I'd Give Eraserhead

WE GO CRAZY WE POLY IT

kaminari's super fun awesome stingray-tastic birthday trip

cw: swearing (it's bakugou), kaminari is neurodivergent-coded, all fluff here baby

me, an elder fandom veteran, suddenly having anne rice flashbacks:

no.

NO.

starting to rock back and fourth.

you do not understand.

you were born into an age of peace. i was there Gandalf. i was there three thousand years ago. i remember the cease and desists. i remember authors hunting fanfic writers for sport. i remember when every fic opened with a disclaimer because we genuinely thought it might protect us.

we do not charge money for the copyrighted gay wizard stories.

do not tempt fate youngling.

step away from the paywall.

that is how you summon the ancient evils.

Anyway, she really, really loves it when I tell her stories. She loves stories anyway, and at first this manifested as "stories about Tad-Cu Bryn", aka my father (her grandfather) who died before she was born. This has been a lovely way to keep his memory alive, and she adores every story - she has her favourites, which she will request.

Then it became apparent that she specifically loves me telling her stories. She'll happily ask others for them too, but from me she just wants any anecdote at all; which of course is wonderful and demonstrates that she is a child of impeccable taste and wisdom and brilliance, but also she has ADHD and the energy reserves of a seven year old and so this gets Tiring very quickly

Yesterday, in the car on the way back from the wildlife centre, she asked for one of my longer stories, and I was like hey, how about we try something different?

And she was like, no, tell me a story about Tad-Cu Bryn

And I was like, this will be a brand new story and you get to play it and help me tell it

And she was like, explain

So I gave her three characters to choose from. The first was a warrior with a sword she could name, who was nonetheless dyspraxic. The second was a gymnastic elf who could commune with trees but was afraid of heights. The third was a dyslexic witch whose spells sometimes go wrong when she spells the words wrong.

She picked the witch. I pulled up an online d20 on my phone. I went to start, and she insisted my mother had to play as the elf.

So I told them that the new queen of the kingdom had called for them, because their palace treasury had been robbed - specifically, a single enchanted coin that brings luck and wealth to a ruler's reign had been stolen. And tales of enchanted coins were suddenly emanating from across the land, so each one needed investigating until the right coin was found.

It turns out kids who like stories will absolutely lap this shit up. She was enthralled. It was the simplest story - they had to get into a bank, revive some unconscious gnomes, then enter the vault, find the coin that had been deposited into it, then get back to the queen. Enough to fill a half hour car ride, basically, but she managed to fill it with all the wacky hijinks you get from a ttrpg, particularly when she tried to smash a door down with a hammer but rolled a 1.

We finished with the queen saying it wasn't the right coin, and then my niece demanded we go again, this time with her playing as a sapient reticulated python. That time we made it all the way to the final boss fight, which was a sorcerer who created a big coin monster out of loads of coins; I asked my niece what she wanted to do, and she described graphically how she wanted to constrict and eat the sorcerer and immediately rolled a 19. So, sure! Okay. The sorcerer is now very dead. The coin monster, though, was still there, and as my niece tried to say she would do the same thing, I was like, no, you're a snake and you just ate. You're now immobile.

At this point, my sister advised her to regurgitate the sorcerer.

Great! said my niece. I'm going to do it at the coin monster.

And rolled a 20.

So she projectile vomited a dead sorcerer into the coin monster, and won the day.

Anyway, today she immediately demanded we play "the game with the story where we choose", and my brother in law is now asking me how he can do this with her ("Are you making it all up as you go along??"). But yeah, turns out, this is a fantastic way to entertain a seven year old. Vague ongoing quest, then three steps: get into (place), resolve (minor puzzle), boss fight to finish. Boom. Easy.

My concept was to visualize how I see and feel the connection within this trio

Hizashi, as a public figure, obviously has pre-programmed cliches that he plays on autopilot, selecting and switching out tapes. He plays them for others, but he doesn't really have a 'tape' of his own, or perhaps he just has no one to play it for. It’s too painful for him to rewatch his memories of Oboro, which is why the tape containing this crucial person stays with Aizawa

Aizawa is the steadfast keeper of that single tape, deeply bound by the weight of this memory. His capture scarf is almost always with him, essentially becoming the personification of that cloudy film reel. He accepted this as a part of himself a long time ago, turning the memory into his anchor and compass

Yamada himself would be too terrified to look back and play something like this on his own; it's vital for him to stay afloat due to his media presence and his anger issues. Shota serves as the perfect counterweight here, providing him with a grounding, stable presence.

Oboro is featured here as a silhouette, elusive and completely recognizable. He only comes into existence while the tape is rolling

For the memory to actually play, you need Hizashi’s cassette player and Aizawa’s tape—only then does the blurred image of their past come alive.

I’d love to flesh out this concept and draw more of it, but I don't have the capacity right now. If you like this idea or want to use it, please tag/credit me as the author 🙏

I also wanted to drop all the sketches I've been too nervous to post until now

I’ve been wanting to share these sketches and headcanons for a while now. Things have been really heavy for me lately, and throwing myself into my work is the only thing that makes sense right now. If you have a moment and feel like it, I’d love to hear what my art evokes in you. It would really help me out right now. Thank you so much in advance 🙏

It also has a lot of different kinds of stitches you can do that make different densities of fabric.

I was surprised that I’d never heard of it though. It’s older than knitting and crocheting and even though it’s been done all over the world it’s super relevant to Nordic culture and my grandmother and I are both into keeping in touch with our roots a bit so I’m surprised I’ve never heard of it.

It’s also a lot easier to freehand and adjust as you go than crochet or knitting and you mostly go by inches instead of rows and number of stitches so a large number of accessories like stitch markers or whatever isn’t really necessary.

they were handsy 

HANDSY I SAY

they STARTED handsy 

they moved in together in like. ep one. 

What you need to know about The Sentinel is that the very first episode is about Jim Ellison acquiring mystical powers. YES I want to be clear, the way he acquires these powers is "problematical" and "not great, respecting indigenous cultures wise" but okay, so he's got these powers that make all of his senses amped up to dangeous levels. he can hear things no one else can hear, he can see things like he's fucking legolas, you get the deal.

so he goes to the doctor to be like "i feel weird" because of course, and Blair Sandberg, twink anthropologist to the stars, BREAKS SEVERAL LAWS to get in Jim's exam room and say—i know how to help you. i know what's wrong with you. i know how to make life better. and jim ellison looked at the little twink man and said yes....YES to love YES to life YES to living in a 1 bedroom LOFT apartment together. YES to being soulmates and life partners! YES I'LL MARRY YOU!!!!!!

This is the ORIGINAL big gruff german sheppard/lil yapping chihuahua pairing. And fandom looked at this show and said "this is good. i will build a kingdom upon this land. from now on, these are the two genders: big, angry, powerful, forced to their knees by circumstances beyond their control AND small, jokester, has skills INVALUABLE to Big, bad self worth. And then so the sentinel/guide aus RULED the pervert community, and everyone rejoiced.

But also, fannishly, so inventive! Some of the first vids I ever saw back before there were computers –VHS vids, wonderful ones. (Shout out to GloRo!) Great great fanfic and art. I still have gorgeous zines from this period. And the loft tape! Go to fanlore and look up the loft tape you guys!!