A quiet summer afternoon.

The sun is shining through the foliage, touching the grass, making angel’s hair look like a halo.

Being by your side is the only heaven I ever dreamed of ❤️‍🩹

New summertime artwork for Good Omens Artbook 😇

Eddie going: why fuck do I crave reeese cups with caviar???

Venom: we’re pregnant, forgot to mention that

Good Omens | 2.06 -"Every Day" | Crowley/Aziraphale Kiss

cursed emojis that no one asked for but I don’t care

free to use!

I have an addiction.

free to use!

who needs coherent words when you have cursed emojis

free to use!!!

And there was this one guy I talked with who seemed super sharp, but had virtually zero experience writing software. When it came time to do the show-n-tell part of the interview he whips out his laptop, brings up a website, and spins it around to show me what he made.

A website of tiny ceramic frogs.

Not for sale. Just… all these ceramic frogs, organized into categories. Frogs on bicycles, frogs with hats, frogs sitting on lily pads. It was a virtual museum of ceramic frogs in web form.

I scrolled through his online collection of frogs, slightly baffled.

“This is your website?” I asked finally.

“Yep!”

“You coded this yourself?” I popped into view-source mode and poked around some incredibly well-formatted, well-commented html. I nodded slowly. This guy was meticulous.

“Yep!”

“So… where’d all the frogs come from?”

“I made those too,” he says, beaming. 

And while I’m processing this he rummages in his bag and pulls out a little ceramic frog working at a computer terminal. He places it on the table before us, next to the laptop.

“And THIS one,” he says, “I made for you! As a thank you for the interview.”

It was adorable. I hired him on the spot. I mean, why not? Worst case he’d wash out in 90 days and we’d hire somebody else. He turned out to be one of the best developers on our team. 

Can track prey for hours without losing focus

Special interest: basket weaving

Always fidgeting - banging rocks together and discovers flint-knabbing

Distracted by berries

Stimming by making noises, discovers the sksksk that lures out squirrels

Can't sleep at night, great at guarding the cave while family sleeps

Sensitive senses means discovering and refusing to eat rotten/poisonous food

Sees bird eat nut - impulsively tries it too and discovers that nuts taste good

Cons of having ADHD:

Can't do homework

Impulse buys

Can't use a calendar

The thing is, I don’t like talking to people in person. Voices on the line are… different. They can’t see me. I can’t see them. It doesn’t make me anxious the way face-to-face does. So I’ve been working the midnight regret-line for years, and rarely interact with anyone outside it, which makes me happy. People sometimes call just to get things off their chest, and it helps them if I listen. Most of them, though, want advice on how to handle their regret.

The secret to giving good advice is pretty simple, and I worked it out early on. There are three keys to it. I have two staple pieces of advice, which I re-dress in language appropriate to each situation. The first one is ‘the only actions you can control are your own’. Whether I’m explaining that you can’t stop someone from divorcing you, why your kid hates you now, or why you can’t love someone into getting over an addiction, it all comes down to the same thing. You can’t control other people. Your responsibility is for your own actions and choices.

The second one is for problem solving. Apply the scientific method, basically – that’s the best way I know to solve problems, anyway. Most people don’t know it, so I explain it in terms they can understand, and coach them through a couple of applications.

The third thing is to just listen. Really listen. People want to be heard, and I’m good at that. It’s why I’m good at weeding out the fakes, and why people usually end the call feeling better.

Some nights are quiet, and I play music, or talk. I tell them, often, that anyone can call. It’s okay if it’s not something big, or if it is. If it’s criminal, the recording will be passed on to the relevant authorities, but we won’t do more than that. Sometimes kids call, or old people. Most people don’t listen to them, but I do. I like to think I make them feel safe.

This one night started like any other. I talked an old woman through rebuilding her relationship with her daughter, and a young man through a bad breakup. Then nobody called for a while, so I played some Vivaldi. Then…

Then the voice came on the line. A deep and very beautiful voice… it was like talking to Idris Elba or Christopher Lee, but with a hint of melodious accent that I couldn’t place. “I suppose,” it said, and it sounded so sad my throat tightened in sympathy, “that my greatest regret is the breach with my father. I was… disowned. Cast out. I never meant for it to go that far. I didn’t want to never see him again.”