born to be mild.

Travis first mentioned he had ADHD quite early in Campaign 1 when there were two conversations going on at once (in terms of saying he had trouble processing it). This is a very common ADHD symptom. I mentioned it on this post because I think it's very reasonable to assume that in addition to Travis not talking much as Teor because Teor legitimately, as a character, had little to add to that specific conversation (as discussed above), I would not be surprised if Travis is not really a "let's jump into the 13-person table talk that is already not very much a thing my character would add to" kind of guy because, as we saw, a lot of people were talking, frequently simultaneously. I do not think everyone joking about this is being shitty (and I know newer fans might not be aware Travis has ADHD) but to dismiss Teor outright as a joke character instead of saying "hm. I wonder why someone might not talk during the giant 13 person conversation for legitimate reasons" is not leaving a good taste in my mouth.

For some reason, and I was very much at the frontlines of this during Campaign 2 and in the leadup to Campaign 3, people in the CR fandom, which in my experience has been generally pretty neurodivergent-friendly (and indeed itself pretty neurodivergent) have consistently been completely comfortable saying shit like "Travis's head will explode if he tries to play a druid" or treating all of his characters except Fjord as stupid joke characters he can use to fuck around. In particularly unpleasant cases, they will even treat Fjord as a character he only made to make Laura happy and not like, an extremely thoughtfully and deliberately crafted character that is both a means to play more seriously and with more emotional depth after Grog - who, I should note, was created for a one-shot for the first time he played D&D and just happened to end up, through a series of events, as his character in what became Critical Role - and in conversation with his own feelings about fatherhood at a time when he was expecting a child having lost his own father in his teens.

It was not just common to see people calling Travis or Fjord stupid during Campaign 2 for things they would never call out other cast members for (eg, forgetting character abilities during the first ten episodes of a new campaign; not knowing everything about boats). It was considered weird and even hostile of you to push back on this. If you said "I think Travis should play a wizard at some point," someone literally would just come on your post and be like "I don't think he could. I don't think he's smart enough."

I say this as someone who sells pottery, and many people who see my art assume I am using art as an outlet to “express myself.”

I am not.

I use art to challenge myself. A lot of what I do is the equivalent of doing a hard sudoko or a half marathon, answering the question of “can I do this?”

I use art to question things and explore ideas. Finding physical synthesis between concepts and working out a design to its end state.

I use art to make money. I make some things just because I suspect they’ll sell well, and I keep making them when they do.

This idea that an artist is “putting themselves out there” every time they create is not only stupid, but harmful, and it kills critique and analysis.

Yes every creative work is influenced by its creator, but the most preliminary step of analysis is to define the purpose of a work of art (functional, narrative, entertainment, persuasive, decorative, ceremonial, etc.) and a vanishingly small percentage of that is self-expression. Even then, it’s generally tied to the self’s relationship with something else—perception, society, etc.

It’s very tiresome to have people assume they know you because they like (or dislike) your art, to make assumptions about who you are and how you approach the world. It’s nothing new— people called the Impressionists insane and the Fauvists degenerate. And now people are expected to hand out their identities and traumas to prove they have the right to explore certain subjects.

Harley was diagnosed with an extremely aggressive spleen cancer that has made us make the hardest decision of our lives. They drained a massive amount of fluid from his chest cavity so he can have a few more comfortable happy days with us. Tomorrow, June 2, 2026, 21 days before his 8th birthday. Harley will cross the rainbow bridge.

This dog has done more for me in his short 8 years alive than most people have done for me in my 32. I will never forget what he has done for me, what he means to me and my husband.

Harley, you were the best damn service dog a woman could ask for. RIP Bubba, breathe easy and run free in the fields of green, chasing rabbits, until we meet again on the other side

She played bass on 10,000 songs, including the most-played track of the twentieth century. She was paid $55 per session. Her name never appeared on the albums.

Gold Star Studios, Los Angeles, 1964. A woman in a cardigan walks past the receptionist, a Fender Precision bass in her hand like a briefcase. She doesn’t sign autographs. She signs a timesheet.

Her name is Carol Kaye. In three hours, she will record what will become the most-played track of the twentieth century. She’ll pocket fifty-five dollars and head to another studio, on the other side of town, for the next session.

The record label will never put her name on the album.

Between 1957 and 1973, Carol Kaye took part in roughly 10,000 recording sessions. Not as the featured artist, not as a guest, but as a hired hand. She was part of an anonymous collective nicknamed The Wrecking Crew—elite studio musicians who actually played the instruments on your favorite records while the famous bands posed for promotional photos.

The work was relentless. Three albums before the day was over. Stale coffee in paper cups. No rehearsal. The charts arrived minutes before the tape rolled. If you couldn’t read a chart and nail the take in two tries, you didn’t get called for the next session.

Carol could do it on the first try.

She started playing guitar in grimy bars at fourteen because her family couldn’t pay the electric bill. Music wasn’t a romantic dream for her. It was survival. It was a job—factory work with better acoustics and lower pay.

But she was faster and sharper than almost everyone else. She corrected charts in pencil while the producer was still explaining what he wanted. In one session in 1968, she told a famous producer his arrangement sounded like a dying dog. She chose her own line. They kept her version.

That descending bass line that drives the Beach Boys’ “Wouldn’t It Be Nice”? Carol Kaye. The propulsive groove of “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’”? Carol Kaye. The acoustic-guitar intro to “La Bamba”? Carol Kaye. The iconic theme from Mission: Impossible? Carol Kaye.

She invented techniques on the spot, out of sheer necessity. When the bass sound was too muddy for AM radio, she stuck felt under the strings and used a hard pick instead of her fingers. The tone cut through the static like a blade. It became the sonic signature that defined 1960s pop.

Bassists spent years—decades—trying to crack the secret of the Beach Boys’ gear to get that sound. They were studying the wrong people. They should have been studying Carol.

She received no royalties. No residuals. No gold-record ceremony. No credit on the album sleeves. When “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’” hit number one, Carol was already back in a studio cutting a soap jingle.

The biggest bands mimed her bass lines on TV variety shows. New York marketing departments decided a mom in classic clothes didn’t fit the rebellious-youth image they were selling. So they simply left her name off the album credits.

For thirty years, almost no one cared. The truth only began to surface in the late 1990s, when music researchers found the same union contract numbers on thousands of hit records. The very documents meant to preserve studio musicians’ anonymity betrayed them.

Think about it. Every time you heard “Good Vibrations,” “River Deep – Mountain High,” the Righteous Brothers, Nancy Sinatra, or Sonny and Cher, you were hearing Carol Kaye. She composed the soundtrack of an entire generation’s youth.

And yet the records still say nothing. She’s now over eighty. She wrote instructional books. She trained countless bassists. She is finally starting to be recognized by music historians who uncovered the truth about The Wrecking Crew.

But she never got what she deserved: her name on those albums. Credit for the music that defined an era. Recognition that those bass lines everyone associates with the “Beach Boys” were, in fact, Carol Kaye’s.

Fifty-five dollars a session. Ten thousand sessions. The most-played track of the twentieth century.

When Life Gives You Corpses is a brilliant YA about a cursed praying mantis who falls for a young witch. Yield Under Great Persuasion is a raunchy, but surprisingly sweet story about two men repairing their relationship. Fabulous Bodies is a horror story about a queer rockstar rising from the dead.

This is Where the Future Bleeds is a fantasy set in a vividly imagined land, where two women (who happen to kiss) are the key to healing the broken sky. You're No Better is a story about a teen struggling in the shadow of his murderous parent. Oil on Canvas is about a woman who finds disturbing paintings in the home of her dead mother.

and we are going to have to stop desperately scrambling to say noooo, they have to be like that, they have no choice, they wouldn’t be like this if they didnt have to. we HAVE to stop falling all over ourselves assuring straight people and transphobes that we hate being us as much as they hate us being us, that we are suffering and that’s why we deserve this decadence and deviancy. we HAVE to start saying “yeah ok and?”

Stay in bed. For days. But don't get up if someone needs you to, or you get bored, or you get antsy. Don't do anything other than rest. Just lie in your bed, whether you need to get stuff done around the house or socialize or anything else "productive". You'll have to cancel on people, you'll disappoint them, they won't understand.