this blog no longer exists

what's up, the name's Re (pronounced like 'Ray') and this is my personal tumblr. Homestuck fanart tumblr /fandoms /pronoun preferences I try to warn for common triggers; don't hesitate to let me know if I forget, or if there's something specific you...

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*adele voice* hello it's me

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ugh I freak out so much more over making mistakes than I do over Things Going Wrong even when Things Going Wrong produces objectively worse conditions than things that were my mistake because I just really hate being anything less than absolutely perfect in every way I guess? which obviously I am far from perfect but. the fact that I am not perfect is a constant and overwhelming source of distress.

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oh my god it's like 1pm and it's already been the worst day ever, and has been getting steadily worse from the instant I sat down at 7:30am technically I haven't fucked up anything today, but for some reason all the times I've fucked up without realizing it over the past few months (i.e. writing down the wrong project due dates, setting up files incorrectly, forgetting to implement edits and ship them off to the printers) have come home to roost today. I have seriously had to deal with about half a dozen mistakes past!me made and wow everything is terrible forever, I would kind of like to go back to bed now maybe I can sort of...close my office door and panic very quietly ETA: oh fantastic!!! I just realized that last week I sent off a file with a typo on it and the file literally just went to press and now we will have about 200 cards with a question mark where a deadline should be!!!!!! can I just press rewind on this entire week, please because fuck everything

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thislousytshirt replied to your post: thislousytshirt replied to your post: and by “the…

oh i was excited i thought we were gonna get the Vex Shipping Olympics next year

oh is that what you meant…………….i thought you were talking about pee jokes…………

no if someone wants to run a version of the hso next year they have a full right to do so, but—although re will have hir own opinions, i’m sure—i would want to be very picky about “officially” endorsing any successors, or handing off bits of our infrastructure, anything like that, for vanity’s sake as well as discouraging any half-baked efforts. as many mistakes as we made, i’m aware it could have gone much, much worse. anyone remember secretsantastuck?

#accidentally srs posts the blog

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yeah I definitely feel the same...I would want to be very clear about us not being affiliated or involved with a new HSO in any way, to the point where I'd actually prefer any new versions to use a new name or some other obvious signifier. of course folks can do whatever they want, and if someone wants to run something under the HSO name I am not going to bother asking them to change it or anything.

the main thing for me is not getting involved in any way, because even if new mods were amazing and perfect and much, much better than we were...I just don't want my name/endorsement attached to something I'm not sitting on the board for, so to speak. it's a control thing, probably!

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yo so I just got home like an hour ago and have been playing through the #upd8 because fuck sleep

ETA: there is a lot of text here. like really a lot. you might not want to clickthrough, just saying.

so I kind of winced when I hit Kankri and read as little as possible of any of his dialogue, like basically everyone else...[clipped b/c I decided to ramble about it below] and you know what, I am just going to go ahead and read it as Kankri being straightforwardly terrible and I am going to selectively ignore the parts I don't want to deal with. that is a thing I am doing.

wow every trollgirl is a babe? I REALLY wish I had time to draw update art because dang Porrim. dang.

I really really loved Rose and Kanaya. like, I feel that Kan thinks they're in more of a relationship than Rose does, if the way Rose was blatantly flirting with Meenah is any indication (and assuming they're not poly but I don't actually think Kan would be able to negotiate a poly relationship at this point due to sheer inability to talk about any relationship things openly at all). and actually that is sort of what I want out of their relationship? I ship them weird. I get that most people ship them either sweet and dorky or devastatingly elegantly romantic but. I just want them to be total failures at having a relationship and I want them to be miserable and passive-aggressive like 80% of the time. that's how I ship them. I think I'm doing shipping wrong.

that's all the feelings I have time to feel because I have to be awake in about 7 hours. goodnight.

ETA: okay so since I posted this last night I feel safeish talking a little bit more about Kankri here. if you want to argue with me please don't. I do not have time for an argument but I want to blog about my feelings because that helps me process. I also do not have time for like a full analysis so this is just more reactionish stuff. honestly if you don't already get why it's a problem I have no interest in talking to you! I do not have the energy, I do not have the time. I don't anticipate anyone will actually see this or want to reblog or w/e but if for some reason you do, please just make a new post. I don't care if you c+p my text directly or edit it or whatever just don't attach my name to it. if I could f-lock this post I would be doing that.

arguments I have seen defending the inclusion of Kankri:

you just don't ''''get'''' what Hussie is trying to tell you

Kankri is not supposed to be a sympathetic character so stop complaining that he says problematic shit

Kankri's character portrayal is not mocking ~you~, it is mocking 'ineffective social justice bloggers'

such as people who use terms that 'nobody can understand'

or people who 'make social justice culture inaccessible/hostile'

so here's the thing.

there are terrible characters.

and there are terrible ways to present characters regardless of how sympathetic they are supposed to be.

what most people are upset about is not that Kankri is a character who uses sj terminology and is portrayed in a negative light. folks are upset about the larger messages about what is portrayed as 'acceptable' ways to care about and talk about issues of oppression and marginalization, using Kankri and Porrim as mouthpieces to set up an oppositional paradigm. on the one hand is Porrim who is chill about things and friendly and doesn't use academic terminology and basically does not ever make anyone uncomfortable. (look, I love Porrim, but I do not love what she represents. anyway she is not the focus of my feelingsdump here so I'm moving on.)

on the other is Kankri who is condescending, shuts down discussion when it's about his own privilege...and is also hypervigilant about trigger warnings and actively interrogates his own orientation in relation to the quadrants.

these character traits/actions of Kankri's are presented as exactly the same. do you see why that is a problem. using trigger warnings is presented as exactly as hilarious and mockable as being a MRA douche. if you actually stop for two seconds and think 'what does the text set up as a joke' it is incredibly obvious.

and finally, I want to talk about accessible terminology. the thing about language, the actual great thing about language, is that it is malleable; that when we don't have words for important concepts we get to come up with new ones. so when we talk about shit that most people don't talk about, that isn't discussed in most public spaces or popular media, we have to use whatever vocabulary fits best. and guess what, words like 'cis' are absolutely fucking necessary for us to talk about our own experiences and lives.

because these are our actual lives we are talking about! there is no divide between 'talking about social justice' and 'talking about our day-to-day experiences' or 'talking about how we feel about shit.' those are not separate categories. the only reason you would think those are separate categories is if you are not aware of how institutional structures of power affect you personally.

not having the same vocabulary as everyone else is okay. not using the same kind of terminology to talk about shit is okay. nobody is saying that it is not. (Hussie is saying that 'sj bloggers' are saying that it is not.) but we need to be able to use accurate words to express ourselves.

which, speaking of: not everything is an attempt to ''''convert'''' or 'educate' or 'reach out to' privileged people! guess what! it's not fucking about you! sometimes folks just want to hang out with their friends in a public space and talk about shit that affects them. sometimes it is actually hella rude and self-centered for you to assume that just because someone's talking about something you don't understand in a place where you can access it, you have the right to demand explanations and education from them.

for example: I am so sick of talking about this whole Kankri thing but I feel a bit better now that I've gotten it all out. I am not getting paid to educate anyone, I'm not responsible for anyone else's personal growth, I do not owe anyone shit. me saying 'I find this thing to be a shitty thing' is actually about me and my own reaction! on my own personal blog! fancy that! I am not saying it to ~score points~ with whatever invisible judge is looking over my shoulder with a clipboard. this isn't fucking debate team. this is me not having had a chance to talk about update shit with anyone yet because of my horrible work schedule, and my emotional need to process my feelings by saying something. so.

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also I am wearing a rad silk tie but my fingertips keep snagging on it because guitar calluses. I am seriously wondering if there is like...some kind of tie-tying apparatus for guitarists, or something. maybe I just need to wear gloves all the time? btw, a surprising number of people have followed me over the past couple months, and I want to apologize--this is what my blog is like when I actually use it! the long radio silences and occasional art are not actually how I usually operate. as always, I don't take unfollows personally, especially as a decent chunk of you followed me during a period of extreme absence.

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soooo I am the youngest person in my office by at least 10 years and I just overheard someone down the hall asking a coworker, "L.O.L. stands for 'lots of love,' right?"

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so it's 9pm and I'm still at work and you know that thing where I said maybe I should just sleep here I actually wasn't kidding about that it would give me a couple more hours to catch up on my projects, and I would actually be able to grab 8 hours of sleep before my morning meetings I don't think there's a downside? other than not being able to shower in the morning. but I have deodorant and a change of clothes here. so really why would I not.

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what is going on in my life and by life I mean job

NB: this is really boring! I am just talking about work stuff because I am at work and I am stressed and I will continue to be at work for the next few hours at least. tl;dr I have gotten a lot done recently but there is infinitely more work to be done, I will probably be spending at least 14 hours at work every day for the rest of the week, and I really, really need a vacation.

over the last six weeks or so, I have

put together a 50-page magazine from scratch, including

single-handedly planning the content and layout of all 50 pages

writing original articles

soliciting and editing articles from other people

conducting interviews

taking photographs

sorting through an extensive and terrible photo archive

editing over 100 photos

completing original digital illustrations

spending hours on the phone with the development office trying to get a donation code to stitch a remit envelope into the center of the magazine because they recently changed the system and nothing makes sense and nobody understands it

designed and ordered eight new print products including my office's primary informational brochure

composed dozens of individually tailored and rather unpleasant communications to [redacted] who have not fulfilled their obligations to [redacted]

negotiated for gallery space in a museum

implemented a new organizational system on my office's shared drive

spent an average of 10-12 hours at work every day, plus one time when I spent 18 hours at work

provided extensive tech support on everything from dealing with computer viruses to setting up printers to creating email filters to choosing external hard drives, despite that not technically being in my job description, because I am the only person here under 30

prepared and presented an extensive report on why our website sucks and we need a new one, preferably using a Drupal CMS

designed and coded a demo website from scratch in HTML/CSS

spearheaded a social media task force and sketched out a plan for this year's social media campaigns

planned three new interoffice programs for the upcoming year

put together a 22-page comprehensive style guide to replace the 'style guide' we had earlier which was truly horrible in every conceivable way

spent over 120 hours in meetings

listened to a truly disgusting amount of electro-pop

and of course all of this is complicated by the overwhelming incompetence of my predecessors, who were 'not designers' and also were apparently incapable of preparing files, keeping records, and negotiating with printers. like--last year's magazine was half the size and they only printed 900; I'm planning to print 2000, and I'm still paying roughly $500 less overall. did they even go through a bid process or did they just choose whichever printer waved enough swag in front of their noses.

anyway a lot of this stuff is not quite finished (most notably website negotiations, the final printing of the magazine, and new program development) and there is actually...a lot more stuff I am working on that I got too depressed to write down because I have been putting it off so I can work on the stuff I did list. because I am currently doing the work of an entire development/marketing/communications department, plus IT and design.

so that is why I have been basically absent lately. sorry.

anyway I just closed my office door because wow if ONE MORE person comes in here needing a last-minute project done I am going to scream. this whole week has been way too fucking long, and the fact that I don't have a minifridge full of beer under my desk is absolutely criminal. I have 80 cards to design and I really can't leave before I do, because I need these cards printed by Wednesday and Monday is a holiday and holy shit I am actually going to be here for 15 hours again, aren't I. my goal over the last month has been to not spend more than 12 hours at work, but...it really hasn't worked out so well.

I do actually love my job. aside from the location, it's basically ideal for me, especially for my first ~real~ job. I'm slowly starting to realize that, frankly, I am actually pretty good at what I do. it's just...I do a LOT, and I am starting to realize that it is a lot by anyone's standards and not just because I am unused to the job. I seriously need an intern or a PA or something. or maybe I just need to set up a cot in my office and live here until I get caught up.

(it's bad that that actually sounds like a viable plan, right)

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i just want to express how i was worried that you had died/left the internet forever but now i see that you haven't and i am pleased. this is what i get for not having participated in the hso. your continued participation in life makes it brighter ^_^

aw, thank you! :) I've been basically nonexistent on the internet lately, I know, but hopefully now I will be able to be around a bit more. maybe. possibly.

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Read More

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YOU GUYS WERE REALLY HONEST IN THAT INTERVIEW SESSION and it helped prep me!!

oh no i’m having feelings

Read More

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ahaha you should've seen our chatlogs when we were deciding to conduct interviews--basically, we were in dire need of another mod but I was super reluctant to inflict the role on an innocent. at least, not without adequate warning.

you seriously saved us though! I kept meaning to do like a Very Special Sandy Appreciation Post throughout the HSO but I never got around to it. you were an absolutely perfect addition, and I am so so glad you joined the team despite the super-honest interview!

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you guys did a really great job with the hso, it was fun and ran smoothly and was free of wank and in general it was a really delightful experience!!!!!! thank you so much

ahhh thank you! ♥ that means a lot, especially that you think it was free of wank (it definitely wasn't, but I think we handled the bulk of it privately...I am glad it didn't bleed over onto the main comm!) you guys made some great stuff, and I'm really glad you had fun.

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I just hit 'post' on the last ever HSO announcement, holy shit there were points at which I honestly thought this day would never come, that I would be trapped forever and ever in a cycle of HSO not that I can really talk? work has been solidly kicking my ass. like, a lot. (I will probably make a long complainy post about it at some point.) back when I first started my job I would basically sleep about 5 hours a night, wake up, go to work for 10 hours, come home, put in a couple hours at my part-time editing job, then spend at least 6 hours on HSO; I was still falling horribly behind and had to pull all-nighters on the weekends to keep up. at one point I was literally having a 15-minute breakdown every morning from 6:35-6:50. it...wasn't good! but then I quit my part-time job and decided to prioritize my full-time job over HSO on account of I was actually getting paid to do that, and also it's sort of my career and stuff. so for the past couple months I've been absent a lot from modchats and mod duties and basically I have been a really shitty mod. which...I'm really honestly sorry about, and I apologize to everyone involved in the HSO in any capacity, but honestly it was sort of incredibly necessary for my mental health and continued employment. anyway, my point is: it's over! it no longer hangs like a threatening cloud over my head; I am free! we are all finally free. it feels amazing. and if I may get embarrassingly emotional for a second, I really love all my co-mods a lot! they have all gone above and beyond what we represented the job to be (except maybe Sandy, to whom we explicitly said 'this is not going to be fun. this is going to be awful.' it was an excruciatingly honest interview/warning session...) but most of all I love Ink, who started this whole thing with me and has been my co-pilot in this plane even when the engine started smoking in an alarming fashion and the passengers started multiplying and I think I've lost control of this metaphor. but Ink is seriously great is what I am trying to say! when I think about what HSO would've been like if I had had a less thoughtful and capable co-mod...y'all are so, so lucky we never had to find out what would have happened. ♥

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waaaaaait, how do you know Andrew Gombas? we went to school together ahhhhh

haha, really? I don't actually know him personally, but I went to high school with the girl who sings backup on that track, and saw them perform it...two summers ago, I think? anyway, that song's stuck in my head ever since. :) weird how these connections work out!

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[image: purple lineart of Rose and Jade with lyrics from Andrew Gombas's The Ukraine] so it turns out I need to do an illustration for a publication I'm working on, and I downloaded the trial version of corel painter 12 for that purpose. I have never used painter before so naturally I decided to do a quick sketch for experimental purposes--I used this lineart to test out various brushes and figure out how to make painter crash. (hint: assume it works like photoshop and create a million different layers, then stare bleakly at your screen as it stalls out) and then I realized that this is pretty much the first thing I have drawn at all since HSO started. >_< so even though this is a 20-minute doodle done at work, I am posting it anyway.

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FORMALWEAR AND SHARKWEAR. ILU.

SHARKWEAR IS APPROPRIATE FOR ALL OCCASIONS (caveat: sharkwear is not appropriate for all occasions)(also ilu too, it has been a while, we should hang out more!)

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I reappear briefly in a puff of smoke to say: I may have just dropped by my boss's office in a UCLA Rugby tie, and completely failed to explain why I was wearing it (it's a sample tie that I was sent because I need to order custom ties for our office to give to international guests) (I am currently filling out the order form and thought to myself "I should be wearing one of their ties whilst I do so") (okay so maybe the explanation would not have actually...helped, in the traditional sense of helping) ty for being an effectively confessional venue, tumblr