Not the long walk home that will change this heart

[decemberwinter]

[doubleca5t]

Hollywood truly does always take the wrong lesson from its success stories

[foldingfittedsheets]

I grew up on a well. I didn’t really know how that made me different than other kids except that when their power went out they could still shower and flush the toilet and I couldn’t.

But the real difference is that well water often has little quirks. It’s fresh and yummy from a hole in the ground, it’s not fancy city water that goes through treatment. That means that it didn’t taste like it could be bottled up right from the tap.

In fact what it meant was it tasted like sulfur. Straight up rank eggs. We had it tested repeatedly and it was totally safe for everything, it just stank. It was just something I accepted without question. The sky was blue and water smelled like a chicken egg you'd missed because the hens had gotten sneaky and it had been slowly rotting in the hot summer sun day by day.

It wasn’t until I got older and had friends sleepover who expected a shower the next day that I really caught on that my water wasn’t what they were used to.

“What’s that smell?” they would ask in disgust.

I’d stick my head in the bathroom and look back at them in puzzlement. “What smell?”

I was completely immune. I’d drink it happily, it was as nothing to me to drink water that tasted like a demon had just pissed it out. My friends all thought I was completely off my rocker.

It wasn’t until years after I’d moved out that I smelled what everyone else did. I went to visit my parents to stay overnight. I turned on the shower and reared back. What was that smell?

City life had made me soft. I did not want a stinky egg shower anymore.

[teaboot]

"Oh yeah, we have an outdoor Corgi, he just gets so bored cooped up inside all day. He knows to stay off the road. Don't worry, he's way too smart for coyotes and the neighbor's know to look out when they drive past."

"Us? Oh, of *course* our Dachshund sleeps inside- we just let him out in the morning and make sure he comes back for dinner. He just does his own thing, no worries."

"Um, you know it's not humane to keep a chihuahua confined to an apartment? They're dogs, they're natural predators. They need to experience hunting behaviors or they get depressed. No we don't leash ours, he absolutely hates it, we just let him come and go whenever."

Yall get how fucking stupid that sounds, right? So stop letting your goddamn cats get eaten and attacked and infected and hit by cars

A toddler would probably love full unattended access to the neighborhood too, but we don't do that either, do we

It's 2026, "keep your damn pet in a house or in your view" should not be controversial

[angel-stars]

I had to go on a hunt for this but it was worth it. 100% agree

[release-the-sheep]

just witnessed something devastating

guy on the subway with one ear pierced, little gold hoop. other guy on the subway very quickly and subtly googling "which one is the gay ear". it is not the gay ear. visible disappointment on his face as he puts his phone away.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

I’ll never forget the fanfic space on wattpad back in 2016-2017’ish where its culture was that writers would not post their new chapters until they reached x amount of votes (kudos) and comments. I mean I’d never judge anyone for how they chose to update their fics even though I didn’t agree with them. but like. it was the entire wattpad fanfic culture back then that made most writers believe they had to set these specific numbers of votes and comments that they must reach first before they posted the next chapters. so if you were on the fanfic corner of wattpad during that time, you’d most likely have seen fics where it said in the chapter something like “50 votes and 20 comments for the next chapter!” and it was literally the norm and so normalized that I didn’t see anything weird about it back then. but looking back, years after I’ve left wattpad for ao3, yeah that culture as a whole was weird and it shaped writers into thinking that they wrote for the sake of shallow engagement instead for the joy of getting to create, it shaped writers into thinking that their fics’ worth was decided and dictated by strangers’ approval. and then tiktok became a thing and this mindset continued. not to mention how wattpad is full of ads now unless you pay the site monthly for a premium, ad-free service.

so like. man, this is why I love ao3. there’s none of these capitalism or algorithm bullshit on ao3. just writers creating out of love and passion. everybody say thank you ao3

[digitaldiscipline]

This is the 85 year old creator of Roger Rabbit:

[ozempicofficial]

[glitch1920]

[evil-tboys]

[pisshandkerchief]

this is an example of a symbiotic relationship

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

“how do people read yaoi in public?” I literally write gay porn when I’m at work 😭

[artificialajin]

Tried of saying "this character has autism this character has anxiety" let's step it up a bit. I'm gunna start saying megatron has erectile dysfunction

[silvermoon442]

@quietwingsinthesky

[hometoursandotherstuff]

[echojulietfoxtrot]

Hello, I work for a large moderately evil corporation and for at least five years now I have to sign a yearly thing to say I will never ever have one of these devices in the same room as me while I work.

My large moderately evil employer takes it for granted that these things are spying on me at all times, and you should too.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

ai will literally straight up say "I can make mistakes :)" and be accepted by millions of companies worldwide. meanwhile you'll either get fired or get your resume thrown into a trash can if you, as a human being, make one slight mistake or are not always performing perfectly

[princerevelucide]

theres NONE left. i drinked it all

[stemboards]

theres NONE left. i drinked it all stimboard 🌱

[ejoym]

I wish I could just draw comics of my friends' OCs all day without worrying about dumb stuff like "making a living" boooooo. I just wanna draw OCs kissing.

[ejoym]

I was thinking more about it and legit my happy place as an artist is shipping my OCs with my friends' OCs. In my early 20s I used to do a lot of TTRPG campaigns that had some beautiful romances which inspired me for years. For example, in an old friends fantasy campaign we ended up shipping a scaly couple featuring my barbarian half-dragon OC with her shredded and sensitive chameleon man OC. In another campaign set in a sorta Dues Ex world with a paranormal twist, my GM and I shipped our melodramatic vampire couple. And in a sci-fi alien world I played a three-eyed babe with a green cyborg girlfriend and a BFF named Pornok.

It was never predetermined. It always just happened organically and felt like falling in love with love itself.

Those days were so formative for my comics making process because I'd just stay up late and frantically write/draw these character's stories. Looking back, I wasn't very good but it didn't even matter because I just completely gave myself over to the process without overthinking it. I NEEDED to see these romances become a reality! I was the only audience but I was voracious. (It also helped to have a GM who I could spam with art and know they'd be happy to see it...maybe with the exception of the 35,000 words of my horribly written vampire fanfic.)

I suppose the double edged sword is that when those young friendships inevitably fell apart, the pain was twofold. I lost someone I loved but I also lost a story and its characters which had become a part of me. I got a little more guarded after that and I guess it's no surprise that I don't really do TTRPG's anymore.

Still, I really love collaborative storytelling. The joy of role playing is in part the spontaneity and improv of it all. There's so much room for surprise! Which keeps it way more interesting than anything I'd ever think up alone. BG3 filled a similar niche for me with its endless permutations and variety of play styles. I've often felt in dialogue with the developers especially the writing behind Durge. And even when I've exhausted a lot of what the game has to offer, then there's this fandom space with all these inspiring storytellers coming up with the most niche AUs. It once again sparks that NEED in me to make these stories a reality. It's why I love making gift art and comics.

Though lately I feel overwhelmed by what I should be making and the jobs I should take as a freelancer trying to live. It doesn't help that I probably need to go back to retail again just to make ends meet...ugh, but I digress.

Honestly, it's way more fun to commune with other artists. Just "yes, and-ing" each other, whether it's with another player around a table, in a discord server, with weirdo gift art, or just absolutely absorbed in the collective creativity of a good videogame.

[tragicburnout]

i feel like there is a sleep in me that needs to be slept but each time i sleep i don't sleep that sleep

[stunning-steeds]

E/_ A/_ or e/e _/_, Cr/Cr, and, of course, mld/mld

[queerskittles]

@elodieunderglass mold? Gene?

[elodieunderglass]

Ohhh that’s extremely funny! I can see what happened -

schimmelgen is a German horse term for the “greying gene”. This gene means a horse that progressively turns more and more white. Zarco here is pretty white-looking - a cremello or perlino - because he has genes that have “diluted” his base colour; but he also carries the gene that turns horses white with age, and some people like that, so this ad for his posthumous frozen sperm is talking it up.

Proper “White” horses, like Shadowfax, are born darkish, and the greying process is progressive. They usually go through an intermediate stage that can last a few years, called being a “dapple grey.” The dapples grow and radiate outwards.

The “dapple” stage does indeed look mouldy, or mildewed! And in German, grey horses are called “schimmel,” which also means “mouldy.” Schimmelgen is thus “mould gene.” Technically.

Horse colours are actually not as interesting or dignified as horse people think they are, and if you want to call this a mouldy horse, I think you should!