have most people in this fandom incorporated the backhanded compliments in their vocabulary? Being lowkey or even highkey shady towards Jimin is almost like an unconscious thing for most these days.

Talking specifically about the hate he gets from Taehyung's Jungkook's stans, what you mentioned is half of the reason why. The other half is, ships. The other half of the hate is because of taekook.

They have convinced themselves that Instagram followers and such, are a measure of success. They have convinced themselves that Jimin is not talented, that he can't sing, that he can't dance, that all these years he was pushed by the company as something he's not and that his whole personality is a lie. They fight so hard against the love he receives because they genuinely think he doesn't deserve it for all of those reasons they've invented themselves. Then some YouTuber shows up and reacts to a BTS live song and goes "oh this Jimin guy sounds the best" and they think he's been paid to say that. The idea they have of him has never correlated with the image the real world has of him, and that's what bothers them. If someone says I love this song, they just HAVE to be on his business and spam "this song is awful" because they think it's wrong to like him and want others to feel that way about him too.

That's never going to happen because the real world isn't chronically online, feeding themselves lies the way Taehyung and JK stans are.

It's also interesting, but not really, that according to them Jimin is a "flop" but Jimin is the only one they're always trying to surpass. So how exactly is he flopping if he's their biggest competition. All BTS members are competing with themselves as of right now, none of them stand a chance next to already stablished artists with proven global, stable success like Harry or Taylor. Didn't bad bunny get 1 billion streams on his album the FIRST day? That happened last year. And JK stans were so proud of Jungkook getting it in 409 days. I'd like to see Jungkook or Taehyung stans try and argue how successful they are compared to people like those I mentioned. All BTS members are competing with themselves, but none of them are actually stablished as solo acts, especially in the states. All of them are still confined to kpop so far. Jimin has probably started to crack the surface because Like Crazy was quite successful in the USA and even the UK, and there were a lot of things that gave it publicity, but even then that's just a crack and it takes time to settle as an undisputed successful solo artist. No BTS member has the time to do that.

[tower-girl-anon]

Hi, I'm interested in your opinion! When I meet someone who I find attractive (in real life or just some celebrity) they most likely have venus conjunct mars in their natal chart (or just these planets in the same sign). And I have venus square mars (sag 11 and pisces 2nd, but I resonate with the next house placements well)

So other can find me attractive as well? Or what happens when I'll be in a relationship with for example venus conjunct mars in synastry chart?(really not sure if I could handle that with my cute t-square with moon in gemini hah)

I understand if you don't want to but I'll be grateful for your answer!(or just tell me to calm down xd) Thank you!

Hi and, first of all, apologizes for the huge delay in your response. It must have been frustrating or infuriating, not only for you but for many others, to wait so long for a response, especially since I tended to be more active in this account a while ago, but, despite the circumstances, I have found now the space to come back for a while and answer. So, in relation to your question, I don't think that just one aspect (Venus-Mars) indicates if someone likes you or not. If you find attractive man who has a combination of Venus and Mars, then that could be that you have an interest in individuals who have a balance between masculine and femenine energy, since these planets correspond to these genres, or in someone who has a Venus and Mars dominance. Do you think this apply to you? As if you have, as an example, and Aries/Scorpio and Taurus/Libra dominance in your chart in general? Or have a combination of femenine planets such as Venus and Moon with masculine ones such as Sun and Mars?

What I do think that could make a person feel attracted, or impressed with you, is what type of dominant planet or sign you have and what aspects does it make to his/her dominant planet or sign or if any of your planets makes contact to his/her dominant planet(s), signs, and/or chart ruler. This doesn't have to mean that the other person will like you instantly , but it can signal if you are going to affect his/her life*.

*Take into consideration how his/her planets makes aspects to your planet or dominant signs too.

For example: let's say someone has an Aquarius dominant energy. This speaks of them as someone who is verye excentric, very friendly in general, and with strong opinions. Freedom or a space to be themselves would be a must in a relationship. But if they ended up having a relationship with a Virgo dominant, for example, things could clush quickly since the other may seem overly critical or very serious, while the other could look as someone who doesn't take anything seriously or doesn't pay attention to anything. Now, the benefit that this aspect (Venus and Mars) have this synastry, is that it tends to balance the relationship. One tend to be more nurturing and affective while the other provides protection and a driven energy to be with the other person since it seems as if both can be complements. Maybe that is why many people like this aspect. It does certainly add attraction and interest but, in my opinion, if you want to see if a person likes you, then you must look at other aspects such as the ones I've mentioned above. Since you have Venus and Mars under the influence of Jupiter (it rules Sagittarius and Pisces), perphaps people with Jupiter dominance could resonate more with your energy. Perphaps also a little with people with Aquarius energy and/or Taurus with the placements of your planets. But this aspect alone, if it doesn't have any more complemental aspects such as with the Moon and Mercury, will not bring much into the relationship in my opinion.

I hope this serves you after my long absence.

#venus #mars #venus square mars #synastry #astrology #astrology observations #astro notes #astro observations #astrology placements #sagittarius #pisces

[halt-kun]

Hunter x Hunter Chapter 217 - Meat Orchard

Let's do another one for today

Yes it's his ability, it sounds a lot like a specialist ability but maybe I should check the exhibition chart

After checking : Okay so he's an emitter so to me it could make sense if Knuckle's lending ability was emission too but it seems it's Conjuration

It could also be another case of the same thing being possible with several different categories

It could also be some special traits he was born with that belongs to specialization but we don't know how "inheriting specialist abilities work", it could also be some enhancement of phagogenesis that allows that

Not that this increase in aura would drastically improve his strength

he's already quite above the average nen user

Well true, but a strong leader isn't necessarily the best

but someone dumb like this is definitely too much

The Kakin's arc basically deals with that

Well bye bye

Diego

If people understood them, they probably would spare them more

it's not like a lot of humans of these days ever killed a cow or a swine, before it was more common but they often got used to it quite young

AGREED

When did she have the time to do that

URGH

I really hate this about Palm, it's just the portrayal of her personality deals a lot with some misogynistic ideas but I can tolerate it for now, especially since she becomes way better later

She's not the first character in HxH with a dubious mental state

I think Togashi also likes to play with tropes and making them as deranged as he can but also making them more interesting

I HATE YANDERES

they're not fun, they're not interesting plot wise

Anyway Killua seems to understand more than Gon what's going on

Well I'll redeem a bit of that situationship

Gon doesn't actually know what's happening, he's just keeping his word

Palm is actually only seeking some kind of romantic relationship with no sexual undertones. Because of her personality, she probably never lived it and just wants to live what she experienced through novel/tv shows

It's clear when we see what she wants and what she finds nice and romantic

It's still weird but it's better than what a lot of people would think

She needs to see a psychiatrist though

like cognitive behaviour therapy is a must have here

it's sad she basically got more stable because of a brain operation

MOVING ON

I like that Togashi keeps it steady that Killua is stronger than Gon

They have different weights

the poor guys behind haha

Killua is just me trying to figure out if my crush is interested by guys

ME

WELL GON YOU DID NOT

that's why, you don't understand anything

and you're most likely not even bi then because there is nothing behind these events for you

Anyway I'm docking a few points on Mito for letting him out with those girls

My Poor Gay Baby

Hug Him

(Kanaya style)

Hope is a terrible thing sometimes

My baby is crying ;_;

And Killua is happy

I'm feeling bad

You guys should be less into this guy

There are some nice looking side characters on the sidewalks

Well, it'll probably be all for today

Astarion and Karlach are waiting for me

#hxh c217 #hxh liveblog #hxh manga

[joviantwelve]

Please speak more on your knowledge of vpets???? I've never met anyone who knew anything about them!!

uh oh anon you just slapped the "hyperfixation" button here we go

OK, so, I'm not entirely sure what you're looking for--are you looking for a way to get into it? or are you into it and just want to know my personal faves?? or my general history and opinions of them?? so sure I'll answer all of that. by the end of this you will have wished you were more specific.

I have one of my interests listed as "electronics," mostly to encompass the broad range that is for me, like mechanical keyboards, PCs, synthesizers, game console modding & hacking...but it also includes vpets. Pretty sure it started with vpets.

(Aside: haven't done anything with circuit bending quite yet, but it does fascinate me. A lot of people seem to find it horrifying, especially when it's done with kids' toys, but I just find it...Neat. maybe that's how I know I'm in too deep with this stuff.)

as a Millennial™ I was a small baby child when the craze first hit, and so the whole concept of "virtual pet" was just very formative for me. didn't matter what it was--physical electronic devices like Tamagotchi, PC games like Petz, robotic toys like Poo-Chi or Furby, whatever, I had a little of everything. Tiger electronics and LCD screens dominated our childhoods (RIP).

but then the craze faded, as all crazes do. I became less interested in toys' for toys' sake, and a fair few of the vpets I had became lost in two moves (I'm so sad about my angelgotchi ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. please remake that one next Bandai?!).

wasn't till college where my roommate had a Tamagotchi Connection with her. and I was like, "wait, they still make those?!", a sentiment shared with many of my peers every time I start spouting things about vpets. turns out they never stopped making that shit in Japan, we just...weren't getting the majority of them. Japan had colored Tamagotchi for YEARS and we only JUST got them like three years ago, over here.

I'm very happy about the revival and Bandai's willingness to bring more and more Tamagotchi and Digimon over, because let me tell you, those eBay prices fucking hurt. $80 for a secondhand Digimon X is now $20 at Wal-Mart. Thank god.

I have seen a Giga Pets revival browsing online stores, but uh, Tiger's been out of business a long time now. Those are not the Giga Pets of yore. and Nano Pets? who?? I kinda do miss Nano Pets though...I liked their aesthetic. they had those weirdass talking ones with the super crunchy 8bit voices, and yet, I still played with mine a lot. I think my favorite Nano was a dog one that came as two devices, that you could connect and breed once they reached adulthood, and just continue the generations that way. it'd record your family lineage. I found that one incredibly cool and kinda wonder why more pets hadn't done that. but alas, all of my Nanos are lost to time!

but, like, yeah, I got mega back into Tamagotchi specifically in college. turns out, I can take care of them pretty well! when I was a kid, I lost my Tamas pretty quickly and the rest of what I had were Giga Pets, so I guess they just colored my opinion for the longest time.

here's my general Tama/Digimon strategy, since they operate on similar time scales:

hatch on a day off where you can attend to the needy baby stage and/or be generally aware of the beeping.

once it's at the child stage you're seriously good muting it and playing/feeding it whenever you go to the bathroom or something. after that you just have to be aware of the sleep schedule.

if you want to go for a specific form, look up an evolution chart and follow the instructions accordingly.

you should be golden!! they're super easy if you're allowed the break time to check every couple hours like that.

GENERAL OPINIONS SECTION IDK HOW TO SEGUE INTO THIS ORGANICALLY?????

Giga Pets: I feel like these were the ones that created the stereotype that vpets were hard to take care of--those things were PICKY. if you look up a guide on how to properly care for one so that it reaches adulthood, it fucking SUCKS! don't bother with them! they were just riding Tamagotchi coattails! I had a few of them as a kid and became endlessly frustrated with them, lmao. the revival looks like it's doing weirdass AR stuff, I can't attest to how it is as a "vpet" device, but I feel like it's probably not much better.

Nano Pets: probably the better of the western brands if you're looking for an electronic vpet that's an actual animal and not a funny anime creature. nothing wrong with wanting that. however, I don't think this brand ever came "back," so anything selling itself as such nowadays is bound to be some kind of scam if it's not a '90s used one. I remember them being fairly easy to take care of even when I was a small child killing all of my Giga Pets.

Tamagotchi: the "girly" Bandai vpet. originally sold gender neutrally in the west, Bandai's finally bringing over the modern devices with color and dressup and whatnot. the color ones are a bit unwieldy compared to the classic, but I'm glad we have options to pick from in that regard. go for the classic revival you can find in stores today if you just want Any Old Virtual Pet Device, as it's definitely the most reliable of the bunch. (you fake pausing by going to change the time, and then never finalizing a time change. the color ones have pausing built-in.)

the color ones tend to have some gimmick or another per each release (the latest one has an app and lets you take photos, for example), and are generally even easier than the classic ones. you can literally keep your Tamagotchi alive forever if you care for it every day, while the classic ones do eventually reach old age and a natural death. the color ones are a bit reminiscent of browser games like Gaia with their dressup and room/furniture aspects, and I'd call them fuller "games" as a whole. however, as you can imagine, this makes them pricier.

don't bother with the mini ones or the mascot tie-in ones, unless you really like the mascot. (I think the mascot ones have totally eclipsed the mini ones at this point, but I figured I'd mention them both. they're the same shell and game engine and such.) they're not very involved; more like a glorified keychain than a virtual "pet." but hey, maybe that's what you prefer!

Digimon: a lot of people are surprised to learn that Digimon was originally the "boy" version of Tamagotchi, and not, (shocker) a Pokemon ripoff. but yeah, it is, and it's my favorite! you'll get a big evolution chart in every device, and now that Bandai is bringing more of them out here, they don't cost an arm and a leg on eBay. that's kind of the tradeoff with Digimon--due to the existing fandom, a lot of Japan-only products are pricey or get snapped up immediately.

but thankfully, we have a lot of cool ones in the west. any Digimon vpet you see over here marketing itself as just a Digimon vpet will be the 20th anniversary vpet, which is a FANTASTIC first Digimon imo! it has a huge amount of QoL compared to the original vpets from the '90s: there's RAM, so your progress isn't killed by your battery life, you can train up to two 'mons at once, and you can fight other 'mons as a sort of "stadium" mode rather than NEEDING another device to connect to (which was pretty harsh because battling others determines if you got to evolve or not).

the Digimon X are my favorite vpets overall, but they have a bit of weird backstory that was in Japan-only TV specials and stuff, so the US releases of them...just...market them the same way? be careful if you order an English one if it says "X" or not, in case you're looking for the 20th. the Xs have an actual "campaign" mode with RPG leveling, which is what makes it fun to me--you unlock new evo branches with your progress, so I try to make it to the end of each one. you can store your digimon, too, so if you got a big strong one you don't want to grow old, you can just shuffle it out and raise a new egg.

the Pendulums haven't come out over here, which is a shame, because I like that the devices are specific Digimon elemental families. just makes sense to me! I know the Pen 20th is like the holy grail of Digimon devices, because you can hack the board to unlock every egg that was in that lineup, which makes for the biggest evo branch in any Digimon device. but it's like $300 on eBay AND you have to mess with the PCB. so, no. if you want a modern Pendulum (which is the Pendulum Z line, though I think they recently wrapped it up?), you kinda have to be on top of the preorders from Bandai's site, or pay scalper price. the Pendulums function similarly to the other vpets, but have a gyro shake battle system, and focus more on new digimon and fusion evolutions, almost requiring you to have more than one device...but the fandom loves them.

the actual Digivice electronics are less a pet and more a pedometer with a game attached. these fetch high prices on eBay and are often gimmicky, so I wouldn't go for them nowadays unless you were strictly a collector. apparently the Japanese ones are better, but I don't think it makes them "eBay scalper price" better.

(side note: Japanese devices are fine for Digimon, as the menuing is still in English for some reason. it's a bit harder on Tamas, because of all the accessories and such you can collect. In terms of finding more obscure devices, JYW has my back.)

I tried a bit of the Vital Hero but couldn't get into it, sadly. a bit too unwieldy on the wrist, and it wants you to do a bit of exercise in order to make any progress. which is, like, fine, but it's not really what I was looking for. I guess I was hoping it'd be more like the Pokemon Pikachu, counting your steps and gaining happiness etc. that way? but it wants me to do squats. eh.

The cool thing about the standard Digimon vpets (vanilla/20th, X, and Pendulum), for me, is that it's always been backwards compatible. there's a generic battle system baked into each device, so my Pen Z that I bought a couple years back can battle with my original '90s vpet if I so desire. AND, if you like Arduino stuff, you can very much spoof other devices to connect with if you know how. I've literally battled with folks across the world using this silly little program and an Arduino board. lots of folks make their own on Etsy and such, and the Discord is very friendly to new tamers, making this all less intimidating. I certainly don't know how to program, but I've done it.

they recently announced a color Digimon, which is like, wow, about time, but I'm a little worried it might bring the devices more toward Tama territory, of not being very compatible between generations. fingers crossed, but both are owned by "Bandie" "Scamco," so...we'll see, I guess.

BUT. YEAH. THANKS ANON. here's my collection, thank you for entertaining me.

I literally just came back from the store to this ask. I've been typing for like an hour and a half straight. ahh. sometimes, I go down the toy aisles just to see what's Hip With Kids nowadays. each and every time I STILL feel tempted by whatever FurReal has currently put out or something. (also I'm very happy when I see Tamagotchi & Digimon there.)

I have ideas for a vpet like program thing, or perhaps a story that involves similar devices somehow, but currently it's on the backburner. but lord if I don't end up thinking about it every time I play with one of these.

#text #vpets tag

[frostcorpsclub]

What are some more obscure Frost kid dynamics between em you'd want to discuss but haven't? Ik you have/had a series about that very idea (which I love btw), but maybe there's some more negative ones you haven't touched!

Hehe, I shall pull from this chart! I'm going to go over the kids that dislike eachother and the mortal enemies first but if you'd like I'll make a "it's complicated" addition, I won't be going over ones that are well known like James and January's beef

Truly, they all LOVE each other but those of you who have siblings know how it can be sometimes, you may love your siblings a whole lot but really really dislike the way they choose to act.

Dislikes

Jolyene and Janet and Judah (combining them because it's mostly for the same reason)

This moreso has to do with the way Janet and Judah interact with JEAN, while usually someone like Jean would annoy her the two have a very close bond and she trusts Jean more than anything. This often involves giving her responsibilities and errands to do that are incredibly helpful for the things Jolyne gets up to. The problem comes in with the way Janet and Judah distract her. Janet loves playing devils advocate almost as much as she genuinely is interested in the conspiracy theories that Jean comes up with. There have been many times Jean has completely forgotten about something she was going to do for her sister because she got caught up in defending a theory that makes less and less sense the deeper you go. With Judah its the exact opposite and Jean will take up all of his and Jolynes time rambling since he's perfectly willing to let him go on and on and on.

January and Julian

Julian really strives like to be his father and brothers, so he often emulates their behavior. He's a misogynist, an asshole, and puts his sense of humor above all else. He TRIES to be manipulative. Except he fails at these things horribly because...of some personal things that would be spoilers to reveal as of now. You know how sometimes you guys make jokes about Suzy and Andrew Tate? 😂 Yeah, Julian actually would watch him and his gaggle of goons. (This is why he's the least favorite kid, lol) Unlike his father and brothers who do have SOME respect for the women in their lives, or at least love, even if it manifests horribly; Julian hasn't seem to have gotten the memo and thinks he's better at everything just because he has a dick. While her sisters and mother mostly just make their view of him as pathetic clear, January seems to think she can argue him out of his position. Julian feels a sense of fulfillment and dominance from these interactions, proving that women ARE just more emotional, despite the fact January frequently terrifies him and could beat him to a pulp. These two can't be left alone with each other, but this is under dislikes because he copes and seethes a lot more about it than she does.

Joy and Jean and Judah (ditto)

Its simple really, both Jean and Judah have destructive special abilities and they are both very impulsive. Even though Jean is a bit more aware of her surroundings Joy still fears that they might cause damage to the nature they live around.

Jasper and Jill

Jill loves cooking so who better to learn from than the woman who cooks all their meals! Jasper is deeply protective over his mother almost moreso than say James for example, being a snowball he has a stronger chemical connection to her as the person who esentially saved his life and part of how he sees his family members comes from being a clone of his father. That's a lot of words for: He's an uber mommy's boy and Jill takes her attention but he knows he has no justifiable reason to be mad.

Mortal Enemies

James and Janet

Janet is quite possibly the only person in the entire family who isn't at least a little afraid of James in some capacity. She likes bothering people in general, but with James, it's actively malicious since...well, he deserves it. Sometimes, when James is tormenting one of their other siblings, she'll purposefully pick a fight with him to give them a chance to flee. Even if she knows she's wrong, she likes to pick at the things he says and pretend he's secretly insecure, true or not it manages to get under his skin, which isn't easy to do. A stranger is a stranger, but she's family. Unfortunately, sooner or later, almost all the Frosts fall in line, and because of her own vices, she is no different.

Jane and Journey

This is another completely one sided thing lmao

It started out as a very selfish and insecure thought process on the part of Jane. She thoroughly believed that having somebody around who could remember practically anything they were told was going to be a severe threat to her place in the family thus she treats Journey as a rival. Of course, she was ignoring that the people who saw value in her couldn't care less how much Shakespeare she had memorized. Still, most of the time she interacts with Journey its through sarcasm and mean snippy responses. Weirder still, her actions don't usually match her words. She says it's for the good of snowcietys "mental and intellectual health," that Jane helps Journey but something tells me that Jane just can't bring herself to genuinely leave a fellow academic hanging. It's a very """begrudging""" relationship.

#jackfrostmutantkillersnowman #jackfrostoc #the frost family #frost family #frost kids

[giraffefeather]

Hi, I'm drunk on wine and too deep in astrology, read more included as a courtesy.

Everything makes so much sense. Like I was one of the "Ooh astrology is so cool but totally not real" girlies, but uh...

Quick reference: I am pisces sun, gemini moon, aquarius rising. And right off the bat, I always notice before anyone else when I start talking too much (gemini stereotype) and always question if I'm being manipulative or not (hi again, bad side of gemini) but try so so hard not to (oh hey, there you are pisces). I can never pick a goddamn side in an argument (ahem, pisces? gemini? both known to see both or all sides). Meanwhile, I attract the "outcasts," for lack of better word - the people that don't always fit in (hello aquarius, ya weird little noodle).

Okay but then we have the VENUS. God, the amount of times I questioned if I was asexual, but then dated friends and thought no... thats not right... must be demi. And then I'll enjoy sex for a while, get really obsessed for like a week. but get bored of it and move on to something else. And I'm thinking... huh, is this autism? Adhd? Perhaps. But ALSO have you read up on venus in aquarius? That bastard is 100% on my love life.

Hi, quick disclaimer. I absolutely believe neurodivergency is something not assigned by the stars. It is a separate matter entirely. I am NOT diagnosed with anything, and although I have tendencies that align with both autism and adhd, it does not affect my daily life enough to seek diagnosis. I just think it's interesting that it may not be a true neurodivergency in my case, but just aligning with my signs.

I skipped mercury, hold up, that's aquarius too. It fits, but it's boring. Except the bit I read where they dislike schedules, especially if paired with a Pisces sun (hello, called me out).

And I was so mad that my Mars was in leo, thinking no no no, I can't have a Leo anywhere in my chart, that's not right! Bitch, it fits. All of it. 100% turn into a Leo when I'm angry. Other parts of Mars (motivation, sex, etc) seem to be muted by the rest of my signs, but anger? Aggression? Yikes, hello Leo loud intensity.

And I just think it's interesting that my least favorite sign (Capricorn... sorry, I just have met too many manipulative Caps) is also my Uranus and Neptune.

But back to my favorite sign (Aquarius!), I have 3 of those fuckers and I wonder if it's why I always love other Aquas. Or of it's just because my dad is an Aqua sun. But my mom is a Taurus sun and while I never thought I had attachment to the sign (I love my mom, I just see her flaws too), my best friend growing up was a Taurus, and that's the sign I can spot a mile away. Hell, I worked with someone who reminded me so much of my mom, that it didn't even surprise me when I found they shared a birthday. I wa just like oh... yeah that makes sense, you're basically the same person.

And following true Pisces comparability, I've been dating a Virgo for 7 years. Since day 1, I've been saying we're opposites but it works. And then find out that's one of the most recommended pairings for a Pisces sun for that exact reason. To balance each other out. And as Virgo is literally the only sign not to be found on my chart, i need that energy in my life. Funny, I always used to love libras before him. But isn't that just typical of libras - their allure? And I would kill for an Aqua friend, please someone come talk to me about conspiracies and cryptic!

I still need to delve into Jupiter and beyond, see if those actually fit. I'm starting to suspect they will.

But what if that's just my pisces dreaming, understanding every sign so that of course whatever I have fits? Then... do we question that I fit the pisces personality too? Or am I just a wishy-washy person, and believe everything?

Interesting that a simple Google search reveals so much about the signs too... and not even with the info available. I've found that there's so many hits if you search pisces, possibly more than any other sign. Gemini has plenty, too. But Leo? Sagittarius? A huge decline in results. And if looking at images on Google, its even more pronounced. Pisces and Gemini have so many artistic interpretations. Leo? I found like... 1 cool lion. Compared to the millions of fish and mermaid art with pisces.

#ramble #astrology #beginner astrology

[woolieshubris]

my tamagotchi UNI review:

im so sorry its going to be long...

TL;DR it's good :3 if u want a color tamagotchi and don't mind spending 60 dollars (about what you'd pay for an after market tamagotchi ON/MEETS) i'd highly recommend it!

full review below cut

Aesthetics:

Let's be honest, the aesthetics make sense, but are still a tad disappointing none the less. they are going for a more gender neutral vibe this time around + trying to make it more similar to the way that the original tamagotchi shells look, rather than going for the hyperfem aesthetic, which I can appreciate. I just wish they made them more interesting. give me my glitter!!!!!!!!

Form Factor:

It is very much built to be played with the watch case on. Not a bad idea- but outside of the case, the buttons stick out quite a bit. I just hope they produce an official case that doesn't have the watch band attached- I'd love to be able to clip it onto my belt loop! I'm sooooo glad they continued with the rechargable battery, because it makes it so much smaller and better. It's even smaller than the smart- which to be honest, I wasn't expecting.

Engineering:

I'm so fucking glad they brought back the 3 buttons. They make it so much easier to navigate the menus. I got pretty used to the Pix's touch capacitive buttons though, and I wouldn't have minded them here- but I do understand that they were extremely hit or miss with people. (I do miss being able to do swipe gestures though. I guess that just means I need to play with the pix more.) I'm honestly incredibly glad they didn't do the touch screen here, because after playing with my smart for about a year on and off, the screen gets really dirty really fast. (not to mention the discoloration.) I'm also glad that on the official tamagotchi shell they didn't include any silicone- this pretty much solves the discoloration issue, and I hope that they sell more watch bands in even more colors. I dislike the placement of the lanyard/charm hole, I never really liked it being on the back, it should be on the side- otherwise it has a tendency to hit things, but I can understand putting it there. I do wish they upped the speaker quality though, the 16 dollar gigapet shouldn't have better speakers than the 60 UNI. I'll probably turn off the sound after a while. The speakers do their job regardless, since the tamagotchi has continued to stick to their guns and not have it play any noise other than beeps at various pitches. ALSO. USB C CHARGING IS A GAME CHANGER FOR REAL.

UI Design/Region:

The fact that this tamagotchi is not region locked is amazing. all tamagotchi UNI's share the same programming, and on startup you can pick whatever language and whatever server you want. The menus are pretty simple and not confusing, and I like a lot of the choices they made. It's not my favorite UI from a tamagotchi, but it's perfectly serviceable.

Gameplay:

It's cute! It's tamagotchi gameplay. Seems like they brought a bunch of fan favorite features back- having pets, marriages ect. I also like that each tamagotchi has a specific personality that you help them develop. I think that's really sweet. Also, being able to hold 4 accessories at once is a great way to be able to decorate the tamagotchi! I like that they added more places to go- the pix was really missing that. The games are fun and interesting, and I really like the way they use the gyroscope in some games. The growth chart seems like theres elements we haven't discovered yet which cause certain characters, so I'm curious as to see how it pans out. There's still a lot of mystery surrounding the gameplay!

Online Functionality:

The online functionality is scary to me, since I'm worried about the ability to push out updates. I haven't run into any bugs, so it seems like it'll mostly be used to push content updates? But I'm not entirely sure. I do like having the codes be exclusive, (I'm sure the modding scene will be able to find ways to automatically hack in certain items) because the PIX's QR code system made me a little bit sad with how easy it was to get any item in the game. It seems like there are also more items in this game as well. I do think the online functionality could be a really useful gateway for the modding scene, and the fact that the tamagotchi can download updates and items from the internet (not just backgrounds like the ON/Meets) is super exciting. I'm very excited to see what comes next. It is slightly worrying that bandai could in theory patch out any modding/hacking entrances, but also this is bandai we are talking about and they only really care about each tamagotchi model for about 2-3 years before phasing it out. (Though to be fair the Pix and Smart were smaller releases- they kept support for the Meets for 4 years)

OVERALL REVIEW: it's good :3 if u are a tamagotchi fan and have the money it's a must buy imo! I can def see it becoming a fan favorite down the line, esp if they release some extra lines with fun designs.

#tamagotchi #tamagotchi uni #review #alice lore docs

[disgruntled-welshgirl]

A couple of things.

As far as I know, I have little to no Welsh blood, but I am quite interested in linguistics, especially the Celtic languages of the Gaelic and Brittonic families. Welsh is, in particular, a very beautiful language, which I understand informed the languages of Middle-Earth, as well as countless other fantasy language systems. I am also a huge fan of the Welsh side of Celtic mythology, as well as the Welsh side of Arthurian stories. All of this is to ask: Would I be appropriating Welsh culture by attempting to learn the language? I understand that it is one of the less-spoken languages in the world, and since it is an older language, and not one I plan to use for day-to-day business, I worry that by learning it I would be intruding.

If it is okay for me to learn this language, what would be the best way to go about it? Should I use books, Duolingo (ew), Croeso, or another source completely? Do you know of any difficult pitfalls in this language? Is grammatical gender more or less difficult in Welsh than in, say, French? How are conjugations? Is it a very dialectic language? Are there any alternate writing systems to prevent the need for double letters and make it truly phonetic/phonemic, a la Shavian?

I am really sorry for writing such a dense ask, but language learning is one of my passions, and this language seems really, REALLY cool.

Okay so that's a lot and I'll do my best to work through it in a way that's at all satisfactory. My qualifications for this are a decade of Welsh language schooling so I'm not the best but you could do worse. First off yes, Welsh was the inspiration for chiefly elvish and Tolkien called it "the senior language of Britain" and I like him find it very beautiful. Alright then, next point!

It would in no way be cultural appropriation to learn to speak Welsh, and by doing so you would not be intruding in any way shape or form. If anything I'd call it appreciation to learn a language especially a minority language such as Welsh. Even if you don't plan to use it day to day knowing it is the best thing you could possibly do in relation to the language. Next!

I'm not sure entirely what you mean when you ask where you could learn the language but I would recommend geiriadur yr academi or Glosbe if you want to translate specific words and word hippo if you want to do longer strings. Word hippo also has a pronunciation feature so that may prove useful. The best way to learn how to speak Welsh is learning the alphabet, Welsh is entirely phonetically consistent so if you learn the alphabet you will be able to pronounce every single word competently and in a way that people will understand. This playlist would be incredibly useful in learning the letter sounds. Onwards!

The biggest pitfall is absolutely mutations, there's a number of letters than mutate in at most three ways depending on a number of factors. The best thing I can recommend to help with mutations is to commit this chart to memory:

(radical here just means the original letter) So for example, the mutations of Pen (head) would be Ben, Mhen, and Phen. Next you should learn these rules

So, taking those examples from earlier we can see that the mutations would occur as follows (remember these are just one example);

Dy ben

Fy mhen

Tri phen

I would also recommend you look into this yourself to make sure you understand it because it is a surety that whatever you find will go more in depth than I have. Let's press on!

Grammatical is a complete and total Trainwreck with no rhyme or reason behind it. You will have to look up what each object is gendered as on a case by case basis. Alternatively, you could just not care. I can't honestly say I've ever met a Welsh speaker who cares about grammatical gender so I think you'll be fine if you don't. We're nearing the end to let's endeavour to get there!

Conjugation is simple once you get it but it can be daunting when you're starting, but trust me, it gets easier with practice. I would highly recommend this Wikipedia article which explains conjugation better than I ever could. All you'll really need to worry about on there is the colloquial section so I'd focus on that if I were you. Penultimate point!

Welsh has two primary dialects, north and south. The differences are small and they're not going to hinder communication much so you should be fine. This video showcases dialects pretty well. And now for your final point!

As far as I'm aware there are no alternative systems for writing Welsh. The double letters, while confusing to people unfamiliar with them, are actually fairly simple when you realise that they are a completely separate sound to the singular letters. D and Dd make completely different sounds, same F and Ff, G and Ng, P and Ph and all the rest. The third video in that playlist I linked earlier focuses on these so turn your eyes there if you've any questions.

And that is everything. Thank you ever so much for this ask and for showing interest in the language. It's nice to see people show interest in it from farther afield than I'd expect.

#wales #welsh #cymru #cymraeg #languages #linguistics

[infernaltenor]

sorry to bother you but i've stumbled across your second and third? niki analyses, and they've been really interesting! niki's so... argh. he's the type of person who basically everyone finds really personable and friendly but from his single arrows on his relationship chart it looks like he doesn't actively try to deepen relationships with anyone unless they butt in trying to get to know him better. his condition and the way he was treated when he was younger because of it, combining with the stigma against his last name kinda snowballing his lack of self-esteem kills me... the idea that he doesn't deserve to do anything more than eat and survive because he's already enough of a burden on other people due to his condition makes me want to fall on the floor. and potentially, that his fixation on his skills as a chef could be because he only has confidence in preparing food since his entire life revolves around it...

there's a lot of interesting parallels between niki and mayoi because of this actually! despite them not having any real ties between them, they both don't really value themselves that highly because of parts of their identities... while mayoi's whole story hasn't been revealed, in black jack, it is mentioned that mayoi is an indigenous person whose family, ancestors, and others he knew live in tunnels under yumenosaki, and legally don't exist to the japanese government so he technically uses forged documents to prove his identity. since he seems to have lived underground for a large portion of his life and is distinctly aware of his status outside of general, 'normal' society, he tends to see himself as someone less human because of this. i wonder if since niki's condition makes him different from other people, a similar thing occurs to him because he perceives himself as lesser than others...?

anyway, i don't really have much more information on them and their relationship for you unfortunately... but something that you might want to look at could be some of paradisecorrupt's analyses (specifically on what the human/genius dichotomy is? it's not totally related to this, but it's a really interesting read about how enstars characters are written) if you're really interested in digging into general characterization. (also feel free to poke me in future! i'm unfortunately obsessed about alkakurei specifically their roles in the idol industry and society in general oops)

raaaaaaaaaa omg this is awesome actually. i largely don't poke around stuff that hasn't hit en yet, so i didn't know the stuff for black jack! i'm basically flailing around with what i have/remember to see how much i can get out of this lmao. honestly thanks for some of the further context though! i think i'll make updates as i come to new stuff since,,,,, niki gives me way too many thoughts.

#tenor talks #raaa thanks for the people too whwhwh #and no worries for the ask! this is fascinating. ty!!

[ladala99]

More Legend of Heroes: A Tear of Vermilion Rambling

Extreme spoilers edition - I'm about 7/8 of the way through the game, I think. Maybe a little less. My characters are level 36 and my completed file has them at like, 43.

After a big Detective Pikachu->Mewtwo Raid->preparing 3DS Pokemon games Pokemon for transfer (which I'm still in the middle of) break, I'm back to playing A Tear of Vermilion, at least during the weekdays.

At first I had a harder time getting into it, but then I actually got to the next story beat: the confirmation that Mile is alive.

I didn't actually remember this part - the part at the starting village. With Mile's possessed body being used by the main villain to cause problems in the village and corrupt the nature spirit.

Already, I am a sucker for games that take you back to the starting village, but something is wrong. Neopets: The Darkest Faerie in particular hit me hard since I played in the starting village as a kid and didn't beat the game until I was in college.

In this game it didn't hit me as hard, but it still hit. The darker music in the familiar town. The peaceful villagers being possessed by the villains and being used against Avin. And Mile in particular. The childhood friend. The healer in all aspects. Being used as a weapon against his best friend.

And now, past that, I've reached a plot point where Avin and co. are trying to find an explosive crystal and I'm like "why do I remember this of all things?" Although, by Michel's reaction to them, I wonder if what I remember is from Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch, as I've played that game twice. I do recognize Michel's full name and I know he's from that game, but I think he has green hair in that game while it's brown in this one? Unless I'm mixing him up with someone else.

Seems there is one nature spirit left to save, and then we'll be able to enter the final area. Writer guy says he's wrapping up his series, and I got the final book in the Swordsmaster series, so the game seems to be coming to a close.

It is interesting how the story changes to be much more videogame-y after the first half. In the first half, you're traveling the land with two goals: deliver a thing to one place, and then another, and find Eimelle, wherever she happens to be. Everything else that happens is incidental, and Avin and co. get involved because they're good people who want to help. This ends up making them friends who help Avin in his goals.

The second half, you go to a shrine and find out you need to backtrack across the land and go to 5 other shrines. Each shrine has a boss you must defeat to receive a token. Get all the tokens to unlock the final area.

And of course, getting back into the series, I get obsessed a bit and decided to think about/chart out my course through the Trails series to follow. Nevermind that I still have two more Gagharv games I want to beat before then, and nevermind that I have a ton of other games I'll be mixing in, meaning it will be literal years before I get to my first new game.

Perhaps my biggest problem - the fact that I own Trails in the Sky First Chapter and don't have any way to get the others - will be solved by then. Maybe they'll actually release that trilogy for Switch (or Switch 2 or whatever).

Or maybe not. And I'll have to make the decision then whether I want to watch a playthrough of the other two games to see their stories before moving on or accept the uncommon situation of having the information of the first game and not the others going into the second arc.

I should probably watch the videos. Since I think I'd be more confused knowing some but not all than I would knowing nothing going into the second arc. But I'm not going to not play the game I bought.

But this is also Not Something I Should Be Worrying About Right Now. Because, again, it'll be years before I reach the point where I'm starting the Trails series.

#the legend of heroes #a tear of vermilion #gagharv trilogy

[redbootsthetimetraveller]

share more info of your ocs :) when did you start creating them?

hmm that's a question. I've always been creating little characters to draw, mostly because I never really wanted to make true fanart but making fan characters and so on was so much more interesting to me. though original character wise I have been making little stories, or actually really big stories since I don't know when to stop. one of my earliest ones was this conflict between these kingdoms and I called the people there wolves even though they. weren't wolflike in the least. (there's a deeper story to that but to keep things concise, I won't get into that) and I am genuinely considering making that into a story, but we'll see. I'm not really a high fantasy person and I have another high fantasy story that I keep thinking about a lot at the moment so I'll see

I'm gonna stick the rest of this under the cut to keep this post a bit shorter because that seems polite lol (note: this will be longwinded and rambly)

the first of my original characters who I have now would be keith.

he's been around since about 2013. coming up on ten years in april, actually! the story is, keith's a fan character. he's a doctor who oc. as you may or may not know, I have been a dr who fan (on and off) since 2003/4. I watched the first few series of new who, then stopped watching because I didn't see any episodes for a long time til 2010 and then didn't want to watch it after that, but one day in april 2013 my cousin sat me down and made me watch the snowmen and I got hooked. so hooked that I ended up having a dream about it within a few days, and I drew that dream.

the character in that dream would eventually become keith, through a few twists and turns. at first I drew him similar to how I looked at the time, but later he would become ginger whereas I am not, though at the time my hair was very reddish. funnily enough, the incarnation of him that I later turned into my oc nico was also inspired by a dream, though not a dr who related one. but a year later in 2016 I would start writing keith's story, and his appearance changed again, but I never actually drew him.

I think I might've drawn the very early stages of his current form back in 2017, but it wasn't til 2018 that I actually drew him and settled on the name 'keith neptune'. he also travels with a nebulous 'next' incarnation of the doctor so I don't have to try and get the doc's character correct lol.

keith's a bit of a nervous wreck though he's got the excuse to be one since he does get technically kidnapped about four different times within the space of about four months for him, but he's also reckless and dives into things headfirst.

the next lot of original characters I came up with are my (main) oc band, the starstrucks

the members of this band are davey, charlie, roger, snowy, pete (not to be confused with peter) and also rory and mick. there are a few characters connected to them, like sylvia, holly, mary and james (not to be confused with jimmy), though I won't get into them because that will quickly snowball into explaining every single character. I probably ought to draw up an affinity chart xc1 style!

davey's the lead singer, though he gets kicked out in 1970 because he steals some of roger's tracks to use on a solo album that he didn't tell anyone about til it released. he starts out as an arrogant, kinda spoilt nepo baby - and he is a nepo baby, the band unfortunately allows his uncle gerald to manage them and he says 'you need a singer' and he puts davey in the band. davey is actually quite a good singer, so initially they can't be that mad at him, but most of their personalities clash horribly. part of davey's problem is that he's a repressed bisexual, so hanging around with two aspec gays, another bisexual and a polysexual for four years does bring him out of the closet. he's not exactly the villain, because there isn't a villain, but he's definitely the antagonist

roger is the actual leader, and the keyboardist. he's shy, but he does have a bit of an arc where he learns to beat his social anxiety. he's still shy, but he's able to stand his ground. he writes a lot of their music, too. I can't really talk too much about him because a lot of the stuff I have worked out about him is spoilers, and I am genuinely working on presenting the story

snowy is the youngest and also has the most anger issues - davey has them, yes, but he expresses his deeprooted problems by being annoying whilst snowy sits in the corner and simmers in anger. he doesn't have the best control over his reactions, because he is autistic (though davey's meant to be the only nt, so...) and he really didn't come from a good home. in fact, the scene in which you first see him, he's literally running away. he does learn to mellow out, but it does take not being around davey for that to happen lol! he's a bit of a stereotypical resting bassist faced... bassist.

charlie's the golden retriever of the group. snowy and he have been best friends since they were kids - snowy being the type to have one friend and only that friend, meanwhile charlie just. likes people. anyway he's probably the happiest of the group; he graduates his arts degree while being a full-time musician, he marries holly and is all 'I LOVE MY WIFE!!1!', and is a positive anchor. he's the guitarist for the band.

pete is the most laidback member, and also the (original) drummer. he's been roger's best friend for years, and he's incredibly observant. he's very good at de-escalating situations, as well as being very good with emotions. he's the oldest, the most serious, but also has a very good sense of humour. he also marries his first wife, mary, at the start of the story, and part of his story is him realising he's falling out of love with her - they remain friends, it's not bitter or anything, but I feel like it's an interesting dynamic that I want to explore.

rory and mick i'll put in one paragraph. pete leaves the band in 1972 because he realises he doesn't want to be absent from his kids' lives (he has two kids with his second wife, isabelle) so the band needs a new drummer. so along comes rory, who is super similar to charlie so they get along excellently! snowy, uh. doesn't have a happy ending. about eight months afterwards, roger gets the band back together, but he needs a new bassist and he doesn't want to just have a session musician after trying that. whilst he was producing another group, he comes across mick - a session musician, and after a bit of persuasion, he joins. mick's very deadpan, but he's also rather warm when he opens up. he's not in much of the story, because the 1980s-on chapter is an epilogue of sorts, but he's significant enough that I felt the need to mention him

the other oc band I have is the midnight delusions, who I feel have more outside characters than the starstrucks do, but the characters you need to worry about most are jimmy, peter, arthur, teddy, stevie, lucky, and also katherine because she is important too.

jimmy is the on-again off-again frontman/lead guitarist for the midnight delusions, and I made him visually and name-wise similar to a certain member of led zep because I hate his guts and wanted to make someone better than him out of spite. therefore, james rafferty jade came into existence. he could genuinely be an incredible musician, but when he's not too mentally ill to leave the house (something his partner christopher gets extremely worried about) he's clashing with teddy, arthur or stevie too much to get much done.

teddy is incredibly similar to jimmy, in the sense that they're both stubborn, headstrong musicians who have similar mental illnesses. unlike jimmy, who manifests this as silent rage, teddy is similar to davey in the sense that he's annoying, slightly immature, and arrogant. but teddy's more... balanced... and there's a definite harrowing depression to him. can you tell what mental illness he might have. anyway teddy's got really complex family history but what you need to know is he was born in post-war holland to a large family where his mother was busy looking after his ever so slightly older cousins so he was neglected a lot and not treated well, and eventually he ran away to his estranged uncle who runs a boutique in london. his uncle tried to make up for his childhood by spoiling him a little, but honestly teddy has such crushing guilt all the time that it didn't turn out the same way davey's spoiling did. he's sort of the jack of all trades musically. keyboard, bass, guitar, whatever needs doing.

arthur is one of my favourite ocs if I can say so! he's the bassist, and he's also got a really complex family background, but he's very grounded. he's also completely done with everyone, which sometimes manifests as anger, but he likes to be in control, so he doesn't have the anger issues snowy does. he's a bookworm, which is how he met peter, and he's otherwise very chill, or... aloof.

peter is also one of my favourite ocs... he's laidback, incredibly hardworking - like arthur - protective and probably the most put-together of the group. he's been in charge of his sibling, morgan, since he was about sixteen/seventeen. his story is again really not something I can talk about without spoilers, but one last thing about him is that he's the rhythm guitarist.

stevie is a character I think about a lot. part of peter's story is that he has some friends ditch him whilst on a trip to america, and he'd met stevie whilst in houston, texas. they travel across the usa after stevie runs away from his awful family, inspired by peter, and eventually they both end up back in the uk and stevie, having decided to take up piano, gets dragged into the band. he plays on their first few albums but eventually he decides to leave and I don't know exactly what he does after that, but he's still a part of the story.

lucky is the ray of sunshine of the group. he's the drummer, having joined an amateur orchestra as a young teen as a percussionist and learning a lot of percussion instruments. he then played in a jazz band, before getting snagged by the band. him and stevie get along really well, despite stevie kinda hating people. his real name is either gonna be luke or lucas, but I haven't decided yet. he's more in the background like mick in the starstrucks because I don't think there is enough room to fit another angsty character with personal issues in the story, and besides. there needs to be a mediator.

and lastly, katherine is an artist, a writer, and a vital link between the two bands. so, katherine is a fellow art student with pete, roger and charlie (though he's younger than the others) and they sort of interact, but later in late 1965 roger decides to commission her for some record sleeve artwork, and they become friends. however, her housemates (who sort of form an artist collective) are either the older cousin of one of morgan's friends - how jimmy, teddy, arthur and peter know the collective - or a friend that holly has, and later works with teddy's uncle which leads to the others working with him. so I feel like she's the most important link between the two sections

anyway at the end of 2018 I wanted to come up with my own oc band, because several of my friends had their own, but it took until early 2019, a trip to my dad's and a trip interstate to housesit plus a sprinkling of extra energy for me to come up with the starstrucks. I feel like they're my best designed characters, because I used a shape for each's face (where a lot of my design variation goes to, especially when the characters don't have 'set' outfits to distinguish them by) for example, charlie used a heart, snowy used a diamond, roger a rectangle, davey an oval, and pete a pentagon. I was quite happy with them, but whilst I was too overwhelmed with my grade twelve portfolio I came up with another band; who were the midnight delusions. the only ones who remained of that were teddy and stevie. teddy originally had a doppelganger, but I dropped that character. priscilla kinda took the helm of another character, now that I think about it. but once I finished college I repurposed arthur from my english writing folio into, well, arthur, had my moment of spite and created jimmy, and lucky existed in my head but wouldn't get drawn til february 2020 lol. most of the rest appeared later, or like nico, were redesigned from older characters

anyway that was incredibly long but I hope that it was not only intelligible but also answered your question!

#ask/ #anonymous #original characters #oc lore #the starstrucks #the midnight delusions #at some point I'll create a character directory. not now though it's nearly half past five in the morning!! #of course just because I didn't list them here doesn't mean anything other #than 'you don't need to know about them for the moment' #trust me I have whole side stories for them. the story's gonna be like xc3 with all the side stories #comparing my work to that masterpiece feels wrong though!!

[forever70301]

[HYUNGWON] 210911 Kstyle Interview

Take all translations with a pinch of salt as there may be inaccuracies!

Ori article: https://news.kstyle.com/article.ksn?articleNo=2174102

Hyungwon: The members sang 'Secrets' coolly so I'm really satisfied. 'BEBE' which I wrote the lyrics for; was the most difficult song that I've ever participated in. I thought it'd be nice if my feelings were conveyed to fans but it really wasn't easy to express them in lyrics. I wrote and erased it, wrote and erased it countless of times. The process was difficult but I'm glad that the fans are happy with it. There are still a lot of parts that are not enough so I can't say I am a 100% satisfied. Especially more for my songs.

But when I see fans who say that they are touched, I am even more touched. I will do work hard to show you better results.

- On 'Nobody else' charting on Billboard Digital Song Chart I'm thankful that it's loved but it is also true that there are still many weak parts.

Rather than the song is good, I think it's because of the members. It's like putting only a spoon on a set (meal) prepared by the members? *smile*

I'm usually far from a perfectionist but it's only when I'm composing, I do my best because I want to get closer to being 'perfect'.

I'm not the type to work fast and making one song takes quite a lot of time. 'Nobody else' was a song I prepared since FANTASTA X. I wasn't satisfied with it so I put it off for the next album. I'm always trying to write songs so that there'll be songs at good timings.

- On the performance that left the biggest impression 'Shoot Out'.

- If you were to do solo activities, what sort of concept will it be? Have you thought about it? I haven't thought about solo activities before. There is a concept that I definitely want to do.

Hyungwon: MONSTA X mainly shows powerful music and performance. If I were to have solo activities, I want to show a calm atmosphere. If there's a chance, I want to release an album as a DJ. Not one song at a time but a proper full album that has various genres.

- Are you still steadily practicing (DJ stuff)? Yes. I even made a playlist of songs that I can play in the future. I think DJ activities and composing are closely related. There's a difference between DJ-ing alone and a DJ who can compose.

Hyungwon: I can't DJ now so I'm focusing on composing. When the situation gets better, I want to use the ideas that I've gotten while composing on the DJ stage.

- You are said to be in charge of MONSTA X's visuals, do you think so? Actually, I don't really know. I don't think I'm particularly handsome. I don't think there is any specific person who is in charge of visuals in our team. Each of us has our own distinctive appeal.

Everyone is really unique. I think we are a group with no one in charge of visuals. My members will probably get really angry with me when they see this interview thinking I'm being humble and wanting people to say that I'm 'cool' *smile* I hope the members don't misunderstand...

- What made you decide to train?

I.M had been tempting me for 3 months on the side. To say it nicely, it was a temptation, actually it was a reprimand *laugh* I didn't really care no matter what I.M said but one day I saw myself in the mirror and got a shock.

My stomach was sticking out. I thought I looked like a spider. I was thin in the other places but only my stomach was sticking out *laugh*. So I started exercising from the next day. It has been about 8 months. I found that my shoulders gain muscles easily. My next aim is my back

- About monbebes messages

Mbbs' sense is the best. They are really interesting that I'll forget about the time. Among the title of the letters, there are really a lot of savage ones *laugh* I'm scared just looking at the titles. It makes me think if I did anything wrong but when I really click in, the contents are overflowing with love. Sometimes the fans seem to be more intense than us *laugh* I guess this is the feeling of being intensely loved? Thanks to the fans who overflows with intensity, I'm happy.

- I think #MONSTA_X is a group on such good terms that they can communicate with just looking

Even if we don't, we can *smile* I can say confidently that our teamwork is the best. Every member is different so we fit well. I, Shownu and I.M are the quiet type while Minhyuk, Kihyun and Jooheon is the type who overflows with energy. It's a good combination because it's properly mixed. Also, because we spend a lot of time together so we understand each other better than anyone else. Because we understand how it feels, we can respect each other.

- What do you think you'll look like 7 years from now?

My dream is not big. 7 years from now, just like presently, I want to keep meeting the fans. To do that, we have to strive to keep growing. If we don't do our best, I don't think we will be able to be in our current position.

#hyungwon #hyungwontranslations

[hanjifuck]

.˚｡⋆ ༊ .˚｡⋆ stray kids ideal types - series .˚｡⋆ ༊ .˚｡⋆

lee know version ʕっ•ᴥ•ʔっ

based on their birth charts! s2

✧*:.｡. t/n: i’ll be using SIDEREAL astrology on this one. it’s also important to say that when we talk about romance in astrology we have to fully analyse the couple’s birth charts individualy at first and only then apply compatibility analysis so we’re able to check out the synastry overlays.

✧*:.｡. t/n: kinda proofread.

firts of all, i'll be taking a different approach to minho's birth chart as his' way different from chris'. with him we're gonna look at other placements.

let's use Lacan (1985) as a method to examine the relationship he has between the "i" and the "others". when we look at a Möbius strip it's possible to see that if we turn one side of the two surfaces of the band, we find ourselves outside, while the other finds itself inside the circle. which leads us into thinking about how much of "i" is in the "other" and how much of the "other" is in "i". even if we look at houses of the self, it's percepcion will only be seen on others. our notion of individuality is created trough the mirror offered by the other (the mirror stage).

the basics:

someone who has the sun in gemini, libra or aquarius;

moon in cancer, scorpio or pisces. leo and aquarius moons are a NO;

venus in aries, aquarius or sagittarius;

jupiter in gemini.

obviously there’s way more aspects to look into to see if a relationship would work but i’d rather not go too deep into it right now.

a person who above all things is his friend first. he wants to make friends with the person he likes because he's not the most romantic.

someone full of surprises, who excites him in differents ways everyday. boi wants an adventurous and unique love. he loves the drama and the unexpected.

a person who has knowledge about unusal things/likes to read about all types of things. interesting personality is a MUST for him. he loves being around strange people because he doesn't want to be bored. when it's about fun he likes to engage in all sorts of not-usual activities, what seems the strangest is also what’s best.

not-into-fairy-tales-romance type of person. he wants to be around someone who's interesting and makes him curious, so their meetings are most of the time unusual. i don't think you should expect the whole wine and dine type of thing from him, specially because he can give you way more. <3

someone who likes being around groups and is good at socializing. i know this can trigger some people but hear me out, he's happy when collaborating with others and functioning in groups. when he's having fun he wants to be part of the noisiest events, so it’s normal to see him at concerts or big art related events.

a non-judgmental person. it's not that he's scared of you "not accepting" him or whatever, believe me he does not care about this. he has to live to the fullest and to be unusual. he expresses his creativity in his own way. he wants to feel excitement when it comes to a relationships, so if you're too worried about what other people will think it won't work.

a person who wouldn't be a strict parent, if it's a long-term relationship we're talking about. his kids are very likely going to have strong aquarius/uranus energy on their birth charts, meaning his chiquitos would be as accentric as he is. he wants his children to express their individuality and be themselves. he's really good with children as well, having a great way of communicating with his kids, making them mentally strong and independent. yet he may tend to stress his kids with education stuff related cus he feels they should pursue their interests. cool dad™. will be good friends with his kids (the children will be as funny as he is).

someone who's not traditional. a rebel when it comes to love and don’t prefer to date the traditional way. he wants to fall in love with your mind. his dating ways can be unusual, maybe online since he has a kick for technological advancements. he can be strange when it comes to sex as well.

but is still a 100% monogamy. the king needs to rule ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. he wants to be the center of attention, he can be a bit domineering even. he may be a bit possessive or jealous, but tries to hide it. expects absolute loyalty from you. his kinks? a lot of love, affection, and admiration.

a person who's not scared of experimenting. he wants to try everything at least once.

a "modern" person. minho has always been interested in technology. he gives me big nerdy energy. he's quick to respond to his creativity urges.

someone who has a longing for learning. he enjoys traveling and learning about technology, psychology, philosophy etc. deep and philosophic conversations are a must (but don't get it twisted he enjoys humor more than anything). he's unhappy with what he's being given, he's always looking to improve things and his thoughts.

a person who's comfortable with silence as well. even tho he loves having fun with other people he's still kinda a loner who doesn't need to interact with other humans or to talk very much.

someone passive. would like it better if the person's willing to give him the spotlight. wants to be paided attention to, wants you to worship him. his fantasies probably revolve around devotion. ofc he enjoys giving his effort to you as long as he receive the same back, too. disobeying is a no.

a feminine and elegant person. rude or harsh behavior and crudeness about sex are a no. you must have a sparkling physical appearance as well.

easy conversationalist. def not into monosyllabic communicators. he's prideful, he won’t back off from a conflict that involves his own principles so it's essential for you to be good with words, too. fights can be commom in the relationship.

someone who enjoys praising him. don't forget to show your appreciation for all that he’s doing. wants you to see him as the confident man that he is and the man that will fulfill all your dreams.

a 100% honest person. you deceive him, he will just leave and not turn back. he finds it hard to forgive. again, he wants his partner to worship him. he works hard to make sure you leave idolizing him, so his feelings will get very hurt if he finds out later on that you were “faking” things. he will feel inadequate and insecure.

patiente. he can be easy to offend or to be hurt quite easily. you may need to walk on eggshells sometimes. when you first meet him, he might come off as a bit unattainable but don't be discouraged.

a person who doesn't get scared by his feelings. when he's actually in love, he will fall head over heels. if he thinks you're a match he wants to make sure nobody else will ever get you. he can easily get caught up in the moment and be impulsive. he wants to attract your attention as soon as possible after he realises he loves you, and it will be in an obvious and eccentric way. he wants you to remember him for a lifetime. his placements makes him one of the most emotional individuals, he feels love, anger, disappointment, happiness and so on, at a much greater level.

someone who stands out. he has always attracted a lot of attention since he has a gravitational energy, so it won't be just anyone who's going to catch his eyes. as a child, he felt very different from the people he was surrounded by. he loved and still love anything that is labeled as odd by others and he likes to feel like he's strange.

someone who's interested in humanitarian work.

a person who's flexible. he needs someone who's willing to take risks with him. someone who's in to enjoy the ride.

#cool dude #stray kids #skz #stray kids reactions #stray kids imagines #stray kids scenarios #stray kids headcanons #skz reactions #skz imagines #skz scenarios #skz headcanons #lee know #lee know reaction #lee know imagines #lee know scenarios #lee know headcanons #lee minho #stray kids astrology #skz astrology #lee know astrology #astrology #sidereal chart

[mysticaldeanvoidhorse]

A Supernatural Love

Chapter 6: A Doctor

Summary:  Y/N, a nurse working towards medical school living with her roommate and best friend Genevieve Cortese, meets Jensen Ackles while visiting the set of Supernatural one day.  Is this chance encounter a coincidence or fate?  And if it is fate, do they have what it takes to make it through separations and hardships?

Slow(ish) burn, some angst, some alluding to sexy times, fluff

Pairings: Jensen x Reader

Warnings: Bad writing

Word Count: 1237

No hate to any of the real people in this story, it is purely fiction and for enjoyment! No images are mine

First fic I wrote, please be kind but open to feedback, both positive and negative!

Tag List: @streets-in-paradise @leigh70 @sexyvixen7 @deandreamernp @universallyraylangivens @siospins2 @let-me-luve-you  @lyarr24​ @nancymcl

Tag list open!

Masterlist here

     It had been a few weeks since Olivia told you about the newest hire.  You couldn't believe you hadn't met him yet but you also were pulling a lot of night shifts and it sounded like the hospital wanted to get him comfortable in geriatrics before moving him to your floor.  You mostly worked with pediatrics but your true passion was trauma and every chance you got to work in the ER was great.  You were learning so much and it helped you stay motivated and focused on your goal.

     Gen tried to reason with you about the headline promising she'd figure out the whole story once she got to set Monday, but honestly you were just trying to forget the whole thing.  Forget him, he wasn't worth it.  Just another shallow actor who only was beautiful on the outside.  But deep down you knew you were wrong.

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone that focused on charts," you heard a kind voice say next to you that Monday morning. You looked up to see a handsome face in a white coat.

"Oh, I guess I was lost in thought," you respond, trying to look away from the chiseled jawline of the handsome stranger.

"That makes more sense, most people can't wait to get away from paperwork" he responded with a kind smile.  You couldn't help but notice it reminded you of another beautiful smile you were trying to forget.

"I'm James Braddon.  The newest doctor here." He held out his hand.

"I'm Y/N Y/L/N" you responded, taking his hand.

"It's nice to meet you, but I'm surprised we haven't met before.  I've been on this floor for at least a week and I would have remembered meeting you," he gave you a flirtatious smile and you couldn't help feeling pretty good.

"I've been helping cover a lot of night shifts lately.  Ever since three girls quit pretty much at the same time it's been understaffed and it gives me a chance to study." You didn't know why you were sharing so much, you just met the guy but he didn't seem to care. The opposite actually.

"That makes sense.  What are you studying?" He genuinely seemed interested so you told him.

"I'm actually hoping to one day become a doctor myself.  But it's a lot of work and costs a lot so I'm working as a nurse for now but I'm actually enjoying it" you weren't lying though at one point you would have said being a nurse was the worst thing you could have settled for. You had quickly changed your mind; being a nurse was one of the most rewarding things you had ever done.

"Yeah it is pretty challenging but so worth it.  This is my second job as a doctor but I've been loving it ever since my white coat ceremony.  Do you have a specific interest?"

"I've been really enjoying my time in the trauma unit and ER.  I really like the fast paced adrenaline rush you get" you chuckled.  He chuckled too and flashed another beautiful smile.

"I enjoy trauma rounds too.  Nothing can give you a high like having someone's life in your hands.  Maybe I'll see you on rounds there sometime." His pager went off but before he walked away he said, "it was nice meeting you Y/N and if you ever want someone to help you study, you know where I work." He gave you a wink and walked in the direction you assumed he came from and man did you like to watch him leave…

     "Was that James?" Olivia said from behind you.

"Yes it was, I just met him.  He's really nice."

"And cute!" You laughed at her remark.

"Olivia don't forget you're married" you teased.  She just rolled her eyes.

"I may be married but I'm not blind.  And if anyone asks, just blame the hormones." This earned a laugh from you.  You didn't want to tell her how James flirted and said he'd be a study partner because though it was a nice offer, you weren't sure if it was a real one.  You didn't know him well yet and you were still trying to get your mind off another beautifully built man and you didn't need to be distracted by another.

     The rest of the week you didn’t visit the set, opting to take a break for a while to help you clear the intoxicating man out of your system.  Besides, this week brought about a new friend.  James seemed to spend more time at the nurses’ station than he needed to and you were thankful for the company.  He was caring and passionate, characteristics he brought to his professional and personal life.  You quickly became friends and had a lot to talk about.  He wasn’t into all the same movies or as interested in Garth Brooks as you were, but that was okay.  If he was, you would be comparing him to Jensen even more than you already were; a habit you were trying to break.  If you barely knew Jensen, why was it so hard to erase him from your mind?

     “Has he asked you out yet?”  Gen asked once you came home.  Of course you told her about James, you didn’t want to at first but she was your best friend and you didn’t keep secrets.  On top of that it helped her to stop mentioning Jensen.  She had said she heard the story from Jared and that it was a misunderstanding.  Wasn’t it usually?  Jared was his best friend so of course he would do his best to try to make Jensen look the best he could and you didn’t want to hear about it.

“No, and I doubt he will.  He is new and making friends is really important.”  You tried to reason.  Truth was, Jensen or no Jensen, James was a catch.

“So is finding someone to date,”  Gen countered.  “Come on Y/N Jensen or no Jensen James is a great guy.  If you won’t give Jensen a chance you should go for James.  What is the harm in one date?”  She was right.  He was a great guy and you could see yourself falling for someone like him.  He was a doctor, driven, caring, and most importantly right now, he had no drama.  Exactly what you were looking for.  He was someone you feel safe and comfortable with.  Maybe not a passionate love affair, but at least you knew he would treat you right.  And that is all anyone could ask for; more than most ever get.

“Alright Gen, I’ll tell you what.  If we can drop the whole Jensen thing and admit whatever I was feeling was just a silly school girl crush on a celebrity and nothing more, then if James asks me out I will say yes.  Deal?”  You hoped this would appease her.

“We both know there was a spark between you two and it was way more than you are trying to convince yourself of, but for the sake of peace,  I will drop it for now.   But you know you can’t lie to yourself forever.”  She pursed her lips and walked out of the room leaving you on the couch to continue to cuddle with a pillow.  You knew she wouldn’t drop it for good, but she also underestimated how good you can be about lying to yourself.

#Jensen Ackles x you #jensen ackles x y/n #jensen ackles x reader #jensen ackles #jensen x you #jensen x reader #jensen x y/n #jared padalecki #genevieve padalecki #daneel ackles #supernatural #supernatural fic #supernatural show #a supernatural love #supernatural writing #writing #fanfic #supernatural fanfic series

[zephycluster]

Precolonial HWS SEA Rant Post, feel free to ignore

If you're still reading, then you're probably looking for evidence or some juicy tidbits to throw back at me or to try and find dirt to cancel me, like typical Tumblr/Twitter. Go ahead, I don't really care.

First off, let me just say that If you like Precolonial South-East Asia AUs, feel free to keep enjoying them. I will respectfully support your passions from afar. This post is just to explain why I don't like it, especially the way they keep insisting/portraying PH in it.

Still here? Then let me begin.

Since the recent confirmation that the ASEAN Six Majors (Can't really say ASEAN 10 atm since it's still missing some people) Were completed and the Ma-Phil-Indo Trio was included, there has been a large surge in 'Precolonial' fanarts and portrayals of South East Asians, those three especially.

Even long, long before, circa 2010's ish, a rather well-known fan universe known as 'Maaf' dealt with their story and how their Author thought their intertwined histories went. Written by (my best guesstimate) an Indonesian writer who wants to explore the old, SEA bond.

When I first stumbled across Maaf (I was in Highschool at the time, around age 16-ish), I took a casual interest in it and tried to read it through. But, I will wholeheartedly admit that at the time, Pre-Colonial cultures of South-East Asia in general, let alone Philippine, did not really interest me that much. The focus (I think) was mostly on Indonesia, a country I didn't really know back then, and the liberal use of 'ancient' names and artwork just made it feel like an entirely Original Work (that needed a degree in History to really appreciate) and not something from Hetalia. I also completely disagreed with what I could gather was the story's portrayal of PH but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Do I hate 'Maaf'? No, I don't hate it. Do I wish I never came across it or that it didn't exist? Of course not. Just because I didn't enjoy it or appreciate it that well doesn't mean I wish any ill toward it, its fans, or its creator.

Fast forward to April 2021, the long awaited inclusion of South East Asia to the canon Hetalia verse. I was happy, the other fans were happy, all was good.

Then started the questionable fanarts, fan theories and fan pairings.

Especially the expansion of Precolonial! PH.

Let's go back to Maaf for one moment. From what I understood of Maaf, PH there was a character who once was like all the other South East Asian cultures, trading with them, all around being a nice family.

But all that changed when the Spaniards attacked, so cry the precolonial buffs. They destroyed everything, ransacked and marginalized the tribes, erased everything that PH was!

Did that happen? ABSOLUTELY. The Spaniards had this vision in mind that they must spread Christianity to all of the 'savage, unchristian heathens' of their realm. :V /s

But back up a second, back to PH's portrayal in Maaf. The way she (yeah, she) was portrayed there was that she was slowly losing her memories of being a 'true' South East Asian and grew more and more westernized in the process, like some sort of Culture-specific Alzheimer's or something.

Firstly, that is seriously depressing, and secondly, I just really don't see that happening.

Here's why.

Point 1: Even before Colonial Masters, Filipinos as a people cannot agree on anything.

I'll just begin this segment with a Philippine proverb that outlines what Filipinos call 'Crab Mentality' or 'Crab Bucket Mentality'.

"You don't need a lid for a container when you're keeping multiple crabs. If you keep at least two crabs together, they will just pull each other down instead of helping each other up."

I don't know how it goes with Indonesian or Malaysian history class, but what I know of my homeland, both pre- and post-colonial history, we were never really 'united' or 'together' in the sense that Indonesia and Malaysia were (from what I assume).

Let me pull up a somewhat related question on r/AskHistorians.

The reason I brought this up as it shows the reasons why, in my opinion, a single entity that is 'Precolonial Philippines-tan' is an impossibility.

The answers are long and would extend this already long post to stupid proportions, so I'll just quote relevant sentences. The link is here for those that wanna deep-dive into the answer.

"All this to say that there wasn't a name used for the entire Philippine islands before the Philippines that people now would agree to. An interesting comparison would be the Holy Roman Empire, which might also be characterized as disparate politico-geographic groups of relatively small size that had a history of relations between each other, but one thing they had that the Philippines did not was a common language, or at least a family of mostly mutually intelligible languages, so that the name Deutschland or Germany isn't terribly offensive to anyone. If you called the Philippines the 'Lupang-Tagalog' or even 'Lupang-Tao' the other ethnic groups would protest."

For those in need of translation, 'Lupang Tagalog' means 'Land of the Tagalogs' and 'Lupang Tao' means 'Land of People', specifically. The first one is already exclusive and offensive, as the Tagalog peoples are but one of many ethnicities here.

And for the 'Lupang Tagalog' suggestion specifically, it's even more offensive as they are the majority ethnicity (not by much, just around 28%) From this chart from Geography Now! It would basically be alienating everyone else in the 72% remainder that isn't 'Tagalog'.

And even 'Lupang Tao', the most generic name in a local language you can think of, would be met with contempt because the name itself is in the Tagalog language.

Just travelling between two individual island groups today would sometimes require a translator because the words can change very rapidly and very drastically. Here's a sample of some differences coming from a friend living in Visayas (in Red) vs. the words I know living in Luzon (In blue).

Ate vs. Manang = Older Sister

Ibon vs. Pispis = Bird

Tumawa vs. Kadlaw = To laugh

Takot vs. Hadlok = Fear

Kain vs. Kaon = To eat

Ngayon vs. Subong = Now, at this point in time

Iyak vs. Hibi/Gibi = to cry

Talampakan vs. Tiil = Foot (in Tagalog, the word retains its 'body part AND unit of measurement' meaning)

Tulog vs. Tuyo = to sleep (Tuyo in Tagalog is either a dried salted fish or 'to dry')

The kicker is that just like Tagalog is just one of many languages here, so too is the language my friend speaks. Ask an entirely new person, like someone from Mindanao, they'll probably have an entirely new set of words.

It's not just Luzon vs. Visayas vs. Mindanao, either. Here's a map listing some of the ethnic groups here.

Even the way they're written differs from location to location.

While we're on the subject of Island divisions, a casual skim across Twitter and Tumblr has shown that their Precolonial PH has been one of the following ancient civilizations: Tondo, Butuan, Sugbu, Namayan. There may have been others but that was what I have found.

Notice how even today, the posters of Precolonial PH can't seem to agree on what he's supposed to be? With Indonesia it's either Majapahit or Srivijaya and Malaysia it's usually Malacca iirc.

What is the big deal? Well, let's go back to the Ask Historians post. "Why didn't the Philippines ever change its name to remove the colonial mark that being named after a Spanish King has?" The answer: "If you suggested something dating to precolonial times, the other ethnic groups would protest."

Since we're on a roll with maps, let me bring this up.

As you can see, the precolonial PH posts have a reason to not be able to agree on one thing, as there is a LOT of options. Do you also see how THAT list is also split up?

It's split up into those aligned with China (Sinified), aligned with India (Indianized), aligned with the Middle East (Islamicized), and no alignment (Animist). Now, let's go back to the main suggestions for which Kingdom/Polity/Civilization/whatever Modern Philippines used to be.

If the Filipino peoples' couldn't agree on something as simple as WHAT TO CALL THE LAND THEY'RE LIVING ON, what more a living, breathing, walking, talking entity that is supposed to be a beacon of all of their 'unified' culture? ESPECIALLY if that entity used to be a currently existing Kingdom/Polity/Rajahnate/Sultanate/whatever.

Tondo? "Of course, always the damn Tagalogs. Tagalog this, Tagalog that. First the capital city, then the language,* THE REST OF US EXIST, YOU KNOW! What about us in Visayas? Mindanao?"

*The national language known as 'Filipino' is just standardized Tagalog*

Butuan? "Wait, you want Butuan to represent us? They're they only Indian-aligned city in the Islam-majority Mindanao! They're not even that many of them! I'm not gonna change my religion!"

Sugbu, the other name for the Rajahnate of Cebu on the map? Lemme bring back my Visayan friend again. According to her, she hails from the Hiligaynon part of Visayas.

"Sure :v and the other islands are what?

Chopped liver?

Not to mention the language and writing barrier helloooo"

And Namayan? Well. I'll let this pic speak for itself.

To summarize, no matter who you pick as Modern PH's previous identity, it will not end well nor be accepted by the other Kingdoms at the time.

"So where does that leave Modern PH, he had to have been ONE of them, right?"

Well, not really. He doesn't HAVE to be one of the Ancient Kingdoms that lasted till the modern day. I mean, predecessor representatives exist in Hetalia canon, after all. Like Modern Greece is a different character from Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt and Modern Egypt, heck even England and his brothers have a canon mother that was the rep before them.

Or you could even use the same logic that Germany does, in that each specific region has/had its own representative and that Modern!PH is just the 'mediator' between them (cause gawd does PH need one). There could be a Tondo, a Namayan, a Butuan, and a Sugbu, all arguing and this Proto-PH is just trying to make headway in making them all satisfied.

But, even after all this, there is another reason why I personally don't subscribe to the 'Precolonial PH' idea, and by tangential extension, the Indo x Phil pairing.

Point 2: Even without intending to, Precolonial Indo x Phil just comes off as patronizing

This second point is just ENTIRELY personal preference and barely has any facts to back it up.

Again, if you like the pairing and disagree with me, You do you. I will respectfully support you and your passions from a distance.

But for me, Indo being Phil's seme/bae/boyfriend and consistently bringing up precolonial times just comes off as patronizing.

Just one more time, I'd like to point out that I am NOT bashing Indonesia, its people or the subscribers of Indo x Phil. This is just how the pairing feels to ME specifically.

The way I see it, Indo x Phil as a pairing, especially if it extends back into precolonial times, reads the same way as a long-since married couple where the husband/wife CONSTANTLY brings up that ONE outing you had together, or that ONE prom night where you kissed while dancing, even it happened like 30 some-odd years ago and so much more happened since then.

Even in a platonic sense, It reads like two besties where one ALWAYS mentions stuff like 'Yeah but you looked so much cooler back in High School' or 'Back in Grade School you would've known that', or 'Remember back in Pre-school we did X? How could you forget that?'

How does one respond to the notion that no matter what you do now, it will never compare to a past you've already forgotten or barely remember? That the best version of 'you' is already long gone?

"That's because the westerners made you forget your culture! You gotta take it back!"

While it is true, yes, as a collective we barely remember the Kingdom that commissioned the Laguna Copperplate, or created the Banaue Rice Terraces, or created the millennia old bonds that we still share with Indonesia and Malaysia.

But to keep pushing the precolonial identity would be to neglect and cast aside the one REAL binding belief and culture that spans the entirety of these islands we call the Philippines.

We take on all the bad stuff that happens to us, conquer it, and make it our own. Be it natural disasters, foreign powers, or negative stereotypical mentalities.

Yes, we've forgotten the ancient kingdoms of old and are just now digging through the closet for those remnants of the past. Yes, the colonizers imposed that on us, and made us forget. But in the process we've also taken everything that they left behind, everything that they threw at us, and created something that can only come from us.

The lanterns that the Spaniards used to light the way to the morning masses they made us attend became our globally known symbol of Christmas. The junked vehicles that the Americans left behind in World War 2 are now rolling works of art that announce themselves loud and proud on the streets (for better or for worse). The iced dessert recipe that the Japanese forced us to learn while they were occupying the country is now so distinct and famous it is synonymous with us, and is so delicious even Italy has taken notice.

Even after all this? Even after all the 425-ish years total we have been under a foreign power, with all the progress we've made as a country, a people, and a nation, you would still imply our fragmented, jigsaw puzzle state of being in the past was better just because it was pure 'South East Asian' like everyone else?

We might not be as well put-together as Indonesia or Malaysia, but we made this melting pot of angry, leg-pulling, dogpiling, Native, Mestizo, Chinoy, and Fil-Am crabs OURS, damnit!

It's now 4:30 AM and I have work in 5 or so hours. I'll be going to sleep now.

#hws #hws philippines #precolonial philippines #hws theory #hetalia #hetalia world stars #hetalia world series #hetalia headcanons #aph #axis powers hetalia #aph philippines #hetalia philippines #aph hetalia