#the girl looks like she shops at hot topic there is no way she’s cishet

[vergess]

SO some week in september i am going to a gay/lesbian bar (idk which we havent picked a place yet) for the First Time and i have! Questions! 1 is it weird if you go to a bar and don't drink alcohol 2. what the fuck do i wear 3. what do i say if a cute girl talks to me 4. how do i talk to a cute girl 5. what do i wear in a way that will make it obvious i am queer at the queer bar 6. is showing bra strap sexy or trashy bc i hate strapless bras i am going shopping for clothes tonight at New Mall

1) No it's very normal to not drink alcohol at the bar. If you let the bartender know you're not drinking alcohol, you may even get a designated driver discount on your sodas and juices. Some places will also et you get a stamp or paper bracelet so that waitstaff know not to offer you alcoholic drinks if you're going to one of those classy places with the booths and shit.

2) Comfort > Style. You want to wear whatever clothes make you feel like your best self. Your favourites. Whether this is jeans and a buttonup or a skirt and blouse, or a t shirt and board shorts, or whatever else. This is not a high end restaurant or an exclusive club. You do not need to maintain a "look" to enter or fit in to the space. Dress for yourself, not for the bar.

3) I would recommend saying, "Hi, I am [AWKA], nice to meet you."

4) and then following up with some gentle questions about safe subjects such as but not limited to:

Pets: If you could have any pet, what would it be?

Local weather: Yes, really, because you know you both have it in common.

Hobbies: I'm a total [social media addict/gamer girl/whatever], how about you?

Pop culture/art: Ask what movies, books, or music she has been listening to lately.

Current events: What's the best thing that has happened to you in the last week/month?

Her clothes/hair/accessories: If anything she's wearing looks cool, compliment her on it and ask where she got them.

Those are some examples of safe, reasonable opening subjects if someone comes up to talk to you but conversation isn't flowing well.

Topics to ABSOLUTELY AVOID 100%: politics, finances, economics, her work/career (you can talk about your own).

5) Remember in point 2 when I was like 'dress for yourself not the bar'? I assure you, it's a queer bar. People will know you are queer. Because you are at the queer bar. This is what the queer bar is for. Is some wayward cishet wanders in and gets hit on by an disliked gender that's 100000% on them. Alternatively, anything with a rainbow on it. Anything.

6) Tragically, depends on the outfit, but usually sexy. You have to fuck up pretty bad for it to come off "trashy" instead of "I am a smoking hot but readily accessible member of the working class."

When in doubt, you can either use a safety pin to pin the bra strap to your shirt's shoulder from the inside so it's not visible, or you can integrate the bra strap into the outfit more openly/purposefully, by attaching a bow, ribbon, brooch, flower, etc to it.

EXCEPT FOR THE PART WHERE I KEEP REDIRECTING YOU TO POINT 2.

You are severely overthinking the queer bar scene. I think you may be thinking of clubs? Bars really really do not have dress codes, and you emphatically do not need to stress about it. Anything you can wear to the walmart you can wear to the bar, and also anything you can wear to work you can wear to the bar, and also anything you can wear on vacation? You can wear to the bar. There are no limits.

#ask responses

[cleverclove]

You know what in honor of Pride Month, Vanessa Doofenshmirtz is a she/they closeted lesbian </3

#pnf #phineas and ferb #vanessa doofenshmirtz #the girl looks like she shops at hot topic there is no way she’s cishet

[neonstarz]

uuuuuhhhh ok here we go! These are for Fried Egg, Samuel, and I’m incredibly curious about Opal so this is also for them! Number wise, 6,9,26, 32, and 50!! Totally not asking about their fashion sense because I feel like they all are incredibly stylish and I want to be like some of them what noooo ahahah

LOOOOL 69 <3 also ur incredibly valid in wanting to look like some of them i try and give my ocs as much drip as humanly possible

FRIED EGG:

6. What were they like at school? Did they enjoy it? Did they finish? What level of higher education did they reach? What subjects did they enjoy? Which did they hate?

Fried Egg was kind of .. absolutely incredibly average in school. She kept her head down and tried to get good grades and not cause trouble. She dropped out when she ran away, though. Albert, the guy who owns the diner, is trying to enroll her in school again though. She liked art class and hated math.

9. Do animals like them? Do they get on well with animals? 

animals in general don't really love fried egg but bacon is the exception 

26. How do they act when they’re happy? Do they sing? Dance? Hum? Or do they hide their emotions? 

copy n pasted from another ask: she goes like >:) a lot. she is not a super expressive person tho and like its kind of hard to tell what mood shes in most of the time. she doesn't actively suppress her emotions, when she ran away she promised herself she wouldn't lie about herself and how she felt, but she just naturally isn't very expressive. 

32. What do they dress like? What sorta shops do they buy clothes from? Do they wear the fashion that they like? What do they wear to sleep? Do they wear makeup? What’s their hair like? 

she wears a lot of band t shirts and black jeans. that is pretty much her entire wardrobe. she has a few things that Albert bought when she first started living in the diner that are like.. stereotypical cishet girl clothing and while fried egg would not be caught dead wearing them she refuses to throw them out because they were a gift and it makes her happy thinking about how little hesitation Albert had before he just started taking care of her. When she has extra money she’ll shop at hot topic but for the most part she thrifts her clothes. She didn't bring a whole lot of money with her when she ran away and Albert’s diner does not make an insane amount so she is not really rolling in dough. She wears a tank top and pajama pants to sleep! She doesn’t wear makeup, it irritates her skin. Her hair is about waist length and neon yellow ! She has bangs that she lets grow out so they cover her eyes for the most part.

50. If they could only take one bag of stuff somewhere with them: what would they pack? What do they consider their essentials?

KJASDFKLS she already did that so im just gonna. tell you what she brought with her when she ran away. The only clothing she brought was a flannel and pair of jeans, and her emotional support black hoodie. She brought about $200 with her, enough for 2 weeks of food and a bit of public transportation. She brought some beef jerky and those tuna cans that come with crackers and plastic spoons and an apple with her too, just enough food to keep her going for the first few days before she could stop and go shopping. she brought her phone with, after factory resetting it. Although if she had to leave and take one bag of stuff with her NOW she would also bring Egg, some food for Egg, and some creamer packets from the diner. 

SAMUEL:

6. What were they like at school? Did they enjoy it? Did they finish? What level of higher education did they reach? What subjects did they enjoy? Which did they hate?

when samuel was at the oakley academy of alchemy he was a very different person. he was very withdrawn and focused on being the perfect kid the perfect student. he didn't love the academy, it was a very conservative school full of other stuffy rich kids trying to be the best. a very competitive environment. he didn’t enjoy any of his language arts classes, but he did like basic/intermediate general alchemy, history of fine arts, and resource collection and identification. samuel dropped out of the university in his 2nd year, when he was 16. 

9. Do animals like them? Do they get on well with animals?

samuel’s SO fuckin good with animals. he has a dog!! an Australian shepherd, named Bo!! animals just naturally trust samuel and like to be around him.

26. How do they act when they’re happy? Do they sing? Dance? Hum? Or do they hide their emotions?

samuel likes to hum and sing under his breath when he's happy!!! 

32. What do they dress like? What sorta shops do they buy clothes from? Do they wear the fashion that they like? What do they wear to sleep? Do they wear makeup? What’s their hair like?

he likes to wear knit sweaters and those super fancy extravagant old timey white button ups, with the flared sleeves and ruffles on the collar and everything. except he wears them in a cool and gay way not in a like. im part of high society way. he also likes to wear dresses sometimes especially for parties with dancing. he likes how skirts flare out. big brand clothing stores don't exist, people get their clothes from tailors, so he just gets his clothing from the local tailor. he does knit his own sweaters though!!

50. If they could only take one bag of stuff somewhere with them: what would they pack? What do they consider their essentials?

what is it with me and characters who run away god. anyway when samuel ran away he brought a fuck ton of gold, enough food to last a week, his bow and arrow, a photo of his parents (that he later threw in a river because fuck those bitches), his hunting knife, a journal, and a few pencils. i think if he had to get up and leave now tho, he just... wouldn't. he's built a life in the tiny town in the far lands, he’s healing, he's found a family and he’s in love, i don't think he could bring himself to leave. 

OPAL:

6. What were they like at school? Did they enjoy it? Did they finish? What level of higher education did they reach? What subjects did they enjoy? Which did they hate?

she was kind of shit in school. she managed to get good enough grades to get into medical school, although she dropped out, but she caused a lot of trouble and tended to get in trouble a lot. she was kind of neutral on school. she liked anatomy classes a lot, especially the ones that involved dissecting cadavers. she didn’t like ela though. 

9. Do animals like them? Do they get on well with animals?

animals do NOT trust her. vibes are RANCID

26. How do they act when they’re happy? Do they sing? Dance? Hum? Or do they hide their emotions?

she has this.. little smirk she does. her expression of emotions is always kind of lowkey though she tries to keep this air of like,,,,, neutrality and kind of stay formal and cool 

32. What do they dress like? What sorta shops do they buy clothes from? Do they wear the fashion that they like? What do they wear to sleep? Do they wear makeup? What’s their hair like?

she dresses SO fucking fancy. her clothes are from like. idk where do rich people shop?? im sexy and poor. she likes what she wears!!! she wears those weird old timey pajamas with the fuckin stripes and embroidered intials to sleep. she wears makeup!! she likes black lipstick and red eyeshadow. her hair’s brown and she has a buzzcut 

50. If they could only take one bag of stuff somewhere with them: what would they pack? What do they consider their essentials?

money <3 she has found that like. really all she needs in life to get what she wants is just insane amounts of money so she would just. bring money.

#ask asnwered: samual #ask answered: opal #ask answered: fried egg #tysm for the ask!! sorry it took me so long to answer

[janiedean]

Since we're in topic, do you have some advices for writers? Where do you begin when you write original stories and characters? The plot, the concept, the description of characters?

spewell considering that you’re talking to ‘oh hey I have the original idea that might work but I’ve been figuring it out for a whole year and a half’ take them with the necessary skepticism but since I did come up with some decent ocs in fic apparently my advice is probably not entirely shitty lol so with the premise that writing is Not A Science and other than reading a lot no advice is 100% foulproof especially if it doesn’t work for you...

I’d start with the concept, ie: what do you want your story to be about or what message do you want it to be about or what do you want to do with it. do you want to scare people? do you want to make people happy with quality entertainment but without writing a Serious Novel? do you want to write a sad thing to make a point? like, you need to know where you’re going with it in general;

when you have your concept, whichever it is - for one, without going in-depth let’s just say that my original novel concept that I’ve been trying to figure out for good is ‘blade runner meets high fidelity’ (don’t worry IT MAKES SENSE) -, you need to work at once both on main setting and protagonist. I mean, idk let’s just discuss a thing I wanted to write last year when I was thinking of sending original writing to this scifi anthology and then never managed because time and drama and real life happened and I couldn’t commit to it;

so, the theme of that anthology was ‘alternate peace’ ie write a short story where a situation that in history ended up in a fight/war/bloodbath is solved peacefully and write the alternate universe coming from it. so: I had to come up with the idea first because otherwise I wouldn’t have known where to start, then the worldbuilding, then the characters - ngl I think that if you have the worldbuild the characters come a lot easier but that’s me. so: I was like ‘what if I wrote something where the ludlow massacre never happens?’ (the ludlow massacre was tldr a strike in colorado which ended up with the strikers being mass killed by the national guard and in turned caused enough scandal to get unions/unionized labor a lot of traction in the US at least until maccarthysm.) then I didn’t, but in order I went like:a) if what happened is that it had repercussions on the history of unionized work in the US, if I did it so that the workers accepted a plea or smth and the rockfellers won without no one dying, those repercussions would Not Have Happened, nor it’d have created all the left-leaning literature/politics/thinking that came out of it, john reed wouldn’t have written about it etc, so I had elaborated an entire situation post-wwii where unions had all died long before, people were pretty much without any single social lifesaver and could get fired at will and it was basically dystopian hell with mccarthy being president or smth;b) at that point I was like, who do I put in this, and at that point I didn’t manage to go much forward but I had a feeling I should have some young person who was born after the not-massacre who had no idea of what went on talking to an older one that had actually been there and wished they hadn’t taken the deal;c) young dude would have been more or less cynical/not really much of a politics person, old dude would have been old school leftist who still wishes there could have been a better world and wishes the new generation would put two and two together and talk to their elders;d) young dude wouldn’t have known how to read/write because he wouldn’t have needed it for factory work, old dude would have etc;at that point I could have probably gone and gave them families (or not), or a friend (or not), and my general idea was having them discuss politics for the main part of the story, then old guy dies or smth like that and young guy actually gets the message and idk I basically wanted you to read it and feel like I felt when I listened to the ghost of tom joad, that was the general idea;that said, the characters were the last part i came up with because I needed the worldbuilding to know what character I wanted in it, which is why I’d say worldbuld first if you’re writing that kinda thing ie scifi, alternate history etc;

now, obv. if you’re writing the coffee shop au just in novel format or if you’re writing something lighter where the setting doesn’t matter, you need good characters first. I mean, if you write the coffee shop setting just to have a good love story you might want people to pick yours and not the umpteenth version of it with the same dynamic (same with the YAs with the sixteen year-old girl who thinks she’s ugly falling for the hot dude with abs and a bad attitude), so in that case I’d go for the characters. for one, if I had to write a YA, I’d make it with a girl who is actually ugly and has hobbies other than just reading and maybe plays in the school band or has some peculiar post-school job or idk can repair cars but is not good at everything she does and the guy would be moderately hot though not THE SPIT COPY OF DAMON SALVATORE JUST WITH GREEN EYES, he wouldn’t have a license and he wouldn’t think that it’s sexy to tell your girlfriend that you own her, and while I’m nowhere near interested in writing YAs, that would differentiate it from 99,9% of the YAs around from what I see, and so at that point I’d make sure I got the main two down and then I’d work on the friends and family and make them less stereotypical as possible so my YA is different from everyone else’s YA, and if any of them is a supernatural creature they suck at it and hate having supernatural magic and the likes. I mean, you want your characters to have a personality, but if you have a good worldbuilding behind them it might come after, if you don’t gaf about the worldbuilding and just want the standard setting work on the characters and try to give them depth before you plan anything else;

figure out where do you want your story to go before writing it - ie: the only reason I haven’t written the original yet is that idk what kind of spin I want the ending to have and I’m not 100% convinced so I’m not doing it yet, but if you don’t have the backbone of it planned then you’re going to lose steam or the plot will fuck you over (in my experience). like, try to have at least clear what happens in the main arc so that you know how to get from beginning to ending without needing to figure shit out as you go along, then you start, and if you change your mind while you do go with it, but try to start it knowing where you’re headed because it makes it easier imvho;

if you go for complicated shit like time travel figure that shit out before you start writing it including every possible repercussion because you’ll hate yourself if you don’t;

don’t try to re-do what others did obviously. I mean, if I wanted to write rep for non standard attractive cishet women I would not try to re-write brienne of tarth just changing the hair color. I would try to take the same tropes he’s using, change the setting and go with it, but it shows if you read a book and your character is the exact same as your favorite writer’s. like, if you read ian tregillis’s milkweed tryptich it’s going to be obvious that one of the main characters is the same tropes as jaime but that guy has enough personality differences and an enough different background and circumstances of upbringing that while you can see it has the same basics (generally nice guy forced to do horrid things who wants to redeem himself, live without his overbearing sister who wants to control him and has a generally straight moral compass), you don’t think ‘oh ian tregillis who is grrm’s friend has copied from him and put jaime lannister in a wwii alternate history trilogy’. like, we all have our tropes and our favorite writers and it’s good to take inspiration and homage them, but try to give your spin on those tropes you’re using, because otherwise it’ll just look lazy;

do whatever the fuck you want with your plot. don’t think about what others would want to read - it’s your story and you should tell it the way you want to. then please listen to criticism and find people who’ll provide it for you without tearing down your work but telling you what works and what doesn’t, but like... if you want to touch some themes or write characters from a different background or whatever do it;

also, do your research. I mean, I could have written the ludlow massacre story because:a) I read all of john reed’s articles pertaining to that specific happening and those articles include interviews with the people who were there, a description of who they were, an extremely detailed reconstruction of the facts and so on;b) there’s folk songs, two novels and one opera on ludlow not including history books, so it’s not only easily readable upon, but you also can see the impact it had in media/the american culture.so, even if I’m not american, having read all of that, I could have probably gone for it and done a decent job, find someone with a history degree to veto it and go for it. but like, again, unless you’re writing the coffee shop au or the ya or the kind of novel that does not require an established setting or you are making the entire worldbuilding up from scratch with no influences from the real world, you can’t not do at least some basic research. and when reading something, it does show if the author has at least done basic research or if they’re winging it. then they might be good enough that you don’t care they’re winging it, but still, research XD because research also gives you a lot more ideas that you might not have taken previously into account and might save you a plot detail or so;

I also would advice not to write what you know - because that’s easy and it doesn’t let you go out of your comfort zone and at some point what you know will finish -, but: write something you know. as in, my blade runner + high fidelity au should be scifi and touch stuff idk shit about, but since it’s a high fidelity au half of it is supposed to be set in a (pseudo) record shop and the protagonist miiiiiight have a thing or a hundred for springsteen. now: who has spent half of her life in record shops and is into bruce? yes, me. now, the character in question has zero in common with yours truly except for that, but let me tell you that if there is one thing I know how to write that you can’t convince me I couldn’t write is someone into springsteen who hangs around record shops. I know my people and I know why someone would be into springsteen. like, when making up characters and you want to make them relatable or you want to relate to them more, give them one thing you can relate to even if it’s dumb - idk you like strawberries? that character also likes strawberries and so on - because that will get you closer to them and your reader will feel it. it’s a thing I do with fanfic all the time - like if I have to try and write someone IC I try to relate to one thing they have if I can, because that makes the characters more relatable and it’s easier. ie when I was like ‘how do I crack the jaime pov’ the answer was ‘ALL THE BAD SELF-DEPRECATING HUMOR YOU DO ALL THE TIME GO DOWN ON IT’ bc that’s what I relate to jaime for and so on. idk that is a thing that’s always helped me when coming up with any character so I guess it might be useful advice? *shrug*

(obv: if you’re writing a 100% bad guy that you don’t empathize with then you don’t have to, I mean grrm did say he had to take a shower after writing chapters from A Certain POV because it’s horrible being in their head so like.... you can feel disgust at what you’re writing esp. if it’s the POV of a terrible person, but That Character resonated with people and felt relatable to some of them because to them they had... RELATABLE moments/humane moments too so if you’re writing bad guys but try to not make them cardboard cuts/TOO HORRIBLE it will make them stronger as *bad guys*. mvho.)

but mostly: read a lot of stuff, try to put your spin on things and don’t gaf about what people think until you finished it. then you can worry about concrit xD

#janie writes #long post for ts #writing advice #i guess #Anonymous #ask post