Artist-in-failing, jack-of-all-trades. Things I like: FFXIV, The Elder Scrolls, Naruto, League of Legends, Stardew Valley. FFXIV: Haurchefant Greyscone [Light/Phoenix] ESO username: @Allia_Andromeda [PC/EU].
give a man a guitar and heâll play for a day, teach a man guitar and today is gonna be the day that theyâre gonna throw it back to you
I swear to God I am so tired of this meme. You guys need to leave Wonderwall alone, seriously by now you shouldâve somehow realized what you gotta do
Thinking about a girl I grew up with who spun her dog's fur into yarn, then knitted gloves out of the yarn and how all the other kids made fun of her mercilessly for it.
And how she's now used those gloves for over thirty winters and each time she puts them on, she gets to pet her beloved dog's fur even though Ginger is long gone. And how even though her bones have long since been swallowed by the earth, Ginger is still protecting her owner from the cold.
Just an ancient pact, passed down from the earliest dogs that slept beside humans to keep us warm, continuing on for decades after one of their deaths.
1) do this even if you're under 40. seriously. I definitely should have been doing something like this for years and I only turned 40 a month and a half ago
2) if you're like me just now trying this going "oh god i've only done 15 and i think my hands are cramping" start lower than 30 and increase by 5 once whatever number you're doing no longer makes your hand cramp up. I can manage about 15 per exercise at the moment.
Day one of trying to resurrect my dead wife and my assistant who for some ungodly reason is the only necromancy expert that agreed to work with me keeps asking things like âwhere's the lucky body, so to speakâ and âare we still in the clandestine promenade to the graveyard with a couple of shovels stage orrâ until I snap and tell him I don't need a body for all the advanced reconstruction that I'm pioneering here and I can swear the fucker is giggling behind my back as I type this. The fucking nerve.
Day two of trying to resurrect my dead wife and my assistant keeps insisting it's ânot, strictly speaking, necromancyâ and I inform him if he keeps going on like that I'll kill him and bring him back to show him what real necromancy looks like, and he makes doe eyes at me and says he's my necromancy expert. I fear one of us may not survive this. Perhaps multiple times.
Day one of trying to â¨reconstruct⨠my dead wife and now that I've conceded on the front of dialectics we can finally get some work done. Maybe exact language is really important when you're a ghoul or a vampire or whatever he is but I'm pretty sure being an asshole played the biggest part in this. Anyway, I showed my assistant (henceforth referred to as The Menace) all of the material I've gathered from my wife's journals and interviews with her friends and the more responsive members of her family and maybe going through all of her browser history and how I have been mapping my findings to an experimental neural guide that I can use as basis for growing a brain (something nobody has done this precisely before, not that it's a big deal) and The Menace went âwoww you sure had to do a lot of research to figure out your wifeâ.
I shut myself in the dungeon as a murder-prevention measure and by the time I cooled off enough to reemerge he has plugged all kinds of new data into the neural guide, data that I have already deemed useless, might I add. The Menace has currently locked himself in the dungeon. Why the actual fuck did I think it's a good idea to have a dungeon that locks from the inside.
Day two of trying to reconstruct my wife and the janky data The Menace plugged into the system seems to have, by some miracle, improved its outputâs correlation with the sample data I have of my wife's preferences and ideas as they are presented in her journals by nearly 15%. The Menace still refuses to leave the dungeon even when I inform the bastard I have put away both the medical saw and my poisons kit. Highly unprofessional of him, but what could I expect. I try plugging in some of the other discarded data and correlation drops by 2%.
Day three of trying to reconstruct my wife and The Menace- well I do need them to understand who you are, don't I- has agreed to exit the dungeon on the condition that I refer to him by name, and also that he has his input in making the logs, which currently consists of him peeking over my shoulder as I type and giving even more smug comments than usual. Are you happy now, Derek? Can we finally get to work? And why wouldn't I use Tumblr it's a perfectly adequate blogging platform-
Day three of trying to reconstruct my wife, unmonitored log. Derek passed out as soon as I said we're done, so I have something akin to privacy, snoring notwithstanding. Today has been⌠productive, actually. Although he won't reveal his methods, he's been doing well enough consistently enough with sorting the data for the neural guide that I left that to him and switched my attention to constructing the body. If work continues at this pace we might get to prototype testing in no more than a week. Fast work. Too fast, maybe. Fuck, I don't know what I'm talking about. I should go to sleep.
âŚI should probably move Derek to the couch at least. If he sleeps in the chair he's bound to have a headache tomorrow.
Day four of trying to reconstruct my wife and the making of the body turned out to be trickier than I thought. Yes, yes, I know, it has been largely deemed impossible but I figured out the brass tacks easily enough, the devilâs in the details. I know the basics, I have pictures, memories, but they don't particularly detail the inside situation, do they? The deviations in textbook anatomy that make a person something like themselves. She was always fine when we were together. Well, physically at least. I don't have any x-rays or ultrasounds or the like and so I have to turn to the most dire of measures.
I have to go talk to her mother. Derek, if you're reading this, carry on with your tasks as normal. Keep the log going if I don't write tomorrow.
Day five of trying to reconstruct this guy's allegedly dead wife and. God, I do not know what to write here. The neural guide, as he likes to call his pretty janky database, is going fine. Could start growing the olâ brain tomorrow, if he'll be around to give the go-ahead, but. Well.
Day six. I started growing the brain. I'm pretty sure he'll be mad he wasn't around for the occasion but he's bound to be mad at me anyway, so what the hell
Day eight of trying to reconstruct my dead wife and I have.. not managed to retrieve the medical information. Derek has made significant progress in the meanwhile. I suppose I'll just have to improvise.
Day ten of trying to reconstruct my wife. Taking a break. The trip has had.. an effect. I suppose I know now why she was so eager to get out of that house. Derek will provide updates if there are any.
Day eleven. The brainâs fine. Everythingâs fine, except for this whole mess of a project. Janush is moping around in the dungeon and he didn't even care to ask if I am up for continuing the work after.. that. Why wouldn't I be, right? Big, strong Derek. Died before just fine Derek. I ask the brain who its father was and it says he was a musician. It is wrong. I recognize the voice.
Day eleven. I have to acknowledge the lady's capacity to turn a face and a table. Mother-in-law was.. remarkably polite. Gentle, one could say, if one was not in her basement five days prior praying for his life. And there was some logic to her words. She does have, prior experience? Making this body? Of her flesh and all that. It wouldn't be unreasonable to entrust that project to her in exchange for some mother-daughter bonding time and I don't have the resources to do this myself anyway and-
who am I kidding. She wouldn't have wanted this. If I am to drag her back from the dead I need to be honest about who I'm doing this for. What I'm doing this for. If it's worth her being trapped again.
I need to talk to Derek - I think he went to the dungeon just as mother-in-law arrived.
Somehow still day eleven of trying to reconstruct my dead wife and this fucking menace - yes I remember our agreement I don't care - drags a fucking bell tower - no I will not be thanking you for leaving the tower behind there's still a goddamn church bell in here and. Okay if that's how you want to do it let's do it. Let's type out a little q&a, shall we? Keep the record straight.
Q: How did you know there was a secret passage in the dungeon?
A: You're really stuck on that one huh? There was a draft, J. I poked around the first time I was hiding there and found where it was coming from. It's frankly embarrassing you didn't.
Q: Why did you leave?
A: Because I had a genius plan that only worked if I did it right then?
Q: Why did you leave me?
A: I was not aware youâd fancy an elopement. I was under the impression you were in the middle of becoming a happily married man again- okay okay fine put the scalpel down. Jesus Christ. I needed a distraction, it would be suspicious if we both up and left. I thought she would behave if she wasn't on her home turf, and I thought right. It worked perfectly. I am curious when you're planning to hold my celebration party.
Q: So it was all calculated?
A: Yes. My Machiavellian schemes are going very well for me, thank you for noticing.
Q: You are aware I can backread the thread, right?
A: âŚ
Q: Your parting note didn't sound very Machiavellian to me.
A: I fail to see the question here. Yes, she's scary. I was scared. I do some of my best scheming scared.
Q: Fine then. Why the bell?
A: In my opinion it is the best material for the body.
Q: Why?
A: You didn't really bother going through the data you gathered, huh? It's the bell she and her father made together. The personal connection will aid in readjustment greatly. Second to her actual body, which we cannot get or copy, this is the best shot we have.
Q: Why are you doing this?
A: Because you're going to pay me extremely handsomely any day now?
Q: Then why were you the only one willing to help me?
A: I mean, look at this mess. Look at where we are. Holding a q&a in your basement on tumblr dot com while your frankly terrifying mother-in-law is keeping critical information hostage, your phone screen is cracked and typing is hard because the damn thing doesn't recognise my fingers half the time. There's a draft from the secret passage you apparently didn't know about. Not what most would call an ideal work environment.
Q: Then I'll ask again. Why are you here?
A: Look, believe it or not I like what I do, and I like being good at it. If I can squeeze a successful reanimation out of this I can safely consider myself the best in the business. It's professional interest. And the fact that youâll pay me handsomely any day now doesn't hurt, either.
Day twelve. The body is ready - quick work, but my assistant assures me it is without fault. I think to ask him how he is so sure, think better of it. Maybe it'll all click into place when she's here. Who knows. I miss her. I hope I see her soon.
Commencing the unification and reanimation procedure.
Hiiii. So, I did look over your shoulder when you were logging in to write one of your logs and maybe memorise your email and password just in case, well, in case of this, I guess. I'm so alive you wouldn't believe. Your wife did go up in flames though. Again. My condolences. Your mother-in-law is probably fine? Didn't particularly bother to check. Didn't particularly bother saving our project, either, and I do feel like I owe you an explanation for that.
I wanted her to be real so badly. It would be my greatest work.
Some version of her existed since I was fifteen, perhaps before. I don't remember clearly. She was a necessary invention to keep some of myself: different mannerisms, different likes. Different laugh, all chime and no sting. My father was a bellmaker. He wanted to make music but all he made had the sound of him, and that he could not stomach, so my father was a bellmaker and his wife was a woman with whom he could share a dislike of everything he was, the common interest biding him over to his grave, and then I was left with the metal, my mother and her.
By the time I married you I knew more about her than I did about myself. I'm sorry, you had no chance. She was warm and agreeable and a good listener and she had a beautiful laugh, oh, the chimes in it. I dressed her like a doll and loved the way you looked at her, awed, small glances that caught nothing I would wish to hold. You did not question why our new house had a dungeon that locks from the inside, did not notice the hidden passage leading to the cemetery.
My father was a bellmaker: I know how metal learns to sing in careful hands. Flesh is much more pliable.
I will not bore you with the details â suffice it to say I made myself with much more care than I made her. You had ample opportunity to observe the finished work.
What I do need to tell you is what came of her.
You were right to not go looking for a body: not really much to find. Some parts I used in the transfer - it is a profoundly bad idea to transplant oneâs own brain without any assistance, in case you were wondering - the rest are ash in the flower pot in your lab. I thought itâd be a nice touch. Iâd love to tell you I had thoughts of coming clean then and there but I am trying to cut back on all the lying, so. You were useful enough, and nice, and I made no plans of missing you. I did not account for how much you'd miss her.
It flattered me, in a way, to see the impact of my craft. Its surprising longevity. I began to wonder whether I had misjudged her, discarded her too easily in my desire to exist. She wasn't real, sure, but who said she couldn't be, given the chance? It was all half formed doubts until I saw your posting and knew exactly what I had to do, which is to reroute all calls and emails to myself and show up a few weeks into the search, when you should have been just desperate enough to accept however. You didn't get any, by the way. Calls or emails. Shouldn't have bothered with the whole interception thing.
To my delight your data had only scraps of me in it, her making up the bulk, and most of the me-scraps you had already discarded as your lovely wife having a particularly bad day and saying things she wouldn't say, otherwise. To my surprise the thing had no chance of living.
It is hard to explain to someone who'd never worn her face: every bit of âI want to be here, I want to existâ was an error, a slip of the mask. Something I failed to separate as cleanly as I would have liked. The more void of me you rendered her the less use there was in trying. So I compromised - threw in a few of the discarded bits and watched the model confirm likeness.
I was an idiot. Probably still am, but now I am aware of at least one of my glorious fuck ups. The mask only works if it fits the face. Do you understand? No matter what he did my father's music had the sound of him.
This would be a great time to stop and walk away but. Iâm not sure but what. Sure Mother did piss me off but it's not like she did anything she wouldn't do, and anyway it had nothing to do with me now. Maybe I wanted to figure out what your angle was. Maybe it was too much fun to throw dead wife introspections at you and see the wheels in your pretty head all crash into each other.
Anyway, sorry I didn't save your wife. The whole question of personhood was really getting to me and no matter if she could be her own person or was truly just a piece of me it would be unfair for her to be born trapped into the same old bullshit. Also fires make me nervous. You can think that she broke free if you want, which wouldn't be the truth but wouldn't be as much of a lie as I thought. It was fun. Lying to you less. Scary as shit at times, but fun.
You can DM me on Discord if you want to hang out or something.
prguitarman
gamechangershow
titsay
germansingergirl
