Fandoms everywhere

If you like best friends from different cultures who like to learn about each other you might like it!

If you like a heartbroken character falling in love and fighting it cauee, they're scared to get hurt again, you might like it!

If you like someone experiencing life and freedom to explore what they want from life for the first time, you might like it!

Basically I'm excited about my story and would love to share it with literally anyone else who would enjoy it.

"How is claiming they drowned a Hilux possibly underselling it" GREAT question.

To start with a little disclaimer, Top Gear's Hilux did not start off, as in the video above, in pristine condition. It started off with nigh-on 300k kms (for you yankees, that's about 8.4 million Boeing 737 wingspans) and a condition to match.

And it's only once careless driving around town yielded zilch in given shits...

(look, I found a local newspaper picturing it being driven around!)

...that they decided to drown it. Now, the underselling part: if you told me that they drowned a pickup the first place my mind would go to would be "driving it through a river a bit too deep for it, perhaps as deep as its height, until it stalls and then tugging it back out. You will concede that's rather different from tying it down on the seashore with the second highest tide in the world...

...and leaving it there until it engulfs the whole truck...

...only for the ropes to snap...

...and for the truck to be lost to the tides for FIVE HOURS.

(and for those wondering, yes, just as promised, well within an hour and the mandatory limits of basic tools and no spare parts, up the mechanic made the thing fire and away the presenter drove it - I must imagine doing a number on his clothes in the process.)

Oh also I would have mentioned the caravan.

Or at least the wrecking ball.

But hey, at least the fire was mentioned.

Still, I feel it's criminal to leave out how they celebrated it surviving all it did: by parking it at the top of a 23 story building for all to see! :)

Wait NO-

Well, that was uncalled for. Given what it survived, it deserved to rest in a museum instead of being unceremoniously cleared out with the other chunks of public housing that buried it.

Or at least, given that buried it wasn't...

...to be tumbled down from the rubble utop which it sat...

...and be fueled up.

"be fueled up", pfft, what for?, I hear you say. And you are right.

Look at that thing, you say.

Let's be serious now, however pretty of a story it would be that's not a truck that will do anything remotely in the ballpark of firing up, let alone running.

And again, you are right.

The battery was disconnected.

Sorted that, tho

"You can't be serious." Oh darling I sure can! "Well the presenters can't then" no no, I assure you, it lived. Go see it for yourself! It's at the National Motor Museum in Beaulieau, England!

FEBRUARY 2, 2024

Tesla issues an over-the-air software update recall for 2.2 million vehicles, including the Cybertruck. The font size of the ABS, brake, and park indicators is too small, which could increase the risk of a collision.

FEBRUARY 22, 2024

New Cybertruck owners report rust and corrosion on the allegedly stainless-steel body of the truck, especially in vehicles exposed to rain. This was one of the biggest selling points that Musk touted when he announced the truck.

FEBRUARY 28, 2024

Multiple owners report seeing 25 critical system errors within a few days of using the truck, including warnings from the high-voltage system, “critical steering issue” system malfunctions​, and “loss of system redundancy” that alerted drivers that the “vehicle may suddenly lose electrical power, steering, and propulsion, and may be unable to apply the parking brake.” 

There were also alerts for degraded adaptive drive control plus automatically disabled traction, lane departure avoidance, and stability controls. Some users also report door latches that don’t work.

MARCH 12, 2024

Musk previously announced a futuristic optional camping tent that matched the polygonal shiny looks of the car, but that sleek render of the future turned out to be a sad hodgepodge of flaccid fabric in real life.

MARCH 13, 2024

The Cybertruck Owners Club forum is now flowing with a multitude of reported problems. Owner “cyberstank” reports how they took delivery on March 13, “made it one mile down road, started getting steering error, flashing red screen, pulled off the side of highway. Now the truck is dead and I’m waiting for a tow truck. Dealer couldn’t do anything for me. It was great for 5 minutes. I tried everything, restarting, screen is stuck black and keeps beeping.” The message ends with: “Tesla really rushed these trucks out, what a nightmare.”

MARCH 26, 2024

One owner reports problems with the Cybertruck’s autopilot system: “I encountered a truck on the other side of a two-lane highway. My Cybertruck suddenly made a hard brake stop when we both had a clear wide enough space between us. Luckily there is no vehicle at the back as it would have been a definite collision.” In the same thread, others report similar problems but, to be fair, users report this happens with other Tesla models.

APRIL 1, 2024

Owners all over the internet show the effects of the Cyberguillotine: Tesla didn’t include anti-pinch sensors for the Cybertruck’s trunk, which could cause severe injuries or amputations if fingers get caught. The truck will slice the hell out of your fingers—or any body appendage—that gets too near its closing front hood. (It happens with its doors too.)

APRIL 9, 2024

Apparently, the Cybertruck’s allegedly bulletproof and indestructible, so-called Armor Glass can’t stand hail, as this Redditor shows. The cost for the repair, according to the owner? “Just got an estimate of $2,326.75 via app service request.”

APRIL 15, 2024

Tesla halts all Cybertruck deliveries after owners report a problem with the accelerator pedal, which could become stuck down, due to lubricant residue causing the pedal cover to shift and become lodged in place.

APRIL 19, 2024

Tesla physically recalls all its Cybertrucks.

The recall notice states: “The accelerator pedal can become stuck, sending the truck accelerating beyond control, making it a danger to everyone on the road.”

JUNE 25, 2024

Tesla is forced to recall its Cybertruck for the fourth time in the U.S. because of issues with trim pieces that can come loose and front windshield wipers that can fail. The problems announced by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration affect more than 11,000 trucks. 

One issue involves the windshield wiper motor controller receiving too much electrical current. This can cause wipers to fail and reduce visibility, posing a crash risk. Tesla will replace the wiper motor for free and must notify all owners by letter by August 18. 

The other recall concerns a trim piece along the truck bed that may come loose and become a hazard for other drivers. Tesla will fix this issue by replacing or reworking the trim piece and will notify owners on the same date.

MARCH 20, 2025

Tesla issues a new physical recall that covers all 2024 and 2025 models built between November 13, 2023, and February 27, 2025: about 46,000 units, most of the Cybertrucks ever shipped. A stainless steel strip could fall because it doesn’t meet durability testing requirements, causing a risk of injury or collision.

OCTOBER 23, 2025 Tesla recalls 63,619 Cybertrucks—essentially every Cybertruck on the road at that point—because the front parking lights are too bright, exceeding federal safety standards and blinding oncoming drivers. Tesla fixes it with an over-the-air software update.

MAY 7, 2026 Tesla recalls 173 Cybertrucks equipped with 18-inch steel wheels because the brake rotor stud holes can crack under the stress of rough roads and cornering, allowing the wheel stud to separate from the hub. The wheels can fall off. Tesla will replace the front and rear brake rotors, hubs, and lug nuts at no charge. Notification letters go out in early July 2026.

(from this article)

*note, i changed "frunk" to "trunk" even though apparently tesla is actually that word for its "front trunk" :\

*also, not included in the article, but if you take your cybertruck through a carwash without remembering to set it to "carwash mode" it totals the vehicle, bricking the entire electronic system and rendering the car permanently un-drivable

"males and females" "AFABs and AMABs" "TMEs and TMAs" "You're TME, you'll never understand how scary it is to be a girl with a penis in the women's bathroom" (said to me, person who was literally beat up in middle school for being a girl with a penis in the girl's bathroom) "AMABs can never get cervical cancer, that's an AFAB only thing" "they won't let trans kids have hormones, but they'll give them to cis kids for free" "you can't be cis and trans at the same time" you can't be transfem and transmasc" "You can't be transfem if you were AFAB" "You can't be transmasc if you were AMAB" "RMAB and RFAB? Now you're just making things up" "All intersex people are biologically nonbinary" "I want to transition into intersex" "I'm such a b*eddel/f*ta/h*rm" "You're intersex? I'm so jealous, that means you get an easier transition right?" "I wish I was intersex, then I could get myself pregnant" "Trans people are brain intersex" "So what does it look like?"

Not long after arriving he was cracking jokes with the other men in the room and he had said something misogynistic and the others laughed.

In this moment, in their eyes, I wasn't the explicit target of that kind of joke. But I struggle to define this as any more privileged than in the moments I am perceived as a woman and the joke is.

I don't feel unaffected by these ideas, I am bothered by their misogyny alone but I also know that to them, myself in my fullness as a trans man, I absolutely do fall into that target of their beliefs. These ideas in society do affect me, and even in this interpersonal situation, they would be applied to me to if I was openly trans.

Then in an environment with cis men like this, there's a standard of masculinity that has to be met even casually, and when you don't meet that it gets pointed out. It doesn't go unnoticed. Especially meeting their family I am being analyzed as the new boyfriend, a new man, being brought in. Even my SO's last boyfriend who was a cishet man was determined unmasculine enough he would get called 'a queer' by their father. Everything soft about me, every androgynous or feminine quality I cannot control, threatens to out me.

I wore a baggy and masculine outfit to hide my bound chest, I put my wallet in my pockets and left my bag at home in case it was too feminine. My presentation had to be limited as to not make me stand out, open me up to scrutiny, to passively emasculate me and then potentially out me. Even in a context where men's presentation is policed, I have to adhere to a stricter level of it in order to avoid larger consequences.

In this situation, when they joked about women I didn't feel a sense of privilege in that this joke wasn't about me, in that room, in that moment. I didn't feel validated in my gender or like I was off the hook.

Passing in a room of men making misogynistic jokes I don't feel safe from misogyny, I feel held hostage by it. Because I know I am not safe here.

I feel about as privileged as I would standing in a room of people expressing homophobia and expecting me to laugh along because they don't know I am gay. I have to hyper analyze my presentation, my voice, my words, my behavior. I have to consider whether to call it out and attract scrutiny, potentially danger. I have to move carefully and quietly and not be too much, too obviously, who I am.

This is why I don't find the way those who dismiss trans men's discussions on our unique discrimination out of an insistence of our access to capital M Male Privilege is a sound argument.

That 'privilege' is shattered the moment we are outed as trans in a transphobic, patriarchal society. This passing may allow us to fly under the radar from interpersonal misogyny but systemic misogyny still affects us on all institutional levels, and that interpersonal conditional avoidance of misogyny doesn't go without effect on our psyches.

Encountering misogyny on an interpersonal level doesn't signal safety, but a lack of safety. And a society that will only treat transgender men equally if they are keeping their transgender identity hidden is not a society that privileges transgender men. And frankly, there is no way to remain stealth in all ways forever.

Encountering misogyny while stealth is threatening, not affirming. And when manhood is treated as a masculine competition, we are vulnerable to the enforcement of toxic masculinity and its scrutiny on our presentations and personhood, to devastating effects when we are outed.

I know what it's like to stand in a room full of misogynistic men as a 'woman' and feel that sense of threatening and dread. I also know what it is like to stand in a room full of misogynistic men as a stealth transgender man.

Both situations you feel "I gotta get the fuck out of this room," but in one I know I'm obviously a target, and in the other I know that they haven't realized I am one yet.

These things have similarities and they have differences, certainly. I personally have faced less sexual harassment when I pass, cishet men don't really pursue me, I have a blanket of anonymity I didn't have before. If I come off as a butch lesbian or a clockable trans guy I am not so anonymous, they'll harass me to humiliate me, but still, they don't feel entitled to me the way they do my feminine female friends. The intentions and actions can be different.

But there's also a specific danger I never experienced before I came out- the specific reaction of a misogynistic/transphobic cis man who has realized you are trans.

Many point-of-sale machines now are essentially just a smartphone with a card reader attached and the interface. The control layout can change at a moment's notice and there are no physical boundaries between buttons. With a keypad-style machine, the buttons are always in the same place and can be located by touch, especially since the middle button has a raised ridge on it.

Buttons can also be located by touch without activating them, which enables a "locate then press" style of interaction which is not possible on touchscreens, where even light touches will register as presses and the buttons must be located visually rather than by touch.

When elevator or door controls are replaced by touch screens, will existing accessibility features be preserved, or will some people no longer be able to use those controls?

Giveaways the comment is a bot, in my opinion: - The character named is mentioned by his/her full name

-The overall comment will not make sense with regard to the content/plot of the fic, even though the "voice" of the commenter will be convincingly informal and enthusiastic

-The comment is from a guest but uses a registered username for the alias, similar to guest bots in the past

unfortunately this is not new. bots have been mentioning specific scenes from the fics and/or characters by names for a while now, both as guest commenters and registered accounts, and a lot of them can sound human. most likely because they run the fics through ai and have ai write comments for them.

It's never done that before so I looked it up and turns out Roku TVs have added all sorts of creepy things in the privacy section since I last checked.

One of which being they take screenshots from what you're watching and send them to third parties to identify it.

Fucking hell! Remember when every fucking device in your life wasn't a spy implanted in your home and working against your interests to try and sell your data? Remember how nice that was??

Remember when the TV was just a tool that would play the things you plugged into it?