Not to keep, not to polish⌠Just to shake the rust loose.
⢠A character deletes and rewrites a text three times before sending it
⢠Two people arguing quietly so no one else hears
⢠Someone almost confessing something and backing out
⢠A character lying about being âfineâ in a way that convinces no one
⢠Bonus: Same scene but they convince everyone, and it's even worse
⢠An apology that comes moments too late
⢠A secret revealed accidentally, not dramatically
⢠A character overhearing only half a conversation
⢠Someone packing a bag and pretending itâs temporary
⢠A reunion where one person is happier than the other
⢠A goodbye that is meant to be casual but isnât
Low stakes, high emotion. Momentum comes from movement, not brilliance.
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You, the queen of a fairy tale kingdom, got cursed to give birth to a princess whoâs going to live her life isolated in a tower the first 20 years of her life. Narrate how you avoid your daughterâs fate.
She laughed, when she placed the curse on me. Laughed and laughed. She called me a fool for coming to her, for wanting children who would sap my strength and steal my power.Â
One child to take my kingdom, she promised me. Well, Iâd wanted an heir. It didnât have to be a curse.Â
One child the sea would steal. There was room in that. They didnât have to die, only to love the sea. I would buy the finest ships.Â
And the third would suffer my grandmotherâs fate.Â
The tower.Â
Grandmother told me stories about that tower, shuddering. About the isolation almost driving her mad. About the desperate longing for escape. I know what that escape cost her, and my grandfather as well, with his scarred face and limping gait.Â
That was going to be difficult.Â
The sorceressâs curse worked. Within the year, I held my first babe in my arms, a sturdy boy who kicked and cried and cuddled against his mother as if he hadnât been made only to bring me grief. Well, all mothers grieve.Â
Throughout the day, partners would make requests for connection, what Gottman calls âbids.â For example, say that the husband is a bird enthusiast and notices a goldfinch fly across the yard. He might say to his wife, âLook at that beautiful bird outside!â Heâs not just commenting on the bird here: Heâs requesting a response from his wifeâa sign of interest or supportâhoping theyâll connect, however momentarily, over the bird.
The wife now has a choice. She can respond by either âturning towardâ or âturning awayâ from her husband, as Gottman puts it. Though the bird-bid might seem minor and silly, it can actually reveal a lot about the health of the relationship. The husband thought the bird was important enough to bring it up in conversation and the question is whether his wife recognizes and respects that.
These bidding interactions had profound effects on marital well-being. Couples who had divorced after a six-year follow-up had âturn-toward bidsâ 33 percent of the time. Only three in 10 of their bids for emotional connection were met with intimacy. The couples who were still together after six years had âturn-toward bidsâ 87 percent of the time. Nine times out of 10, they were meeting their partnerâs emotional needs.
Those who showed genuine interest in their partnerâs joys were more likely to be together.
I think that is ABSOLUTELY what a lot of that is. Our culture is very isolated (even BEFORE covid!), and weâre desperate to connect with others. I read an article one time that suggested that childcare workers stop saying that a child is âJust wants attentionâ and start saying that the child is âlooking for connection.â Weâre starved for it even from childhood.
When they are speaking about a passion, respond to children as if you would a tenured professor at a prestigious university, and to an adult as if you would a child free of the burdens of adulthood.Â
Children are desperate to teach the wonders of the world that they know, that they have just learned, and share it with anyone interested. Adults pour passion they didnât know they had into voluntary obligations, and crave a simple acknowledgment of that passion as being worthy and valid.Â
âDear third grader, tell me exactly why you chose <x> as you third favorite carnivorous dinosaur instead of second, as specifically as possible.â
âHey neighbor, your vegetable garden is absolutely gorgeous this yearâŚand no Iâm not just saying that because the tomatoes you gave me last year were absolute perfection.â
This is why I find it odd when people disparage/make fun of people for live streaming mundane things like them chilling and eating and going âwho would watch that?âÂ
Someone also chilling and eating and just looking for a brief connection to another human being? Even if itâs on the other side of the screen? Even if theyâre not necessarily even speaking to each other.Â
Itâs knowing that at this moment in time you know what another human is doing across a vast distance and for a moment the world doesnât feel so large and empty.
This is happening in so many ways in so many areas of life.
When fandom becomes a consumer thing instead of a community thing, and engagement with fics drops while demand increases, fic writers burn out. And weâre told âwrite for yourself!â as if thatâs some magic balm for creative output that gets ignored. Sharing what we make is a social thing. Fandom used to be a community, a collective. Yeah, some people were still shut out for one reason or another, but it happened so much less than it does now.
Artists who put in months of work to make stuff, get a gallery, advertise to interested people, and then on the opening day⌠no one bothers to come. Thatâs how it feels these days as a fic writer. Shouting into an uncaring void.
I think itâs deeply damaging to people, to society, to pathologize and even demonize âseeking attentionâ because it creates this cycle of feeling neglected, trying to find connection, and being slapped back for daring to do so in a way deemed âwrongâ. Even and especially when someone else does the same thing you did and doesnât get censured for it. See also: childhood as an autistic kid.
I think we as a society need to take a long hard look at this new trend of consumerism, and also about general connection with others and why thereâs so much baggage with it.
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That olâ chart of mine makes the rounds online periodically and it drives me crazy because itâs frankly not very good. So, I finally got around to remaking it.
I doubt this will get anywhere near as popular, but I wanted to make it.
Good reference for animation, comics, and for visualizing phonetics!
Summary: Working in Hero Forceâs mail room is the equivalent of being a poison taster for monarchs â it wasnât a matter of if a disgruntled citizen was going to send Hero Force a bomb, but when.
Based off this prompt (X)
--------.
Travis, your supervisor, makes you take Disposal Training every two weeks to keep your skills fresh for the inevitable day something does show up in the mail.
âYouâre lucky,â Travis says with his wide arms folded over his chest. He still wears the mail uniform from the 90âs with the pale blue, short-sleeved button down and the darker blue pinstripes. The Hero Force mask covering half of his face is in the new âregulation blackâ that every Hero Force personnel has to put on at the start of every shift. You hear Travis complain that they wonât let him wear the old brown one a lot. âBut luck wonât ever take you further than training, kid.â
You arenât a kid. In fact, Travis could almost be your kid. Your pension isnât supposed to start for another three years, so thatâs how long you need this job to last. There are rumors that Travis is trying to get you to quit before then as a way to prevent you from collecting retirement benefits from Hero Force. Save the company some money. You donât think thatâs true. You think that the extra training every second week is actually Travisâ way of being kind â you get to sit in the air-conditioned office for two hours and watch the same videos with your feet propped up.
Still, it is unusual that you havenât opened anything criminal yet. Lots of people cautioned you against taking the job. Your neighbors, friends, your husbandâŚeven your eldest -who also works for Hero Force and who suggested it to you in the first place. They said it was the equivalent of being a poison taster for monarchs â it wasnât a matter of if a disgruntled citizen was going to send Hero Force a bomb, but when.
âI donât think it happens as often as people think,â youâd told your husband and child when the offer letter came. What you didnât say was we donât have a choice. Youâd laughed and petted the coffee table. âNow maybe we can think about getting this old thing refinished, hm?â
Three years isnât a long time anymore, not with a good 63 of them already under your belt. When the financial advisor ran the numbers and grimly told you how long youâd need to stay in the workforce, youâd been relieved. Youâre fortunate that being a baker for most of your life has kept you reasonably fit and that youâre used to being on your feet.
Still, eight hours is a long time for anyone to be staring at bland white envelopes and brown boxes wrapped with yellow tape, so youâre thinking longingly of the bath you know your husband will have drawn for you at home when the blast doors slam down over the exit, trapping you and three of your coworkers in the sorting room.
You blink at the heavy metal plate that nearly took your (seemingly ever-growing) nose right off your face. The WARNING light hanging above the door is lit, casting the room in a striking red glow.
âYou scanned that here?â Ring asks. Heâs over at the sorting table, standing over the new hireâs shoulder. He gapes down at the screen held between her hands. It shows an x-ray of the box sitting innocuously on the sorting table. âBoxes with that dimension are supposed to be scanned in the disposal room!â
âItâs my last package,â the new hire says. You have to strain to hear her voice despite only being a dozen feet away. Sheâs already been given a nickname â Mouse. Fear makes her even quieter than before. âI-I thoughtâItâs to Strongwoman. Who would even think sending her a bomb would work? She got hit by a bus last week and the bus lost.â
âYou know we donât sort based on recipient,â Hawk says, pinching the bridge of her nose under her mask. Sheâs the veteran in the room, gaining her nickname from being the longest surviving member of the mail room after Travis and for having the highest number of successful disposals in history. Hawk eyed. âYour scan just told the defense system thereâs a bomb in a vulnerable part of headquarters. Weâll be trapped here until they can get Demolition out to disarm it.â
âOr until it goes off,â Ring offers helpfully. Ring stands for ring the alarm, something heâs always doing. âWhich it probably will before Demolition flies over from freakinâ California.â
Mouse hiccups. Her hands tremble on the scanner. âI-Iâm sorry. Maybe itâs notâŚit could be something else?â
Ring and Hawk look at each other over her head. Ring tilts his head to the scanner. Hawkâs lips thin.
Translation: Unlikely.
âMaybe,â Hawk says. She puts a comforting hand on Mouseâs shoulder. âThe only way to tell for sure is to open it.â
âWhich protocol says we shouldnât do,â Ring says.
You rub your nose. You donât have to go to the bathroom this second, but you know your body. Protocol is not to carry a phone in the sorting room, so none of you have a way to youâre your husband and let him know youâll be late. âHow long do you think it will take for a disposal team to arrive? Supposing thereâs one besides Demolition.â
Three heads whip towards you. Thereâs a range of emotions there, from surprise to dismay to dread.
âIf you survive, no one will ever forgive you,â Ring says.
Mouseâs eyes well with tears. âR-really?â
âEven Neon loves her muffinsâ"
Hawk hits him over the head hard enough his mask slips down over his eyes. While he curses and sets it to rights, she says, âSorry, Granny. Weâll probably be waiting a while.â
You tug at your cardigan and shuffle over. The box is too big to be scanned in the sorting room â about the size of a case of flour you used to get delivered to the shop. The three of them make room for you on their side of the table. You squint at the screen. âWhat type of bomb is it?â
âNot like any Iâve seen before,â Hawk says. She takes the scanner from Mouse and angles it towards you. The box is shown in green and black lines. Inside is a cube of white and some curly bits. There are strange shadows across each shape, as if there are layers and layers of something over the top. âYou?â
You raise your eyebrows. You thought it was common knowledge. âWell, Iâve never seen one before outside of training.â
Mouse starts. âNever seenââ
âGranny is lucky,â Ring says. He pats her on the shoulder like Hawk had. Itâs nowhere near as comforting. âYouâre just unlucky enough to have canceled that out.â
You pull out your glasses. Youâre supposed to get the mask with your prescription over the eyes to prevent anyone from recognizing your personal eyewear. You think the prescription masks are itchy, however, so you regularly sneak them in your cardigan pocket. The scanner remains incomprehensible to you, even with them on. âIt doesnât look anything like it does in training.â You frown as the curls begin to look like ribbon the longer you stare at them. âAre you sure this is a bomb?â
âThe defense system triggered on it,â Hawk says.
You wave your hand. These new AI systems are wrong all the time. You recently saw a news article about how the facial recognition software at the Hero Academy failed to pick out a top journalist, allowing him complete access to the campus. âThey wouldnât have us here sorting if the system were infallible.â
A strange look crosses Hawkâs face. âThatâs one perspective.â
âItâs a state-of-the-art system,â Ring tells Mouse in a low tone. You imagine he thinks you canât hear him or the faint laughter in his voice. âItâs not wrong.â
That grates. You may be new to the sorting room, but you arenât wrong to question the systems. You point. âIt could be cookies. See these disks here? Sugar cookies, I used to make a recipe just as thick. Theyâve been very popular to send to Strongwoman lately; she must like them. And thatâs the ribbon tying the box closed.â
âNo,â Ring says. âNo, itâs not cookies, Granny.â
Your spine stiffens. âI think it is.â
âGranny,â Hawk says tentatively. âDo youâŚoften think things like these are cookies?â
âPeople do send the heroes a lot of baked goods,â you say. âItâs the best way to show gratitude!â
Mouseâs jaw drops. In a normal voice, she says, âYouâve been sending bombs onto heroes thinking theyâre cookies?â
âBecause they are,â you say.
âOh my god,â Ring says. âGranny has seen a bomb, she just hasnât recognized one before. Oh my god.â
Youâre too old to stamp your feet. Instead, you narrow your eyes at Ring like you did when your eldest drew on the walls. âI have not. I open each packageââ
âYou open them?!â
âProtocolâ"
â-and theyâre always just cookies,â you say. You snag the package before any of them can move. âIâll prove it to you!â
Thereâs a bit of a scuffle. Mouse doesnât move out of the way of Ringâs lunge in time, and they both topple onto the table. Hawk tries to yank the package away from you, shouting something or other about better to be cautious or Granny stop! But youâre stronger than they think. They may call you Granny, but youâre only 63! Do they think you need a cane to walk?
You rip open the tape. Mouse screams. Ring whimpers. Hawk closes her eyes tight. You shake out the contents of the box.
A pink pastry plops out of the package and onto the scanning table. The three of them are frozen, eyes darting over the pretty ribbon curled into a bow holding it closed. With an indignant huff, you use a letter opener to cut the ribbon and flip back the lid.
Sugar cookies in six sloppy rows and stacked four deep sit inside.
âSee?â you say triumphantly. âSugar cookies!â
Hawkâs brow is furrowed. âThatâs notâthat canât beââ
The bomb doors slide down and the WARNING light switches off. The system beeps three times and then falls silent. The quiet that fills the room sounds like victory.
ââŚso I can go home now?â Mouse asks.
âYes,â you say smugly. You know itâs bad manners, but all the excitement has dropped your blood sugar. You snag a cookie and bite into it. âWe all can.â
Ring and Hawk stay behind, staring from the box to each other and back again as you go home.
----.
You have two days off, and then Travis is off the day you come back so it takes three days for someone to tell you it was a bomb in that box.
That someone is Foresight, the leader of Hero Force.
He looks out of place in the sorting room, smiling and standing by the door as you shuffle from cart to cart to collect your jobs for the day. Travis is there with his arms folded and his eyes narrowed on Foresight.
âWe call your class of power S-class,â Foresight explains. âThe ability to change reality with a thought â itâs only been observed in a handful of super-powered individuals.â
âI donât care what power she has,â Travis says. âYou arenât poaching Granny.â
âI would also like to stay in the mail room,â you say.
Foresight opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again. He looks bemused as he says, âAlright then. We do need to quantify your power. Does Thursday work for you?â
âYes,â Travis answers for you. âWeâll be there.â
Your ears perk up. Maybe it will be a long meeting. Maybe youâll have a chance to sit down. âThursday it is then. Iâll bring some snacks for everyone.â
----
Thanks for reading! If you'd like to support me and see stories like this one before anyone else, please consider checking out my Patreon(X)!
Next week's story is already posted and is a follow up to this story (X) about Nadezh and Gannon
How fucking annoying is it when you feel so restless with creative energy but you canât decide what to do with it and when you finally try to create something it comes out shit so you just give up and sit there being all creatively annoyed and jittery.
1 - Decision Making Fatigue is a thing.
--> Make a list of possibilities.
--> Use a random number generator to pick something off the list.
--> If you hate the idea cross it off and generate a new number.
--> Continue until you either find a project or cross off the whole list.
--> If you cross off the whole list pick a random short story prompt, write for five minutes, and call it a good work day.
2. Yeah, of course your rough draft sucks. Itâs supposed to.
--> Let it suck.
--> You can fix it in edits.Â
3. When youâre stressed you arenât unbiased about your work.
--> Donât judge your work while your are actively working on it.
--> Remember to drink water, take your meds/vitamins, eat something, and get sleep.
--> Double-check to make sure the restless creative energy is not displaced emotional worries over something else. If it is, displace with intention and let the worries go into your work. You shouldnât keep stress in your head, put it on a page, or canvas, or in a carving, or a meal, or something. Get it out and let it go.
4. No work is ever wasted.
--> All time spent planning and creating is useful in some way.Â
--> Failure means you tried, which is good.
--> Try again. Fail harder. Fail better.
--> Keep going until you like what youâre making.
5. Love yourself enough to allow yourself to not be perfect.
--> Seriously.Â
--> If this is a struggle I highly recommend seeing a doctor or therapist about depression.
--> Because you are dang lovable, my friend. You rock. You do great things. Iâm proud of you.
The bases on this post are all JPEGs for some reason. That makes them hard to use properly. I will link to the originals and provide some additional ones, along with a tutorial on how to actually make them into a GIF.
I couldn't find the caramelldansen base in this post, but here is a version that should work just as well.
Here is the original lick icon base.
To save these and have them be usable, you have to click the "free download" button underneath the image.
Some other good bases:
Dance Icon
Caipirinha
Run Run Run
You can find many other bases like these through DeviantArt.
How to make them into a GIF:
Step 1. Edit the base however you like (I used MSPaint)
Step 2: Crop and save each frame individually as PNGs (Note for the lick base: It's best to crop them to include the black boarder. This makes the GIF 50x50, which is the standard DeviantArt icon size and can easily scale larger if need be.)
Step 3: Go to ezgif.com/maker and upload all your frames
Step 4: Set "delay time" to 10, then click "Make a GIF!"
Step 5: Right-click the result and save it. Congrats! You used a GIF base!
ID: 1. A collection of early 2000s animation meme gifs and their still images.
2. screenshots of instructions to edit animation meme templates in ms paint and ezgif.com to result in a licking gif.
End ID.
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Obsessed with a vampire's existence being symbolic of the terror in a lack of control. Of having needs that scare you. Of a non-violent heart having to enact violence for the sake of survival. Of hiding yourself and longing for the honesty of companionship that you may never hope to get. Of fearing fearful eyes. Of more hunger than you know how to fill. The vampire wants to be taken care of, the vampire is scared, the vampire feels small, the vampire wants to rest. I!!!!!! Like that a lot :) I like pathetic vampires. And I like the catharsis of when someone does offer that vampire the space to be loved and trusted. Of someone offering their blood as a symbol of the vampire being taken care of. I love you, I'm not scared of you, I trust you, I'll feed you. You're safe here. And I know that I am too
Encouragment for writers that I know seems discouraging at first but I promise itâs motivational-
⢠Those emotional scenes youâve planned will never be as good on page as they are in your head. To YOU. Your audience, however, is eating it up. Just because you canât articulate the emotion of a scene to your satisfaction doesnât mean itâs not impacting the reader.Â
⢠Sometimes a sentence, a paragraph, or even a whole scene will not be salvagable. Either it wasnât necessary to the story to begin with, or you can put it to the side and re-write it later, but for now itâs gotta go. It doesnât make you a bad writer to have to trim, it makes you a good writer to know to trim.
⢠There are several stories just like yours. And thatâs okay, thereâs no story in existence of completely original concepts. What makes your story âoriginalâ is that itâs yours. No one else can write your story the way you can.
⢠You have writing weaknesses. Everyone does. But donât accept your writing weaknesses as unchanging facts about yourself. Donât be content with being crap at description, dialogue, world building, etc. Writers that are comfortable being crap at things wonât improve, and thatâs not you. Itâs going to burn, but work that muscle. I promise youâll like the outcome.
See, the first time I grew parsnips, I fucked it up good. I hadn't seen parsnips sprouting before, right, and in my eagerness I was keeping a close eye on the row. And every time I saw some intruding grass coming up, I twitched it right out, and went back to anticipating the germination of my parsnips.
But it turns out parsnips take a bit longer than anything else I'd ever grown to distinguish themselves visually. It's just the two little split leaves, almost identical to a newly seeded bit of kentucky bluegrass when they first come up, and they take a good bit to establish themselves and spread out flat before the main stem with its first distinctive scallopy leaf gets going.
I didn't get any parsnips, not that year, because I'd weeded them all out as soon as they showed their faces, with my 'ugh no that's grass' twitchy horticulture finger.
The next year, having in retrospect come to suspect what had happened, I left the row alone and didn't weed anything until all the sprouts coming up had all had a bit to set in and show their colors, and I've grown lots of parsnips since. They're kind of a slow crop, not a huge return, but I like them and watching them grow and digging them up, and their papery little seeds in the second year, if you don't harvest one either on purpose or because you misjudged the frost, so it's worth it.
Anyway, whenever I see someone stuck and struggling with their writing who's gotten into that frustration loop of typing a few words, rejecting them, backspacing, and starting again, I find myself thinking, you gotta stop weeding your parsnips, man.
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one thing no one ever teaches you is that you can just make things nicer and more intentional- you can take your energy drink, pour it in a rocks glass over ice with a slice of lime on the rim, and sip it slow. and you'll think, "wow i am the biggest faggot to have ever lived". and you know what? you're right.