Dick & Mary

that some people respond to any well-foreshadowed reveal with “ugh that plot twist was so predictable” proves bad faith criticism has rotted their brains to the point they think it’s bad writing if they can correctly identify information the writers were intentionally giving them

Sometimes the point of the reveal is not to shock you. Sometimes the point is anticipation of the reveal. You know it’s coming, just not when, how, or what the consequences will be. And sometimes that can be so much more interesting than not seeing it coming at all.

Could it be “roam her, gem her?”  - Liz Lemon

1920

idc how well it actually cooks the toast i am cooking toast three meals a day if it means i get to push those buttons and turn that thing around wheee wooooo look at my beautiful toast

Me too Donna, me too...

you know it hits hard

can you believe that we have fanfiction. that we have websites dedicated to fanfiction. that there is a place that you can go and read tens, hundreds, thousands and thousands of pieces of writing that strangers have made. people who are not "writers". people who come home at the end of the day and have feelings and say, i am going to put that into words. i am going to share those words. short, long, sweet, sad, horny, funny, wonderful words. we are all just human and we all love to make and remake and share that with others. can you believe that.

You know one of the things I love most about the chelsie proposal, is that Carson chooses the moment where they’re all cheering his Lordship to ask if Mrs Hughes is free to talk. She looks understandably surprised, because this is Carson after all. And I just think…what a statement. In that moment, he is choosing Elsie Hughes over the Family and I’m not even sure he consciously realises that.

Goddamn. Okay

Did you have a kid in your neighborhood who always hid so good, nobody could find him? We did. After a while we would give up on him and go off, leaving him to rot wherever he was. Sooner or later he would show up, all mad because we didn't keep looking for him. And we would get mad back because he wasn't playing the game the way it was supposed to be played.

There's hiding and there's finding, we'd say. And he'd say it was hide-and-seek, not hide-and-give-UP, and we'd all yell about who made the rules and who cared about who, anyway, and how we wouldn't play with him anymore if he didn't get it straight and who needed him anyhow, and things like that. Hide-and-seek-and-yell. No matter what, though, the next time he would hide too good again. He's probably still hidden somewhere, for all I know.

As I write this, the neighborhood game goes on, and there is a kid under a pile of leaves in the yard just under my window. He has been there a long time now, and everybody else is found and they are about to give up on him over at the base. I considered going out to the base and telling them where he is hiding. And I thought about setting the leaves on fire to drive him out. Finally, I just yelled, "GET FOUND, KID!" out the window. And scared him so bad he probably wet his pants and started crying and ran home to tell his mother. It's real hard to know how to be helpful sometimes.

A man I know found out last year he had terminal cancer. He was a doctor. And knew about dying, and he didn't want to make his family and friends suffer through that with him. So he kept his secret. And died. Everybody said how brave he was to bear his suffering in silence and not tell everybody, and so on and so forth. But privately his family and friends said how angry they were that he didn't need them, didn't trust their strength. And it hurt that he didn't say good-bye.

He hid too well. Getting found would have kept him in the game. Hide-and-seek, grown-up style. Wanting to hide. Needing to be sought. Confused about being found. "I don't want anyone to know." "What will people think?" "I don't want to bother anyone."

Better than hide-and-seek, I like the game called Sardines. In Sardines the person who is It goes and hides, and everybody goes looking for him. When you find him, you get in with him and hide there with him. Pretty soon everybody is hiding together, all stacked in a small space like puppies in a pile. And pretty soon somebody giggles and somebody laughs and everybody gets found.

Medieval theologians even described God in hide-and-seek terms, calling him Deus Absconditus. But me, I think old God is a Sardine player. And will be found the same way everybody gets found in Sardines - by the sound of laughter of those heaped together at the end.

"Olly-olly-oxen-free." The kids out in the street are hollering the cry that says "Come on in, wherever you are. It's a new game." And so say I. To all those who have hid too good. Get found, kid! Olly-olly-oxen-free.

— Robert Fulghum, "All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten"

in a rare moment of "huh i can maybe contribute to this", i was reminded of this exerpt from Tim Kreider's We Learn Nothing, a collection of his essays.

this one was written about a deceased friend of his, Skelly, who was known to spin tales about his life to hide the shameful parts from others. at his funeral, when all the secrets inevitably started to unfold, Kreider writes:

different viewpoints

Something I do really love about The Tumblr Experience™️ is that you get everything. The whole blog, in order, not by popularity or (usually) tailored to fit an audience.

I followed this person for one thing, but this is a really gorgeous picture of a bird. A gifset of a movie I never would have seen. A poem about brothers or frogs or ribbon or love.

It's odd but it's meditative, almost. I think it's part of why mutuals, especially ones we don't really talk to, are such a specific phenomenon. I've never spoken to you, you stopped talking about the thing I followed you for forever ago, I don't even remember what it was, but I like seeing you there, still reblogging gifsets of 1990s cult classics and parasocially blogging about Bob Dylan.

Fanfiction and fanart are bonus content, brought directly to you without monetary motives. That is so rare nowadays. You can and should if you're able to support these creators with donations, kudos, comments and reblogs. But you're not obliged to. You can consume it for free, because people enjoy sharing their talents with you. Make them feel loved for their gifts for us.

I did a thing. I haven’t updated this story in a very long time, but I promised I would finish it, and I will. I know there aren’t as many people out there in the fandom anymore as there used to be, but I do hope there are at least a few people who might still be interested. As always, likes, comments, reblogs, favorites, follows, and reviews make me love you a lot. 🥰🤗

So excited to see this and to read your wonderful prose again, @chelsiefan71! Thank you for this gift!

devastated if not completely surprised 💔😔

Charles Carson face appreciation - 4.06

MERRY CHRISTMAS!