Mo

He/him, 29, nsfw (18+)

[mosoderbergh]

So I'm getting a mastectomy

I recently found out I’ll be having top surgery in a little less than two months. Which is a lot sooner than I thought. Even at my most optimistic, I imagined it would be next year at best. But even in a process like medical transition that is so frought with waiting lists, sometimes things can go faster than anticipated. As a result, you might see me rant about mastectomy related stuff here in the coming weeks.

I have a bunch of work for university and my job before the big day, but if all goes well, I’ll have a week of relative peace before the surgery and then about four weeks of recovery before my semester starts. All in all, I couldn’t have asked for a better date.

I’m nervous as hell since this is my first major surgery, so to get ahead of my nerves, I’m fully making this into a project. Which includes:

An exercise schedule. I’m not going from 0 to 100 here — that would hold its own risks, and frankly I’m too busy. But I have made a schedule for the coming weeks. I’m quite short and pre-T had a body type that a skinny friend has referred to as “voluptuous” (kudos to her for making me sound like a bride of Dracula), so it doesn’t really show, but I’ve done light workouts several times a week for years. Mostly home-workouts, since I was never a big fan of gyms. I have decent stamina and have gained a bunch of muscle since I started T (not to brag fully bragging). So from there, I’m gently increasing to 30 minutes of something cardio-related (walking/cycling counts) and 20 minutes of yoga or something comparable per day. This is doable for me since I walk everywhere as is, so the cardio aspect will mostly take care of itself, leaving me with 20 minutes of bedtime yoga every day. To this I’m also adding regular strength training. I’ve mostly focussed on upper body the past months, so chest, arms and back. But researching a little more, I found out that having some core/leg strength can be an absolute lifesaver during recovery, just for things like getting out of bed while you don’t have your upper body strength to depend on. So I’m going for two bigger strength training sessions per week.

Journaling. For mental health as well as for posterity.

Distractions. I have some busy weeks ahead, but if I can manage it, being creative would probably really help.

Prepping my apartment. Luckily I have friends who are driving me back after surgery and who I can ask for help with groceries etc., but as you may guess from… well, all of this: I like to be prepared. And I live alone, so I don’t really have anyone to fall back on for last minute emergencies. I’ve already ordered some stuff online (a wedge pillow and mastectomy pillow) and I’ll stock up on durable foods. I’m thinking about buying one of those grabber thingies for when I can’t lift my arms, but… we’ll see about that. From what I’ve heard others say, none of these things are essential — it’s up to personal preference. Personally, I’m a side sleeper and having to sleep on my back for weeks on end sounds like a nightmare. That’s why pillows were my first purchase. I ordered them early- ish so I can get used to them. Might give a review once they arrive.

My hope is that someone else might find this useful one day, especially since the whole aspect of living alone was making me nervous beforehand. I’ll be spending about three days at the hospital, until the drains are removed. My surgeon said that I should be able to take care of myself after that. The only exception he gave was stuff like groceries (because I won’t be able to lift much). Now, like I said: I’m lucky enough to have support. But all my friends have their own lives. And my family, while not openly hostile about all this, are not going to be there to help (and I’m pretty sure having them around would only stress me out more during recovery lol). So I’m doing this alone-ish and I’m hoping I can make things easier for people who are planning on doing something similar.

[beardedmrbean]

Next up someone is going to claim that the Narnia series isn't kids books.

Kids books is probably not the best way to word it, you can enjoy them at every age, including your childhood, as you get older you may find new truths in them, but they're still good for any age.

[cookingwithroxy]

I want you to understand this. I NEED you to understand this. My mother read me the hobbit as bedtime story, and I started pushing myself to read before pre-school so I could in fact read the hobbit for myself instead of having to wait for bedtime.

I didn't do so right away but jesus wept I PUSHED myself to learn to read SPECIFICALLY so I could read The Hobbit! It is, in fact, a children's story! And children only see page count as 'there is a lot of this fun story to read!'

[berniesrevolution]

[zanmor]

these ones

[lavendermanna]

oh we can get even more specific than just a list of billionaires:

here are all of the scum who control oil, coal, and natural gas

here are the ones who run the factories

and here are the ones who extract the raw resources that the others need to make it all work

[libertarian-therapist]

23,000 people are reblogging a hit list

[bogleech]

Good.

[got-no-skill]

Let’s get to hittin

[isuggesteatingtherich]

i have a suggestion

[jellyfish-everywhere]

EVERY BODY KNOWS SHITS FUCKED

[shirtsthatgohard]

[fionn-o-nassus]

Not gonna lie this makes me a bit irritated. Here's the real version of this photo:

Instead of a cutesie reference to film censorship it was an explicit statement of defiance of Maryland's criminalization gay sex, which was not repealed until 2002. This wasn't a guy saying "Oh they can't put what I do in the movies according to a completely voluntary industry code" he was saying "The State of Maryland wants to put me in jail for being gay and having gay sex."

It wasn't a guy being cheeky about sex in an ambiguous, cute way. It was a man stating, in no uncertain terms, that a whole state of the United States considered him a criminal for being homosexual.

[ororium-z]

Happy Pride!

[rootbeergoddess]

Every pride, you must reblog this. No exceptions

[thesaltofcarthage]

I love that four different people on my feed scheduled this joyous person to reblog by 8am on June 1. I look forward to seeing this a dozen more times today.

[longstringofnumbersandletters]

Peeling off the broken breastplate of a stoic knight who only fights and never speaks, just to realize there’s nothing in there. Not metaphorically—the armor is literally empty. It doesn’t appear to affect him. If the armor stays mostly in the shape of a knight, he just gets back up to keep fighting. But with the chest plate off he just sits there, equally impervious to curiosity as I reach up into the cavity where his body might’ve gone. Stubbornly, no answers are found anywhere in there.

So I forge him a new breastplate and on the inside, because I know he has plenty of room, I put a little pocket. Not big enough to hold anything functional of course. Just a little extra piece to see what he’ll do with it.

He comes back next time with some grievous injury to his nothing, presumably from the massive shredded gash across his thigh plates. He sits and waits. I fix it for him. He is still nothing in there. I decide to add a drawing on the inside, of the type of beast I imagine could rend metal into scraps with a single blow. He puts it back on. He no longer moves as if he is injured.

Over time the interior of the knight becomes decorated with whatever odds and ends I could think to attach to the inside of a guy who’s got room to carry it. What really gets me is that he never removes any of it. Never requests a change. Not even when I installed a curtain rod for a small tapestry, or a bud vase to carry roses for his beloved, or an accordion folder for letters. He didn’t say a word for any of the many, many drawings of mythical beasts that now fight forever inside of his shell.

There are plenty of other forges. I’m not entirely sure why he keeps coming back here anyway. We’re pretty popular, but he could get his armor fixed a lot quicker (and with fewer ridiculous modifications) literally anywhere else. I asked him if I could get a look at his nothing again. He flipped up his visor and nodded his head so I could take a look. It was the same as it had been, filled with drawings and trinkets and weird little fixtures I’d put in there. I asked if he was annoyed by it, or liked it, or felt anything at all, but he literally only ever says nothing, so I’m not sure why I asked.

There’s not much room left in his nothing now. When he comes back for repairs I’ve had to fix my own foolish additions. Some of these pieces are intricate and irritating to repair, but I fix them anyway. It feels wrong to take any of it away from him now, even though I’ve been rudely encroaching on his nothingness to the point where it’s barely even there. How he squeezes his nothing back into a body so full, I’ll never understand. But it’s a game to me now, finding a spot not yet filled and putting something there. A dark part of me wonders if he ever gets filled up completely, if whatever sorcery holds the nothing-knight together may break, and it will all clatter unceremoniously to the floor.

When he hands me his breastplate yet again, it is so shockingly disfigured that I wonder if being made of nothing has somehow kept him alive. No ordinary knight could sustain such injuries. So I fix it. And he waits, unmoving, in a quiet corner of the forge. It’s like he’s watching, even though I know the reading glasses I put inside his helmet were just for fun. I’m careful to put it all back exactly the way it was when he last left. There’s no room to add more this time.

He examines the breastplate, and pauses before putting it back on, like he’s looking for something. Is he worried about the fit? But it suits him just as it always did. He calmly points to a little space, about an inch, between a miniature shelf and one of many pockets. There’s nothing there. I ask him what’s wrong, and again he points. It’s the most emotion I’ve ever seen from him, and it’s barely anything at all. I take it to mean he wants something there.

I spend some time engraving a little snail in the gap. He watches, as much as nothing can watch. When I’m finished he holds the breastplate, but he doesn’t put it on right away. I ask him if something’s still wrong. He says nothing, and puts it on. I tell him I can’t add anything else. Even if he could ask, there’s no room left.

Next time he comes back, there’s nothing wrong with his armor—he lets me check to make sure. I ask him what he’s doing here. Out from one of many pockets, he retrieves a tiny rusted knife. It’s in miserable condition, barely worth saving. I tell him I could make him a nice new one, but I’ll fix it if he likes. He puts it away and reaches around to find something else, a needle and thread. Better condition, but I’m not a sewist and I tell him as much. He puts them away. He then retrieves a little twisted piece of wax paper. I open it. It’s candy. I ask if I can eat it. He says nothing. I eat it. It’s flavored with cinnamon. I’m surprised he let me take it.

He keeps bringing me candy now. His armor is the most laborious to repair out of every client my forge serves, but it’s my own fault so I can’t complain. Sometimes he keeps me company while I work. I wonder if he is trying to tell me something when he hands me mints. I wonder again at the lemon lozenges. He stares at me when I eat, as much as nothing can stare.

One day he brings me a little jar of honey. I thank him, I tell him I’ll save it for dinner. He watches me work, he puts his repaired armor back on, and he stays. My shift passes slowly, and when I finally pack up to leave it’s dark outside. He follows me out of the forge. I ask him where he’s going. He points to the jar in my hand. I ask him if he wants to watch me eat it. He says nothing, but the nothing-knight clearly wants something, so I open the lid and dunk my finger in the honey. I try not to get any on my chin. He stands there, inches away, watching me try to consume this jar of honey without a utensil. It tastes like clovers. About half the jar is left when I’ve finally had enough of pretending to be a bear, but he doesn’t move to leave.

I ask if he’s going to follow me home. He says nothing. I tell him he can if he wants to. Again, nothing. I start walking, and he follows at my side. I know he’s not going to say anything ever, so I fill the silence. I tell him I’m grateful for the sweets, I tell him about how his various components are made, I tell him I’ve never met anyone made of nothing before. I tell him it’s a rare opportunity for a smith to work so much on the inside of something. He says nothing. I tell him again how much I like the candy.

It occurs to me that maybe filling me with sugar is as close as he can get to filling someone else’s empty armor with trinkets. I’m not sure if that’s really why he does it. I tell him I don’t have room to be filled with anything on the inside, not like him. I’m not a container for much besides food. He offers me another piece of candy. Maybe he likes containing something, the way I like to feel full. Maybe it’s nothing at all.

—

I didn’t edit this even a little bit. Thanks for reading!

[rowlfthedog]

[mosoderbergh]

Modern AU Solrook: The Mamma Mia Fic is officially in the making

Ok, so I’ve been gone for a while. Which is partly because I have a busy life. But I’ve also been busy plotting. Some might remember a post from ages back where I talked about my Mamma Mia AU. Which has nothing to do with the plot of Mamma Mia and everything to do with making Solas sit through a girls night complete with chick flicks and rosé. Now, in a world where my mental health is intact, this could have been a oneshot. But (BUT!) since this is a modern AU, I might have gone slightly overboard. So now, while this fic will still contain:

Rook making Solas watch Mamma Mia and singing along loudly while Solas yearns for death

A queer slowburn Solrook romance

rosé

…it will, as of now, also feature:

the eternal tragedy of Solas falling into a magically induced, century-long sleep AGAIN after the events of the Inquisition, waking up to a strange new world AGAIN and coming to realise he has lost everyone he cared for AGAIN

The Inquisition being a historical event to a modern-age Thedas (and all implications thereof)

A modern Mourn Watch Rook and their “imaginary” friend Varric Tethras (who is still around in spirit-form because the dagger that killed him tied him to the Veil)

A version of events where Rook and their team will have to actually sit down and consider the question: Should the Veil remain as it is?

Remember: This all started with Mamma Mia. It’s gonna be fun. So much fun. Not heavy at all. I promise. (I don’t promise. That’s a lie. But we will have fun! …Occasionally.)

If this sounds down your alley, I’ll be thrilled to take you along for the ride. There will be a first chapter… at some point. I’m posting this in part to give myself a reason to write this thing already.

And if you're still here: What other movies should I make the depressed elf watch? What movies would your Rook make the depressed elf watch?

[enjoloras-deactivated20220821]

Okay so Victorian erotica is literally the most heinous, morally bankrupt, horrific shit I've ever read - but I've read a fair bit, partly from historical interest but also because a while back I helped a friend with a university project she was doing about censorship and pornography in 19th century England.

Anyway I need to share with you all the most hilarious line that has ever been written, circa 1887:

[prokopetz]

I feel like this excerpt is significantly enhanced by knowing that the novel in question is a first-person narrative written from the perspective of an inexplicably sapient flea who lives on Bella's body, and that's why the third priest's penis is described in this way: from the narrator's perspective it literally blots out the sky.

[kingarniestar-deactivated202509]

me when im a flea

[systlin]

I looked up and read the Flea after this and it is in fact enough to kill a modern person who complains about 'problematic' smut on AO3 instantly.

It is making a political point but also Sweet mother of fuck

[manu-script]

awww the like button turns into a rainbow when you press it! that's so cute...hey staff what's with all the trans women you keep nuking?

[manu-script]

i think we should be ridiculing them more for this. you don't get to try and go all "queer website" when your staff likes to go on nuking sprees targeting the trans fem users

[smadsel]

would be remiss not to mention that the rainbow notably straight up just removed the trans flag colors from it. like they’re gone. it’s the progress flag minus the trans flag colors.

[smadsel]

that’s not the whole flag, now is it

[manu-script]

hey staff what the fuck

[villainessbian]

hey staff don't you think you're being too on-the-nose

[shrodingers-catgirl]

HEY STAFF DONT YOU THINK YOU'RE BEING TOO ON-THE-NOSE

[licenseddoctor]

Hey kid you want a job?

Great get online and go to a job board. Indeed, Linkedin whatever. Now you're gonna search for a role that's in your city, fits your qualifications, and doesn't seem like a bad time.

See that easy apply button? Don't hit it they just throw those in the trash. Now you're gonna want to go to the company's website and check their careers page.

Oh? That job doesn't exist anymore. Cool go back to the job board and find another one.

Great you found another job, you're on the company's career page and the job exists!! So you're going to need to make an account on the career page website. They're using Workday, the same site as the last job you applied for? Who cares? You need to make another account for THIS job's workday page.

Now you're going to upload your resume. That'll autopopulate about 15 boxes with everything on your resume, except formatted wrong and with tons of errors. So just go through and painstakingly check the dates on all of that and rewrite everything you already laid out in an aesthetically pleasing format on your resume.

Ok time for the cover letter, explain why this specific job and company are deeply important to you. You love their mission statement and wouldn't even laugh if their ceo was gunned down in the street. You'll really want to reiterate the things you just spent the last 20 minutes filling out on the resume section

(Remember to include language from the job description, people who work in HR are lower than dogs and they need patterns or they get confused.) Write about a page, but hey don't sound too desperate or robotic this is where they judge your character!

Maybe add your portfolio site at the end here, who knows if that helps no one has ever clicked mine haha.

Anywayyy time to hit apply! Congrats! You'll see that confirmation email come in and you should be getting the rejection letter in about 2 weeks. Unfortunately your resume didn't have the right buzzwords and the AI auto rejected you :(

Time to start again and try not to kill yourself!

[your-werewolf-boyfriend]

Listen to me

Listen very closely

The above is exactly why half of my friends come to me, and cry they're suffering, and I get to bestow my job hunting knowledge on them. I love this shit, it's a game.

For credentials my fastest job hunting time has been 1 week. I searched for 1 week, got an interview, and was hired within a week. My slowest was 1 month, while out of work, while telling ALL my interviewers that I quit my work without notice (I was testing my interviewers to see how shocked they'd get when I'd tell them why, anyone who wasn't shocked I would tell them at the end that I will keep them in mind (not)). My entire average is 2-3 weeks.

Firstly, what you're gunna do is pick a job sector. You're gunna pick a few of these by the end, but for now pick one. Maybe you wanna do bookkeeping, maybe you wanna do something in doggy daycare. Maybe you're a sous chef. Idk! Figure out what abouts you want first. Do not apply to anything yet. You're gunna look at the job description, I've picked out a few for bookkeepers below.

Now what you're gunna do is you're gunna look for "buzz words", or rather words that are gunna appear commonly and indicate the tone for that job. I've highlighted some, but not all in my examples below

Just look at that snout at how similar those descriptions are!

Now that you've got your buzzwords, you're gunna slap those babies into your resume! You see, since your resume is usually read by a computer first, you're gunna trick the computer into giving it to a person. Really what the computer is scanning for is how similar your resume is to the job description. Remember your bullet points, and to keep it short, try to only have 3 to 5 bullet points per job:

- Processed over 500 invoices a day in an efficient and accurate manner

- Curated reports for management review by utilizing available data

- Monitored and recorded over 100 submissions each day increasing accuracy by 50%

These are some great, made up examples I pulled from those buzz words. You might notice I added some numbers into there. That's something you'll wanna try and note for yourself, how much of something you can do, how accurate, how much efficiency you increased, these look GREAT when your resume gets past the computer and is moved in front of a real person.

Now you have your sector-based resume with lots of buzzwords. This is great! Now for the easy part. You're gunna channel your inner "IDGAF" And you're gunna send that to every listing you like on indeed. Filter for "Apply on Indeed" and spam that shit. Sometimes you gotta answer a few extra questions, but if they give me more than 5 quick questions I trash the submission and move on.

Don't waste your time jumping through hoops, streamline it for yourself and use the same methods companies are using. Push MASSIVE amounts of average quality resumes out. The more opportunities taken = the greater the chance of success. For every opportunity taken you've now pitched a chance of success, for every resume you cannot submit because you're piddling around on their stupid website or answering 50 interview questions online, you send out a 0% chance of success.

So go, try this, and see how it works for you.

Some additional things to consider:

- Add random shit in your resume, I added my "Board Game Club" (BDSM group) into my resume for hobbies and discussed how I got my start using sparklines there

- Never underestimate the flair of a little Clipart fleur-de-lis or something on your resume. Never put colored Clipart, but a little floral or swirl design located somewhere nice makes it stand out

- if you don't have a degree that doesn't mean they won't pick you, twice now I've come to a job without a bachelors and being honest that I was only getting an associates before I think of my next steps

- Embellish, do not lie. Jargoning your job description to make it sound cool and professional is GREAT. Do not give me a resume saying you can use CNC machinery when you've only used a 3D printer. Just tell me you know how to program and manage a 3d printer and want to learn CNC machinery.

- Keep. Your. Resume. To. Two. Or. Less. Pages. You don't need EVERY job, only the relevant ones, if your interviewer asks about the gap, tell them what job you had during that time (or if you wanna lie say you were taking college courses and were on a break, you dont need a degree to say you took courses) and that you only wanted to showcase the most relevant ones

- I'm serious on that last one I'll eat your fucking resume

[johannestevans]

I love hobbies that get you out of doors. Did you know you can volunteer as a contributor on findagrave.com and you can take photographs of gravesites and memorials to help people track burial and geneaology records?

[nitashinori]

That post about death note being "everyone's first anime" (untrue statement) made me curious and now I want to gather data for science

Can you reblog this and tell me where are you from and what was your starter anime?

[mosoderbergh]

I hate myself for this and maybe it's a hot take in disguise but: Solas and Mythal are just Elphaba and Glinda in a different font. Same general dynamic in how they view proximity to power and personal responsibility. Same potential for a fucked up not healthy unending love-hate-zigzag. Only in this one Glinda somehow ends up as the bog witch a couple centuries later.

[mosoderbergh]

A thing I find intensely frustrating about the Solas Dragon Age debate (TM) is that there are two factions (Solas never did or thought anything morally questionable ever vs. Solas is just a Pride Demon and an irredeemable liar) who are constantly accusing each other of being naive or misunderstanding the character. Meanwhile both sides have the exact same approach to character analysis: Cherrypicking certain things Solas says and hailing them as "canon" while disregarding anything they deem contradictory as "well he was lying when he said that obviously".

Like... You're out here talking about how other people must not be media literate enough to understand, all while never (or only when it serves you) acknowledging that character development (in either direction) is a thing. Or that something a character says might depend on the context of who they are talking to or their mental state at the time. Or that other characters, whose opinions on Solas you take as canon, might have character flaws of their own that skew their reading of him.

You really are taking a multifaceted character and going "Well obviously this one facet is the correct reading and everyone else is stupid". That kind of argument might get you through a high school book report if you're literate enough to give one or two good examples. But as an actual, in-depth reading of a character, it's shallow and just... Boring. Why would you dig your heels in the sand about this? "No this character can't be interesting! You should disregard anything but these two examples of him following his worst (or best) instincts! That's how good character analysis works!"

I hope to God most of the writers of these posts are teenagers, but I know full well they're not.

[beardedmrbean]

how to make your effects extra special

[the-thought-emporium-imperial]

It can be somewhat disheartening when you the artisans and craftsman of yesteryear who created miracles out of limited technology go forgotten. Always nice to see someone somewhere making tributes to them.