Thero does some blogging, and also some writing?

So there's this viral video going around. It's the Elite Trine doing a sexy roleplay where Starscream is a sexy slave at the sexy Seeker Market (which is a common porn RP scenario). Starscream is blindfolded, tied up, and acting his dramatic spark out. Skywarp, who is "buying" him, is wooden, visibly bored, and keeps forgetting his lines.

Anyway, there's this point where Starscream is giving a dramatic monologue about how a Sexy Seeker like him needs a Sexy Master to tame him, and Skywarp suddenly gives a mischievous grin to the camera, turns around, and farts in his face. (This is especially impressive because Transformers can't fart.) At which Starscream breaks character, breaks out of his "bonds", and starts chasing Skywarp around screeching insults, and then Thundercracker emerges from behind the camera, distraught, waving the pages of his screenplay and screaming that they are Ruining His Oeuvre.

So as you can imagine the Autobots find this hysterically funny and are passing the clip around, and Ratchet sees it, and decides to run the idea past Pharma.

Ratchet is very tentative because he's like "Is this a totally inappropriate thing for a non-jet to be into? Am I being offensive to Seekers?" And Pharma is like "Who cares lol, I'm not from Vos, I'm not a Seeker, and those bastards try to blow me out of the sky every time I fly towards a patient, I hope they all die :)". And he confirms that they are a Go for the Sexy Seeker Jet Market.

So they schedule a time and Ratchet turns up, excited and nervous and revved up and Pharma has brought . . . paper and pencils. And is like "Okay Ratchet, sit at the table and let's figure this out."

And Ratchet is thinking "Oh, we're going to go over boundaries and safety and all that, good idea" and sits down, and Pharma is like "Okay, what's your name?" And Ratchet is like "Whuh?" and Pharma enunciates "Your NAME. For the roleplay."

And Ratchet is like "Uh, it'll still be Ratchet, right?" and Pharma is like "Don't be silly. Okay, the name can wait, what's your motivation?" and Ratchet is like "Being . . . horny??" and Pharma is like "Jesus Primus Christ, Ratchet, haven't you ever roleplayed before? Your MOTIVATION! For wanting to buy a jet! A being you will have to feed, house, and do upkeep on! Your character must have a reason, otherwise they'd just go to a prostitute." And Ratchet is like "Pharma, it's just a roleplay!!" And Pharma is like "Exactly, it's a roleplay, in real life you wouldn't buy a jet and I wouldn't find being sold sexy, so we need to invent personas who would find that sexy--" and Ratchet is like "you are overthinking this" and Pharma is like "oh yeah, well I think you're UNDERthinking it!"

At this point Ratchet is reconsidering if any sexy scenario is worth the headache but he has come this far so he's like "Okay Pharma, tell me about your character, show me how it's done" and Pharma is like "I thought you'd never ask" and begins infodumping on his character and his tragic past, having been born into a royal caste but then tricked by an evil vizier named Screamstar, then becoming a mercenary for several million years whereupon his outlier ability started to manifest, but he kept it a secret because he knew it would draw attention of a nearby bandit mercenary faction--

And Ratchet is like "so when does he end up at the bazaar" and Pharma is like "Ratchet, please, that doesn't happen until three million years later, be patient" and Ratchet is mentally screaming.

Anyway, Pharma makes a table of random traits and Ratchet rolls some dice to select them and they start the sexy roleplay but as part of his character choice Pharma affects a Tarnish accent and it is absolutely WRETCHED, like imagine a bad Cockney accent, and Ratchet is like "Stop. We absolutely cannot do this if you're going to talk like that" and Pharma is like "But that's how my character SOUNDS!" and then they have to spend another four hours inventing a new character for Pharma.

In the end the Sexy Seeker Jet Market roleplay is extremely short because Ratchet is just fucking EXHAUSTED. But Ratchet, Pharma, Orion Pax, and Deadlock end up starting a weekly tabletop RPG group. Ratchet brought Deadlock in hoping he would scorn the idea and sour Pharma on it, but Deadlock lowkey enjoys it and finds Pharma's fake Tarnish accent hysterically funny, and Ratchet comforts himself with the knowledge that he is keeping Deadlock off the streets, and that's something.

The most beautiful onix around...

From the even-a-chatbot-can't-make-this-shit-up files:

Major consulting and analysis firm KPMG put out a glowing report on how generative AI has transformed society.

Turns out a bunch of it was lying made-up AI slop.

KPMG has withdrawn the report. (If anybody has a copy, though, I'd love one -- DM me for where to email it.)

- you’re magical, oh yeah also magic is real, a wizard told you to go learn all types of magic and you did

- there are ancient entities living in the mines and sewers beneath your feet, and they ARE fighting, just fyi

- there’s an ongoing war happening, that is probably why the economy is the way that it is btw

- animals can talk…just occasionally

- you’re haunted by the ghost of your grandfather, but rarely

- there are tiny creatures that will fix things for you in the night but only if you meet their hyper specific demands. also they’re scared of you

- Yoba is an alien (?)

- also the local shopkeeper’s daughter isn’t his she’s the wizard’s and a townswoman named Emily is a psychic, in case you were curious

it would be so awesome

Thanks, Anon!

Great news: she loved it. Super tasty apparently. Great success. Along with the kidney-sensitive treats we found, it was a nice way to supplement her diet. Unforseen long-term consequence though: she loved it so much she began demanding it throughout the day. Like, would come up to us and meow, and meow, and meow, and not stop, until we got up, went to the kitchen, and got her some cat drink.

And by doing so on demand, we have unfortunately created a monster: no matter what we are doing at home, Dozy knows that if she sits next to you and meows, 1) you know what she wants, and 2) you know that she will not stop until you get it for her now. And when you do get it, she gets extremely excited. She will bum rush the kitchen door as you enter. She will run around your feet as you open the can. She will let out the creakiest, crunchiest, most nails-on-the-chalkboard meow you've ever heard if she thinks you're not going fast enough.

I do not begrudge her this. It is gratifying to care for a creature whose most ardent desires are so simple that it is this easy to fulfill them. But I am a little sad, because I know in my heart that I have never loved any comestible as much as she loves this cat drink. She has a pleasure of a purity and intensity that I will never know.

My parents pulled me for the fourth grade, and I was homeschooled until the end of high school. Nine entire years. They pulled me from the public schools for a perfectly reasonable reason — my mental health was in the toilet and I needed to be away from other kids who might hurt me as they had spent all of my third grade year doing. My mom has a fucking PhD in neuroscience and tutors math professionally. She was, during the ten years that my siblings and I were homeschooled, the best, kindest, most caring, understanding, lovely teacher you could ask for.

But I'm still broken. That's the thing about homeschool. You can have the best experience possible in homeschool and still come out a fundamentally broken person. My social development stopped at the age of 10. I'm a 22 year old adult woman with the social skills of a 10 year old. That's not to say that that COULDN'T have happened in public school, but being homeschooled only made it more of a certainty. Both of my siblings and I have fewer coping strategies on average than our peers with similar neurodivergencies because we basically did not live in the real world for a decade during key developmental years.

Don't ban homeschooling because of the religious nuts. There are plenty of them. Hell, I KNEW plenty of them. But there are also plenty of quote unquote "good" homeschool families. Ones that do everything you would hope the model homeschool family does. And they are still hurting their children, even if unintentionally, because homeschooling is an inhrently traumatic experience. It's isolating. For seven entire years of my life, I had no friends. Not because I was a social outcast, but because I didn't even SEE anybody regularly enough. But, nonetheless, I knew people. You generally do if you get involved in the community.

Ban homeschooling because it breaks and utterly destroys everyone who goes through it.

Everyone.

1) Figured this out.