some loser: humans are innately selfish creatures

my psych book:

I’m sorry if this is how you found out

those posts criticizing common writing patterns in fanfiction are so fucking harmful and they ruined me

so like yknow what??? People tell you to avoid “smirk” and “chuckle” as descriptors because no one does those things (???) but then when I need to use those words I have a ten minute crisis about how I’m a shitty writer. So heres my unwarranted writing advice: If you want your characters to smirk and chuckle fucking let them and don’t let anyone tell you that no one smirks or chuckles because I do both on a daily basis whenever I tell a shitty pun, bye 

Edgy fanfiction critics can eat my entire ass.

Like y’all have never had a chuckle? For shame

” nobody does that”, Well sure, maybe nobody does that when YOU’RE in the room, buddy…

I smirk and I chuckle and I toe off my shoes and I card my fingers through my own hair (don’t have anyone else to do it to, but if I had, I would) and when I’m angry I growl (or wish I could, at least) and I pop the P when I say Yep. And even if I DIDN’T do all those things, the characters I write do, because fuck the language police, it’s my fic.

I honestly hated those BS things when they started coming out of not just fanfic but pro writing advice back in the 90s and 00s.

That’s how long I’ve been holding a grudge against Blanket General Absolutist Writing Advice, by the way. Thirty years now. People would post it on writing lists, or on message boards and I would be the only one going “okay except how the fuck else do you describe that”. Certain Fucking People’s much-vaunted “lists” of how a whole bunch of shit was stupid. Endless complaints about “emerald eyes” with “lololol so sharp edged and glass-looking?” and oh my god how about you fuck off.

And yes, before you go there: I do know the stuff they were reacting to, and the overwhelming trends, and the so forth and so on, and this was still the stupid, wrong way to approach the issue.

Potentially useful advice on the subject is going to a) come from someone whose taste you care about (ie this is the kind of person you’re writing for), and b) is going to be specific - “I think this piece of yours is using this kind of thing too often and it’s getting distracting” or “I feel like using ‘chuckle’ here gives the wrong vibe/imagery” or whatever. And note I said POTENTIALLY. And that’s for EDITING.

For writing use whatever word is gonna get you to the next word, you can fix it later.

My Muppet Princess Bride drawings found their way to Facebook and from that came a ton of good suggestions for scenes. Rizzo as a R.O.U.S. has been suggested by a lot of different folks for as long as I've been doing these drawings, but I was never quite sure how to handle the scene until a commenter suggested Rizzo's line. Maybe it resonated with me because I can kinda relate to Rizzo in this moment (especially so soon after Valentines Day!). Thanks to Paul Adams who provided Rizzo's line, and gave me permission to use it in this drawing.

And shout-out to movie-screencaps.com for providing the backgrounds, I like to edit shots from the movie for my backgrounds because it allows me to focus on the fun part of drawing Muppets. There's also just something fun about 'painting' the Muppets into the actual film.

Can we get a big round of applause to one of the most iconic characters of all time? He’s been through so many muppet antics and I think it’s time for some appreciation

You’re doing great, Kermit. Jim would be so proud :)

no one asked but have Gale Dekarios telling you he likes you, too. (from the bugged dialogue that a friend showed me how to trigger)

I don’t even care who fucking wins the presidency this year look at this

This makes an INCREDIBLE difference!!!! For fuck sake go vote!!!!

A few years back a Republican won my house district by six vote. Now she’s talking about making it illegal to protest the Gazan genocide. Pay attention to Congress

if any of your circle is telling you voting is useless and it will never get us anywhere is lying to get you not to vote. republicans will always vote. not voting is just pulling your teeth for them. go vote and dont reblog propaganda that makes you feel hopeless

this is a poll for a movie that doesn't exist.

It is vintage times. The powers that be have decided to again remake the classic vampire novella Dracula for the screen. in an amazing show of inter-studio solidarity, Hollywood’s most elite hotties are up for the starring roles. the producers know whoever they cast will greatly impact the genre, quality, and tone of the finished film, so they are turning to their wisest voices for guidance.

you are the new casting director for this star-studded epic. choose your players wisely.

(no contestants slated for Round 6 of the Hot & Vintage Women Tournament have been included to avoid tipping the vote.)

Previously cast:

“And remember: you’re worth the time it takes to learn a new skill!”

oh my goodness I love her she’s so wholesome

#She has a book about to come out??#Prev tags say Mercury Stardust which might be her name?

Yeah! Her name is Mercury Stardust, and she’s a maintenance technician who gives tips and talks about renters’ rights. She also does burlesque shows! She’s mostly active on TikTok I think, but she has some other socials and a main website.

Her book, titled “Safe and Sound: A Renter-Friendly Guide to Home Repair” comes out in August 2023.

The book blurb, taken from the publisher’s website:

She actually JUST retired from burlesque.

and she also just launched a podcast! the Handy Ma’am Hotline.

This might be unpopular but I’m not going to use simpler vocabulary in my writing if it’s out of character for the narrator. If my POV character is a botanist, he’s going to call a plant by its name. If you don’t know what it is you can either Google it or move on just knowing it’s a plant of some sort.

I don’t like this trend of readers being angry that not everything is 100% understandable for them. I want my characters to be believable as people and sometimes people use words people outside of their field will not understand. That’s not a bad thing.

You don’t have to understand every word to get the gist of what’s happening. I’m not going to slow down an action scene to describe every weapon because someone might not know them by name. They can just assume it’s a weapon because that makes sense in the context of the scene.

I just had a debate with myself over using the word mezzanine, wondering if I should describe it instead. Ultimately I decided the character would call it a mezzanine, and therefore readers could look up a new word if they didn't know.

It's how I learned words like myriad as a seven year old reading Lord of the Rings for the first time, why would I steal that experiance from someone else by simplifying language?

I don't know about y'all, but books are how i know my vocabulary in the first place

I have no idea where any of you are getting this type of reader, but I feel like I've just seen a shark's fin.

I've had a few personally, but I've seen the type elsewhere.

But be careful! "Seeing a shark fin" as a metaphor is biased against those who don't live near the ocean and thus cannot have any personal experience with such an image! /s ;)

“For the record, I like Gale Dekarios much better than Gale of Waterdeep.”

(Based off that scene in Tangled)

Gale Math

So, we all know that in the epilogue, Gale tells Tav:

I love you.

And if you look at the datamined dialog files and read the dev notes, you’ll see this:

Devnote: With the warmth of having said this a thousand times before.

So, taking that statement as a FACT (which, you know, I’m certain it was intended to be…) we now have a solid numerical value to start with: 1000.

Next, we know that per the narrator at the epilogue start, it’s been 6 months since the defeat of the netherbrain; therefore it’s been 6 months since Gale and Tav got engaged/agreed to live together. We’re going to conclude that they have spent every day together since then.

6 months = 182.5 days

Now, assuming that Gale says ‘I love you’ to Tav on a relatively similar schedule each day (ex: when they first wake up, when Gale heads out to Blackstaff Academy, etc. etc.) we can make an equation:

1000 declarations of love divided by 182.5 days = the amount of times Gale tells Tav he loves them every single day.

We solve the equation and get 5.47945205

We round that down, and voila! We now have flawless mathematical proof that

Gale says ‘I love you’ to Tav an average of 5 times every single day

"Are you ok?" I'm actually tired bro. From the bottom of my heart I'm tired

OH MY GOD

im grading final papers and i'm being a literal monster and i am so sorry to the students who are going to get these back, truly i am, but they also deserve it.

NOT to turn this into a rant about ai

but i feel confident that this is ai's fault. that either these students are using it to write their papers or are using it to do their research and like. stop doing that. stop it.

i got into a whole argument with my friend the other day because they were using chatgpt and i loath chatgpt with every fibre of my being it makes me want to eat my own hands. and they were all like

"why, how is this different than googling something?"

AND LIKE. when you google things google provides you with several pages of results, NOW, we all know that the way those results are being presented to us is being curated by google and their bottom line, but regardless, you are given multiple sources of information and YOU have to sort through it and YOU have to make decisions about what sources you're using. there is an element of critical thinking involved here, there is also more transparency in that you see the actual sources of the information you are getting. You are USING YOUR BRAIN.

chatgpt sorts the information for you. IT decides what is relevant. IT thinks critically (usually poorly but he's just a lil robot what can you expect from him it's a big world)

so now i have all these students who do not understand the importance of knowing where sources come from or who wrote them or how you need to use multiple sources to prove a point, now i have students who do not know how to sort through sources, how to make decisions about what is good and what is bad, or just what is useful to them. you don't know how to critically sort information.

it is TERRIFYING. and what is more terrifying to me is how willing so many people are to just hand over the responsibility of the thinking to an algorithm. like all i have is my brain. i swear to god that's it. i don't own property, i don't have fame, or immense talent. BUT I CAN THINK. like i can think. WHY are you giving that away so casually???? I don't GET IT.

I don't get it for school. I don't get it for art. I don't get it!!!!!