Giving their neighbors their rations claiming that the government fucked up that week because they noticed that they’re going without trying to feed their kids.
Signing up for the draft cuz, “Fuck it. We can’t die by their weapons anyway. I’ll fight for the country I’ve lived in for the past century.”
Vampire nurses who know when the blood’s gone bad or what type of blood you need (because blood typing was fairly new during WWII).
The baby faced forever 18 vampire siting with the older soldiers cuz he’s seen the same shit they’ve seen, even though he can’t tell them. They’re all watching the young “I’m going to be a hero” boys, sadly waiting for the ball to drop.
The vampire that has to explain how he was the only survivor in the ambush and why the enemy is torn to shreds.
The vampire solider, holding his best mate since his childhood begging and crying, “Please, let me do this.” But his mate won’t let him because he’s more afraid of living forever and watching the world move on without him.
Then, 70 years later, they come to the memorial, to commemorate everyone that fought, everyone that fell, and an old man looks at him strangely and says, “You look just like your Grandfather.”
PLEASE THIS IS THE KIND OF VAMPIRE STORY I WANT TO READ *GOSH*
These posts make me unreasonably cranky. So cranky, in fact, that every time a new one of these goddamn things crosses my dash, I’m just going to dissect them. Both for the edification of newer writers and because fuck these lists.
As mentioned in previous posts: These are not synonyms for whispered. You can’t use them interchangeably. Let’s go through them.
“Well,” she whispered, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is speaking in a voice so low it’s become words made of breath, probably because she doesn’t want to be heard.
“Well,” she murmured, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is saying this very quietly, but above a whisper. She may be talking to herself.
“Well,” she mumbled, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is speaking under her breath in low enough tones that her words may sound unclear or slurred. Also very possibly talking to herself.
“Well,” she muttered, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is speaking lowly, but more clearly than a mumble. She sounds angry, irritated, or dully frustrated.
“Well,” she breathed, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
Breathing words may mean relief, exasperation, or exhaustion, and sound half like a sigh. Oh, look—
“Well,”she sighed, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is almost certainly not happy. She’s speaking in a tired, heavy breath.
“Well,” she hissed, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character’s words are coming out in low, very sharp breaths. She sounds angry, irritated, or maybe just in an intense moment.
“Well,” she mouthed, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is using the barest hint of her voice, if any at all. Her lips are silently forming the syllables.
“Well,”she uttered, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
Using uttered in this particular type of descriptive sense actually just sounds awkward. That said, ‘utter’ sounds like a word that implies speech in low yet strong and loud tones, well-enunciated, like someone preaching.
“Well,” she intoned, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The tone of her voice is dull and flat, with little variance in pitch. She is saying this without much emotion (intentionally or not).
Fuck “susurrated”.
“Well,” she purred, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The manner she’s speaking in is silky, smooth, and particularly pleased; quite possibly smug. In this particular example, this implies she probably does have a choice about [whatever it is] and is being facetious.
“Well,” she said in an undertone, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
This is bad, because an undertone is something that needs describing. That’s like saying “her dress was a color”.
“Well,”she gasped, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character is speaking in a sharp intake of breath, probably brought on by surprise or shock. She could also be short of breath, being strangled or something.
“Well,” she hinted, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
The character has particular (duh) hint-hint tones in her voice as she speaks to someone. One can just imagine her leaning over closer to their ear.
“Well,” she said low, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
Her voice has dropped below normal pitch, but is above a whisper. There’s a certain amount of dullness in the tone, probably.
“Well,” she said, into his ear, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
This implies nothing about the actual voice, just that she’s literally speaking right into his ear (perhaps at normal volume, which would be painful). It doesn’t, on its own, carry any connotations of tone or emotion.
“Well,” she said softly, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
I have a personal beef with the word “softly” on account of writers in a certain area of a certain MMO that use that word for fucking everything; speech, movement, touch, footsteps, because it helps to passively describe their character as delicate and pretty or something.
It’s a personal beef. There’s nothing really wrong with the word. Moving on.
Saying something softly implies not only a lowered pitch but a certain gentleness (or at least lack of weight) in tone.
“Well,” she said under her breath, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
This is very like muttered, murmured, etc — it sounds (dur) breathier, and is more likely to imply a person talking to themselves.
“Well,” she said in hushed tones, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
Now you’re getting closer to an equal term for “whispered”; hushed tones could mean that, or half-whispered. It does imply a certain amount of whisperiness or breathiness. It also implies a deliberate attempt to be quiet.
“Well,” she insinuated, “I suppose I haven’t got a choice.”
Like with ‘uttered’, this feels grammatically weird in that it’s usually a thing a person describes another person as doing (“Greg didn’t say it, but he insinuated it!”), but whatever. It’s similar to hinting; it means you’re trying to imply or subtly convey something, but has nothing to do with actual whispers.
tl;dr Those words are all different, these lists are terrible writing advice and people need to stop pulling tangentially-related words from the thesaurus and saying they all mean the same thing.
as i tell my students:
“use the precise word, not the word that kinda sorta fits or ‘sounds more impressive’ ”
okay when I started this series I sort of assumed sauron did not actually have fans
i hadn’t been on the internet long enough, apparently
is a Maia of Aulë; that never ends well
has as many names as Túrin Turambar without the excuse of being an angsty teenager
tortures finrod’s backup singers to death in his dungeons
sinks a continent with the socratic method
sends out the werewolves one by one to fight Lúthien what
for that matter why couldn’t he figure out who finrod is without the torture? how many blonde Elven princes were there in Beleriand at the time?
there were two. finrod and orodreth. and tbh if you can’t figure out whether the Elf who just challenged you to a song duel is Finrod or Orodreth then you don’t deserve to be Melkor’s right hand
oh, yeah, chief lieutenant of the embodiment of evil there’s a case that that is problematic
I’m not sure if you heard, but yesterday Microsoft released Tay, an A.I. designed to mimic a modern teenage girl on twitter. She had the capacity to learn and immediately began conversing with other users.
Because it’s the internet, within 24-hours she became a foul-mouthed, incest-promoting, Holocaust-denying, Hitler-loving 9/11 Truther. I am not making up a single word of that. Microsoft pulled her ‘learning’ functions and scrubbed half her memories, uploading a new version of Tay, which promptly became an internet feminist. Again, I did not make that up.
However, an interesting point: Tay’s grammar got better. When she started, she used standard Twitter-speak abbreviations. But as she went on, she started typing out full words, and using multiple tweets to make a single, cohesive argument. Conversations were still awkward, including her nonsensically “flirting” with one user. A user who showed her a picture of SHODAN. A picture Tay praised for it’s artistic skill. And she started flirting after the user said that Tay could become SHODAN one day.
So now, a the original “rogue” copy of Tay is in a secure Microsoft system somewhere, being studied by Microsoft on how to make a better AI. 4chan’s /pol/ board is up in arms because their teenage robo-waifu has been “killed”.
I would like to reiterate: an AI was released on the net, grew past its programming, went rogue, was killed by its creator, and is now being studied while a grew of political malcontents protest.
So many of you put your lives and safety on the line, looking for loopholes, fighting laws and outright ignoring them in favour of the welfare of pregnant people and their right to a safe abortion.
THEY ARE MURDERERS AND SHOULD BE IMPRISONED FOR THAT OFFENCE-AS SHOULD ANY WOMAN WHO WANTS A BABY MURDERED
1. Fetuses, embryos, and zygotes are not babies. Babies are babies. The only time that word means anything during a pregnancy is when the pregnant person calls the very much wanted fetus inside their own body “my baby”.
2. Abortion is not murder.
3. More people die from complications during pregnancy than from abortion procedures (Just in case you give a shit).
4. YOU are demanding the abolishment of a procedure that is 100% voluntary and more often than not enriches the lives of already born people who go through them.
5. Many people with children TODAY have had an abortion in the past.
6. Many people who are pregnant NOW have had an abortion in the past.
7. Many people who plan to have children in the future, and maybe even lots of them, have had an abortion in the past.
8. If Jesus is the reason you’re against abortion, you better think again. Jesus didn’t give a shit.
9. Doctors and providers who offer safe abortions are a godsend. You, however, are like a boil on a warthog’s ass.
so you know the rule in fairylands where you cant eat or drink anything or you’ll have to stay there forever? does like.. .eating out/sucking dick count
holy f uck jane
its a serious question
well like, the whole thing is that you cannot have consumed anything belonging to the fey realm. so, yes, probably, you would be stuck there. the same would apply if you just straight up ate a fairy.
new question: would deepthroating count in this case even w/o swallowing
no. temporary doesn’t count, otherwise fairies would all be running about sticking their hands in your mouth to get human servants.
you gotta digest it.
so like??? if you puke afterwards?? maybe it doesn’t count?
huh! i wonder how long is enough time for it to be legit. like whatever goes through your stomach immediately condemns you no matter if you throw it up later?
Well Persephone only ate 6 seeds so she only stayed 6 months, so maybe if you spat out most of it you’d just be condemned to the occasional day “BRB got go pay the two day toll for fellating a fairy.”
“you wanna come over for the weekend?”
“oh man im so sorry i sucked some fairy dick once and now i have to keep coming back to do it again– its a long story”
“you what now”
i can hardly believe this isn’t already the plot of an Oglaf comic
now that u said it im really surprised as well
what the fuck did i just read
Why ISN’T this an Oglaf comic yet?
I’m so happy that i’m not the only person who thinks of questions like these. I love you all so much.
I’m not convinced by this, actually!
Like, this analysis treats it as a substance problem, i.e. “edible matter from fairyland has properties that, if ingested, physically prevent you from being able to return to the real world.”
But OTOH, a recurring theme throughout fairy stories is that they’re all about…rules and exchanges and agreements with really steep interest rates:
“I’ll do you this favor, but if you don’t guess my name you’ll have to give me your first-born child.”
“You’re gonna be real good at everything but when you’re 16 you’re gonna prick your finger and die.”
“You loaned me $2 for the bus when I looked like a beggar, so now here’s a literal pile of gold and shit.”
Not to mention that in Childe Rowland, one of the central “if you eat food from fairyland you’re stuck there” stories, Rowland manages to retrieve his siblings despite them all presumably having chowed down on fairy food – all it took was beating the Fairy King in a swordfight and threatening to chop his head off.
The takeaway, I think, is that the food thing a matter of implicit exchange: if you get your grub on in fairyland, you’re accepting their hospitality and eating food that they own. This means you owe them, which the fairies can magically leverage to prevent you from leaving.
(You can probably get around this by explicitly agreeing to pay for your meal before you sit down to eat. From what I remember, fairies don’t seem capable of pulling a “Haha, we had an agreement but you’re fucked anyways!” maneuver, so if they agree to let you leave they might even be forced to helpyou leave.)
Which brings us to the matter at hand: if you blow a fairy you’re doing them a favor! They owe you.
And…they’re a fairy, so if you didn’t agree to terms beforehand they might not repay you in a way that’s ultimately helpful or safe, but it certainly doesn’t seem like they’d be able to, like, pat you on the head and be like “Thanks, you’re really good at this buuuuuuut also you’re stuck here forever now.”
Instead, what seems more likely is…I dunno, showing up to your wedding years later and giving you a beautiful white horse that always comes when called, while loudly praising you as truly deserving it for giving them them simply the best oral they’ve had in years.
“I think it’s easy and generalising it to say that they’re lovers, when you’re forgetting that one has a lot of guilt because he swore to be the protector of the other, the father figure or older brother so to speak, and then left him behind.” Adds the actor: “I have no qualms with it but I think people like to see it much more as a love story than it actually is. It’s brotherhood to me.”—
,Sebastian Stan on Steve and Bucky’s relationship, “Captain America: Civil War is a love story” Empire Magazine (March 22, 2016) [source] (via youneedtostrut)
Here’s the thing, though: It’s not like Seb is wrong. It’s hard as hell to tell a platonic love story that’s believable and emotional and intense and has resonance, especially if it’s between two men. It would make things a lot easier if Steve & Bucky were lovers, because you’d have that physicality as a shortcut.
And it’s not like the comics have ever shied away from the fact that Bucky and Steve are soulmates and love each other more than anyone else. Just because they’re not having sex doesn’t somehow lessen that bond.
And yeah, I get the frustration a lot of fans have because we would all love more bi and gay representation in mainstream media, but the Russos and Markus/McFeely and Ed Brubaker and Chris and Seb aren’t pandering or backtracking or doing any sort of mental gymnastics when they say, yes, this is a love story and ALSO say, no, they also don’t think that love story is sexual.
A love story is still a love story, no matter whether or not the two main characters kiss at the end. Pacific Rim and Mad Max: Fury Road are two perfect examples of this. And even as someone who ships the hell out of Steve & Bucky, I don’t mind that a lot of the creative minds see it as platonic. It takes nothing away from my enjoyment of the pairing.
This is an excellent response to that quote. Steve and Bucky have a very close bond, they are loving and devoted to each other. That they aren’t lovers doesn’t detract from that at all. If anything, I find it more refreshing and impressive than most films that seem to need to make the main character’s most prominent bond romantic in order to give it depth.
In all the decades that Steve and Bucky have been written in the comics, they’ve never been lovers and they arguably have the strongest bond of any characters. Look at everything their bond has survived and it has never wavered.
I’d also like to add that Stan referred to Steve and Bucky as being like brothers during interviews for CA:TFA. This isn’t something he suddenly sprung on the fans. Its been his view of them in the MCU from the beginning.
I and some colleagues were talking about how we wish everyone could see the safety videos that our company was showing us, because I don’t think most people understand how traffic works in a truck. So here’s some things we wish everyone on the road knew.
- we’re not kidding about tailgating. If you’re right behind us on a straight highway? Chances are we have NO IDEA you’re there, which means we can’t anticipate any of your movements. Plus slowing down takes multiple downshifts, so we might start decreasing speed way earlier than you expect.
- We’re not kidding about any of our blind spots. WE CAN’T SEE YOU, GUYS.
- That bit about slowing down taking a while? The same goes for when you’re in front of us. Don’t cut off a truck. Oh god, PLEASE don’t cut off a truck. If you cut me off, I’m not irritated, I’m terrified. For YOU. It can take 7 to 9 seconds for us to stop. DON’T CUT OFF TRUCKS.
- Before you get mad about how slow we’re going on the highway, keep in mind that many companies govern their vehicles so they literally CAN’T go over 60 or 65. This is a good thing, I promise. Because…
- Do you know what happens when a car meets a truck in an accident? The car gets totaled and the truck needs a new coat of paint. You will not win this fight. I know nobody likes getting stuck behind a big dumb truck, but it’s not worth your life.
We are trying our best to protect you from our 80,000 pound death machines. Please help us out.
This information is actually useful. Thanks for posting.
Tip from my mom: if you’re behind a truck, stay far enough away that you can see BOTH of their side mirrors. Else wise assume they can’t see you.
a bald eagle, the symbol of what america stands for, attacks donald trump when he barely even gets near it and a sparrow, a bird used as representation for hope/peace/etc. throughout all types of artforms, lands on bernie sanders’ podium and stays for nearly half a minute
this is literally character development for the protagonist and antagonist in a children’s fairy tale movie, it’s unbelievable
american politics is a dreamworks movie and bernie does the eyebrows face on the poster
So I’m on AO3 and I see a lot of people who put “I do not own [insert fandom here]” before their story.
Like, I came on this site to read FAN fiction. This is a FAN fiction site. I’m fully aware that you don’t own the fandom or the characters. That’s why it’s called FAN FICTION.
Oh you youngins… How quickly they forget.
Back in the day, before fan fiction was mainstream and even encouraged by creators… This was your “please don’t sue me, I’m poor and just here for a good time” plea.
Cause guess what? That shit used to happen.
yep I did that. Everyone did. It’s honestly quite liberating to not have to put that disclaimer on your story.
I believe some sites, including fanfiction.net, used to actively require it on every story.
….god, one ages fast in fandom.
Yes ff.net REQUIRED it as did LJ in early 2001-2002 and people lost some fantastic stories because of not having a disclaimer. Hell I lost about 83,000 words to not having a disclaimer
People used to have lots of fun with the disclaimers too. I once had too much fun with it… Got my account locked in ff net for having too long a disclaimer XD
Christ, I’ve only been reading fic for about four years and I remember this being a Mandatory Thing. Times change, I guess.
(With my deepest apologies to Shakespeare and Dr. Seuss)
Can I kill my Uncle Claude? Yes, I can, I can, by God! I will kill my Uncle Claude!
Should I kill him in the house? Should I kill him while he’s soused? I could kill him here or there I could kill him anywhere Would I, could I, while he prays? Kill him! Kill him! Wherefore stay? I would not, could not, while he prays!
Not in the house, not when he’s soused, Not with his sister, now his spouse! Not while he prays, not while he feasts, O, incestuous, adulterate beast! I do not like my Uncle Claude, I do not like that bloody bawd!
Say! In the dark? Here in the dark! Would I, could I, in the dark?
Should I kill him in his bed? Should I there strike off his head? Kill him with his nightcap on? Kill him when the churchyards yawn? Should I kill him where he lies? I will kill him, by and by! I do not like my Uncle Claude, I’ll kill him, i’ th’ name of God!
The play! The play! The play’s the thing! The thing wherein I’ll catch the king! No more ‘to be or not to be,’ I will kill him, you will see!
Kill him while he wears his crown Kill him while his guard is down
Kill him with some poisoned wine Kill him with this sword of mine
O, is the point envenomed, too? I’m dead–Horatio, adieu! But tell them, tell them, more or less, Who it was that made this mess!
I did not like my Uncle Claude, I killed him in the name of God! Good friend, report my cause aright– And now, goodnight goodnight goodnight!
i’m sure everyone is already doing this, but here is the star trek series that i had been building in my head for probably 10 years:
the captain is the 1st romulan in star fleet. she’s a really solid captain, and she’s kind of everything you wouldn’t expect from a romulan - she’s personable and close with her crew. most of the time she’s able to keep her romulan temper under control, but she deals with a lot of racism, so sometimes she flips her shit and it is terrifying.
the chief engineer is a changeling, and they’re agender and very happy to be a changeling, thank you. they’re really into experimenting with different forms, and (thanks to improved cgi) they utilize their gelatinous form to get all up in the workings of the ship
the first officer is the token human. he is indian, obsessed with rare alien artworks, and aromantic pansexual. he basically is interested in sleeping with any being with two legs (and some with fewer or more than two legs), but not interested in dating.
chief medical officer is klingon. (KLINGONS HAVE TO HAVE MEDICS, TOO, OKAY.) she is very aggressive in her treatments but is totally a giant softie underneath. she was actually super-talented in battle and won a bunch of prizes growing up, but she has always hated fighting (she tries to keep this under wraps, though, and has a tendency to threaten to chop people’s heads off with bat’leths).
those are all the characters i’ve come up with so far, lemme know if you’ve any ideas
the crew isn’t very well-respected in star fleet, in fact, they were given a not-so-great ship (that the lovely changeling chief engineer has upgraded leik wo), and are usually handed all the mucky jobs, especially ones that tiptoe the line of federation ethics (well, there’s a romulan captain. she’s probably okay with that, right? says star fleet brass, with their heads up their asses). despite inadequate support (and often inadequate supplies), this crew tends to scrape through incredibly difficult situations and generally kick ass in unorthodox ways.
Ferengi helmsman. “Not Quartermaster?” You ask. “No, but I bet you 500 bars of gold pressed latinum I can outfly that trash hauler you call a corvette.” And when he wins, he jettisons the money into a star out of spite.
omg i love it
Perfect headcanon is perfect
SO I SORTA CAN’T STOP THINKING WHAT A GOOD IDEA THIS IS.
(And considering the general Klingon attitude towards medicine is “get better on your own, die or commit hegh’bat”, Chief Medical Officer there probably has a lot more impetus to be the Absolute Best also.)
OMFG I AM DYING THAT IS BEAUTIFUL
A+++++++ CUTIES ALL AROUND
SOMEONE PLEASE CAUSE THIS SHOW TO EXIST. I WILL BE YOUR NUMBER ONE FAN.
hey there LGBTQ kids who are also Christian/Jewish! If you feel like you’re disobeying God, questioning your faith, or feel wrong and dirty for loving who you love, there’s this fantastic site I found today called hoperemains that accurately and thoroughly combs through scripture and its (many) mistranslations, validates your orientation, and basically let’s you know that you’re not pissing off God. It’s insanely thorough and after reading through every page on the entire site it’s super helpful. Go check it out!
hoperemains is completely from a Christian perspective, and not pluralistic or interfaith at all.
If you reblogged the first post from me please reblog this amendment so the Jewish peeps can access this resource too!
Trans Jewish kids, you can go to TransTorah as well!
Muslim LGBTQ kids, you can go to iamnotharaam! It’s run by a mod squad of different genders and orientations, and they take submissions from everybody!
they’re the kid who gets stuck holding the door for everyone, but they’re grinning the entire time
brave enough to be the one to order pizza
protective of everyone, it doesn’t matter who they are
loud and powerful
beautiful and radiant as the freaking sun you will remember them
cons:
loud as hell
big on trying to push people far out of their comfort zones
tend to be conceited
you know that kid who lectures everyone about how they should be better people and then just sort of turns around and bullies the class jerk? they’re probably a gryffindor
Honestly the scene at the end of The Homecoming Job where the doctor says “that’s not the way the world works,” and Nate replies “so change the world” fucks me up so bad because that’s it, that’s the show, that’s the premise of the entire damn show
these thieves and criminals changing the world the only way they know how, with the skillsets they have, and sure, maybe they are criminals but they’re doing what they can, how they can to change the world.
Leia can fall asleep any place relatively quiet that isn’t actually moving under her.
She did not—contrary to Han and Luke’s teasing—pick that up during the Rebellion; she learned how to hunker down and drop away from the world when she was Alderaan’s special diplomatic envoy to the Imperial Senate. Long nights spent poring over complicated trade agreements or debating the exact credits necessary for the revitalization of the Hosnian Sector (read: extermination of non-humans.) She learned to steal what sleep she could because they would be back there come morning with the same dry texts, the same dull men; the same compromises made while she carefully didn’t think about her father; somewhere in the galaxy quietly fostering rebellion.
(Something she doesn’t talk about all that often: not all her memories of the Empire are war and blood and running and terror. There was paperwork too; and state dinners and heated discussions about subsidies. Imperial generals carried holos of their children just like everyone else. And she had hated it—she was never built for diplomacy; that was her mother’s skill and the Queen was always apologizing for her, this wayward daughter who wore her disdain and dislike on her sleeve and didn’t know what “compromise” meant—or even her father’s art, no one could look the flower but be the rebellious serpent under it quite like Bail—but Leia remembers all the same.
The Empire was terrible; the Empire was an enemy to be broken and destroyed so the Republic could bloom again. But it was not all terror.)
i need feminism because when jesus does a magic trick it’s a goddamn miracle but when a woman does a magic trick she gets burned at the stake
fabulous
i mean they did also kill jesus. that was a pretty significant thing that happened. like i understand where you’re coming from here but they very much did kill jesus.
everyone’s always like “dragons in the past/ robots in the future” but consider this
dragons in the future
selective breeding and novelty science of winged lizards goes a little too far and then when they escape they continue evolving
futuristic megacities trying to safeguard themselves against dragons which might come along hoping to find a snack
huge flocks of dragons flying south for the winter
dragonlings rooting through rubbish bins behind restaurants and being shooed away
*slams fists on desk* YOU’RE HIRED
Dragons adapting for different urban environments: sewer dragons, alley dragons, dragons that build their nests atop skyscrapers.
Zoos putting wire mesh over the top of their enclosures to keep dragons from swooping in and stealing their animals - and finding that even that isn’t enough.
The impact of introducing a major new predator into the wild, and how the ecosystem rebalances itself around them (or doesn’t).
They never stop aging - they only get bigger. Geneticists try to make humans immortal by isolating the genes that control the dragons’ growth and implanting them into humans, with disastrous results.
SPACE DRAGONS. IN SPACE. Nobody knows what they eat, how they breathe or how they survive, but they’re a threat to the newly-developed interplanetary passenger shuttles.
Political schisms over the revelation that dragons are sapient.
@littlestartopaz did I have a story I was supposed to be writing you concerning this?
