YES THAT’S RIGHT A RAFFLE TO KICK OFF THE PREORDER!

As a lesbian who used to identify as aro/ace, I just wanna say that I'm never going to stop supporting the aro/ace community. It was a big part of my personal journey and I really valued being part of a group that's so open to people exploring their identity. If you don't believe that aro/ace identities are valid and belong in the lgbt+ community, I don't want you on my blog

11 Questions Meme

I was tagged by startrekmania. (Oh God, I've never been before and I'm all flustered about it.) It's a question game! Here are the rules: Answer the questions. Write 11 new questions. Tag 11 people. Let them know they’ve been tagged and…GO!

1. STAR TREK???

I'll take one in every color. *expectantly folds hands together* I’m a new Trekkie, just sat down to my first TOS episode earlier this year in fact, but I've fallen hard and I'm so far gone. Like, picking out my Starfleet uniform pajamas gone. I intend to see all of it, though, in order of publication.

2. Pick your favorite character from your favorite book, movie, or TV series and explain why! No, it does not have to be Star Trek.

Mm, well. Choosing absolute favorites isn't exactly my thing - no one and nothing ever occupies those spaces for long, alone at least. It's a temporary position, we'll put it that way. But! For Star Trek, it's always been Spock. AOS, TOS, every possible iteration; all his imperfections, his irrationalities, his mistakes, and the other sides of those coins. I just flat-out love him.

3. What stereotype would you stereotype yourself as?

Hm. If we go all TVTropes here, The Quiet One? Either that, or Defrosting Ice Queen with a generous shot of Hates Small Talk.

4. What is/was your favorite/best subject in school?

Thankfully I'm well and truly out of it now, but it was English. I was one of those insufferable advanced track underachievers it came naturally to. I had just enough raw talent to maintain and even sometimes surpass the expected level of performance in my classes without much effort - sat through a few awkward heart-to hearts with teachers who thought that with further application I could have a future as an author, in fact - but I was honestly never more miserable than when I was writing. And that still holds true. So it was my best, yes, but never my favorite.

5. What’s your dream job?

This is unimpressive. But anything that totals around thirty hours a week, is done solitarily, requires constant physical exertion, and is never taken home after hours suits me. Extra points for low stakes and midnight shifts. You know, office cleaning, overnight retail ... I'm not ambitious, and I don't dream above what I consider my desserts.

6. How has your blog transformed from when you first created it?

When I first joined up just over a year ago I had no intention of running a blog of my own - my account was strictly a way to keep tabs on the artists, writers, and other fandom creatives whose work I wanted to follow. Even so, I was terribly self-conscious about everything tumblr at first;  I didn't even click like on all of the posts I genuinely liked for fear of drawing attention to myself. It took a few months for me to brave interacting with other users (my first foray into that venture was my entry for the I'm the Real Project), and a few more to start posting anything of my own. I'm still not what you would call an active poster, but now there's at least a bit to see on my page. Check out my art tag, if you want?

7. Android, iPhone, oldPhone, WindowsPhone, BlackBeret (Blackberry), or other?

iPhone. My S.O. received one as a gift from his father, and before you could say "hailing frequencies open" I had it nestled between an off-brand screen protector and a Spock-themed hard case, bursting with bookmarks and notes on fic reccs. It's more of a portable slash fiction library than a communication device, really, as far as I'm concerned.

8. xBox, PlayStation, PC, Wii, or other?

xBox, PlayStation, and PC! I've got a first-gen box and a 360, as well as a PS1 and 2. Besides that, I've got a NES, SNES, N64, Gamecube, GameBoy, GBA, DS, DSiXL, 2DS, Genesis, Saturn, and Dreamcast. I ... might have a bit of a habit.

9. What career would you have in Starfleet and why?

I'd be stunned more than anyone if I managed to snag a berth in Starfleet of all places, but knowing me it'd have to be something maintainence-related; haven't got the education or experience for anything else. I'd be the one scrubbing down the corridors, polishing the bulkheads, sanitizing the replicators. Unglamorous, maybe - but I don't live my life at work.

10. More specifically, what would you love to do in Starfleet and why?

I'm kinda delighted that there's a distinction made between what you'd actually do and what you'd love to, haha - refreshing. Call me crazy, but if I could choose I think I'd be proud to don a redshirt and do my level best to protect and serve my fellow crewmen phaser in hand, even if it would very likely mean my death. I've always been a crack shot, oddly enough, and I've got a decent danger sense. Call it intuition? Frankly, having the opportunity to bend any skill I have to service other than my willingness to singlemindedly work where other people just won't for once (if you can call that a skill) ... would be interesting.

11. What’s your biggest fear?

This questionnaire doesn't pussyfoot around, does it? *shuffles feet* I'll come out and say it, though; the thing I'm most afraid of is losing my significant other to death. It terrifies me so much to think about that I can barely bring myself to type it out - we've been together eight years and understand each other so well, leaving even the love aside - that I can't help but believe I'll never find anything to rival it again. I'd unironically call the man my t'hy'la ... so, um. Yeah. I'll play myself out.

Oh, but my questions!

1. List your top three vices. 2. Now, your top three virtues. 3. Any personal quirks you're fond of? 4. What was the last thing you were really surprised by? 5. Lay out your favorite outfit, and tell us why it's your favorite. 6. And your favorite meal? Take us all around the plate. (Bonus: give recipes.) 7. What was the first thing you can remember being a fan of, i.e. your first fandom? 8. Is there anything you've always wanted, but would be embarrassed to actually own? 9. Can you recite anything from memory, like a poem, or a passage from a script or book? 10. Would you rather be caught in a lie, or realize that someone's been dishonest with you? 11. If you had to choose between a new television adaption, movie, or novelization of your favorite story, which would you go with?

As for my tags, because I'd love to see their answers, I'll go with: sionid, sunderlorn, wiggleofjudas, needlesslycryptic, trashhqueen, and maketreknotwar. Hope you don't mind, tag-ees!

But I confess I don't actually have enough tumblr acquaintances to completely fulfill the last bit of this meme. So if you're seeing this and would like to make a go of it, consider yourself tagged by me!

Not again! (Now with bonus lens flare.)

Any of the three options would serve for me, personally: the replay retcon,  a "choose your own" timeline, or just kinda understanding the real-world reasons behind the whole thing on a meta-level outside of the narrative. All of those work. And honestly, the second option (leaving it to the reader to mentally redistribute the story episodes across whatever constitutes a more believable expanse of time for them) has been my way of keeping the sequence of events and the flow of time in line with the tone of the rest of the thing all along. You know what I mean? Damn near everything else about the world depicted in Simra's journal feels so credible, despite the fantastical setting, that the idea of, say, getting from hold to hold in a matter of a few days or nights stood out in all the wrong ways.

Not that I'm criticizing! *nervous shuffling*

Anyway, as for early volume headcanons, how about this one:

Simra's first journal was canonically lost, along with his father's sword, when he was captured and stripped of all his possessions by the Stormcloak patrol that took him at the Dunmeth pass. If Simra really has been purposefully writing for an audience all this time, and his writings are, at least in part, a calculated bid for posthumous control of his legacy and the chance to eulogize himself... then I imagine he'd regard the loss as a great one. Given how uncomfortable he is with anything that threatens his agency, even symbolically, my bet is that he'd move to retake his position as arbiter of his own legend as soon as possible. After all, the absence of that journal would leave a significant void in the story at a pivotal juncture—the beginning, his beginning—and I doubt he'd be content to allow anyone else to fill it. Regardless of whether the gap was bridged with truth, lies, or conjectures, they wouldn't be his.

So he'd rewrite it. And that could account for both the comparatively grand, mythologizing style of and the dating inconsistencies in the journal we've come to know as the first. Even ordinary people have a tendency to dramatize their lives in the retelling of them, let alone the re-retelling, agendas notwithstanding. Distance from the times in question could conceivably muddle his recollection of the exact dates involved as well. Either that, or it's obfuscation—all caught up with Simra's own peculiar blend of vanity and self-deprecation.

That's it! That's my theory.

http://dunmerofskyrim.tumblr.com/post/85829308915/dunmerofskyrim-dunmerofskyrim

carletoncolton replied to your post “OOC: Timeframe”

Well … it seems like something to ret-con to me. I’d work on changing the dates; the other explanations for the inconsistencies feel a little forced. Really, why would Simra...

I'm not from America so I don't get what happened to Brown...

Michael Brown, described by his teachers as a ‘gentle giant’, was an eighteen year old who had just graduated high school, saying to one of his friends ‘we made it' and telling him that “he wasn’t going to end up like some people on the streets. He was going to get an education. He was going to make his life a whole a lot better." 

On the 9th of August, 2014, a Saturday, Michael and a friend, Dorian Johnson, whose account can be seen in the link, were walking down Canfield Drive to Michaels grandmothers house when a police vehicle cut them off. 

According to Johnson, the police officer, named Darren Wilson "approached us, and as he pulled up on the side of us, he didn’t say ‘freeze,’ ‘halt,’ or nothing like we were committing a crime. He said, ‘Get the f—- on the sidewalk!’ I told the officer we were not but a minute away from the destination.” 

The official reason the police officer approached them was because of jaywalking, which was stated by Police Chief Jackson: "Police Chief Thomas Jackson said Wilson did not initially make a connection between the robbery and Brown … Wilson stopped Brown and a friend because "they were in the middle of the street, blocking traffic," Jackson said."

What happened next is of contention - witnesses have their accounts as do the police and Darren Wilson - but what can be certain is that there was a physical struggle between Michael and Wilson, as there was Michaels DNA found inside the car

Wilson states "punches started flying" but I find it odd that a 289 pound, 6’4 man in his prime didn’t create more damage to Wilsons face. It’s odd that there is hardly any swelling when a man who is 80 pounds heavier than Wilson, and has the advantage of being outside the car, is punching the officers face so much so that Wilson felt like his life was threatened, no? 

Brown was also UNARMED, as he reportedly stated numerous times to Officer Wilson. 

The first shot was then fired, smashing the glass and Michael began to flee. At some point, Michael was hit in the arm and turned to face Wilson, his hands up and saying "don’t shoot" before being shot a collective six times, with one fatal shot to the head, including the eye.

Wilson estimated that "Brown ran 20-30 feet away from the car and then charged another 10 feet back towards him." But Brown died 150 feet away from the car. It’s impossible that he charged another 10 feet. 

Wilson describing the altercation before Michael was killed: “The only way I can describe it, it [Michael] looks like a demon, that’s how angry he looked. He comes back towards me again with his hands up.” It. He called Michael ‘it’. And a demon. Does that not give some indication to what Wilson was thinking when he killed Michael? 

@TheePharoah then tweets “I JUST SAW SOMEONE DIE OMG” with a link to a picture of Wilson standing over Browns body, but I will not link that. 

Browns body was left on the street for 4 and a half hours. No ambulance was called. The police didn’t even let Michaels mother see the body of her son. She later talked to reporters at the scene. 

In the later afternoon, this image of Browns stepfather went viral on twitter, holding a sign saying ‘FERGUSON POLICE JUST EXECUTED MY UNARMED SON’ 

Antonio French provided coverage via twitter and vine when no one else was in the hours after Michaels death (x) (x) (x) (x)

Peaceful Protests occurred in the following days on the streets of Ferguson. The protestors were blasted with tear gas and were ran out of the streets by a militarised police force. 

A no fly zone was put into place, the media were forced to leave, and protests were banned by the police force in the next few days. 

August 15th, Ferguson Police Dept. release a tape they brand as Michael Brown robbing a local convenience store by stealing $48 worth of cigarillos. Police didn’t include this footage which shows Michael Brown paying for the cigarillos.  Wilson also didn’t complete an incident report, which is against the law. 

Store owner states through his lawyer that he, nor his employees, called 9/11 about the ‘petty theft’ and that the Ferguson Police Dept. had requested the tape days after Michael was murdered. 

Store owner attorney states: “Whatever the police are looking for on the surveillance tape, has nothing to do with what went on in the street.”

November 24th: After nearly four months of paid leave, in which time a fundraiser for Darren Wilson raised over $400,000, Wilson got married, a Grand Jury came to their decision to not indict Darren Wilson. Here is the transcript for those sittings, including every piece of evidence used. Here are all the ‘facts’. They had been hearing evidence since August 20th. A Grand Jury’s decision to not indict is extremely rare, about 0.006% of cases aren’t indicted as of 2010

Some other interesting links: Conflict of interest with the Prosecuting Attorney that hints at bias, the rarity of a Grand Jury not indicting, leader of the KKK admits to off the record contact with the police, Anonymous has evidence that Darren Wilson has a connection to the KKK, Darren Wilson racially profiled before he killed Michael Brown

If you want to help, there are a variety of ways you can: this campaign for bail for ferguson protestors, change.com petition against police violence, sign this ‘we the people’ petition, sign this petition to take the case to the supreme court, donate to Ferguson library which is open despite the schools being closed, watch livestreams and by spreading information of what’s going on in Ferguson - talk about DeAndre Joshua, 20, who was killed in the riots yesterday while in his car. Talk about Michael Brown. Spread information about the protests, about how to protect yourself from tear gas, about their innate human rights. Support the protestors, and support the black community. 

I know I’m missing stuff, so if there is anything else I’m missing, or you think should be added, please do. If anything is found to be offensive, please message me and I’ll make changes to the links. 

Daily Affirmation 682.

Having sex does not make you human. Wanting sex does not make you human. Feeling sexual attraction does not make you human. You can have, want, or feel some of these things, or all of them, or none of them, and still be human. Humanity is an intrinsic part of your existence. Nobody gets to take it away from you because of your asexuality, regardless of what that means you do and do not want.

We've lost a lot to the onslaught of enshittification but I can think of none more brazen than Discord getting rid of the send button

You're asexual? But...

“but sex is what makes us human!”

  in 1916 a French officer in his twenties writes his

doctoral dissertation under

heavy mortar fire.

he sends it by mail, a page

at a time, to his wife.

a week before he’s to step up to the podium and

defend his work rather than hiscountry

he is killed in action.

even as the bullets rip

through him he still wishes he could have become a professor

in French literature and

the university awards him a posthumous Ph.D.

sex is

  a woman breaks down in tears on the phone because

a week is not enough time to

get over a breakup.

her sister drives an hour across town,

comes up the front steps with

a gallon of ice cream and somebeer

and together they eat moose tracks and marathon

every

single

Godzilla movie

ever made.

  sex is

she’s late for work but her car isn’t

starting and even through her coat and hat she’s cold.

she knows she can’t be late again because she’s missed

one time too many already because her

father’s nurse was sick with the flu and someone

needed to help him bathe.

the clock ticks past fifteen after and she hits

the wheel like it’s a heavy bag as though that will help

steps on the gas like the car will go

and wonders how she will pay rent

and how she will feed her father.

sex is

  it takes three people to hold the predator down because

even with the cover over his head

a bleeding eye and shattered wing

he is trying to hurt them.

none of them have seen this bird before in their lives but

they bandage his wing and head and give him a painkiller and

put him in a warm place to sleep and heal because

it is right.

at first he is paralyzed and cannot

fly but soon he is taking steps

and then fluttering, and then soaring, and

six months later he is whole and healed and hunting.

once he is gone they never see him again

which means they’ve done their jobs right.

sex is

  in 1969 a girl watches grey-and-white footage on her parents’ tiny television and

can’t quite believe that what she is seeing is not a movie set but

another planet.

the men on the screen look a little like

aliens with bulbous heads and no faces and fat

marshmallow arms

but they are still men.

her mother puffs on a cigarette behind her and declares that

this is progress

even if it was just a small step.

the girl grows up to be not an astronaut but a secretary

and her boss calls her ‘sweetheart’.

but sex is

  a boy is taught that real men don’t cry so

he doesn’t.

when his best friend dies from a self-inflicted

gunshot wound, he locks himself

in the shower every day and sobs under scalding

water until it runs cold

so nobody will see him grieving

so nobody will see that tears are just love that

has no place left to go.

he learns to dull love rather than suppress its expression and

soon the owner of the liquor store knows him by name.

three DUIs, two evictions, and twelve steps later,

he is feeding people at a homeless shelter,

and telling them it’s all right to cry.

Sex is

  the broken man tells the comedian

that he didn’t mean to step in front of the car but the rain

made it hard to see.

he seems okay but his leg

does not.

the comedian clutches a grubby receipt with the driver’s

plate number scrawled on the back

in pink pen, stands out in the rain so the broken man

can have his umbrella,

and gives him the comedy routine that ruined his career

so the man doesn’t think about the pain in his leg.

once he’s out of the hospital, the fixed man sends him a thank-you card

with kittens on it.

what makes us human

  yawning is contagious,

and there is a species of bird whose young we call “pufflings”.

melodic collections of sound, spaced by silence,

can move us to tears.

the tallest building in the world is

two-thousand seven-hundred and seventeen feet tall.

in less than eighty years we went from our first powered flight

to touching the moon,

and in one-hundred from the first phone call

to instantaneous connection between thinking machines of our own creation.

we make pies out of tree organs

and let cow’s milk ferment until it hardens and then

we put them together, because apple pie with cheddar cheese is delicious.

what makes us human is

the earliest fossils of anatomically modern humans are

two-hundred thousand years old .

we have had pet dogs

for sixteen-thousand of those years, longer

than corn

or the wheel.

the steps we take are part of

one of the most energy-efficient gaits the

animal kingdom has ever seen.

we invented the concepts of love

and hate

and justice, and mercy

and we invented the language to convey them.

we sharpened rocks, then metal, to convince other people

who don’t hold the same idea of those things as we do

because we think

it’s right.

we are two hundred millennia of love and disappointment and

sorrow and innovation and

mercy and kindness and dreams

and failure

and recovery.

but sex is what makes us human.

Want an awesome Star Trek Backpack? Want it for free? Then this is the post for you!

It’s been a bit since my last giveaway, and I know everyone really likes the backpacks, so I thought I’d give one away!

There will be ONE prize: A custom backpack with the fabric of your choice! Or, if a backpack isn’t quite to your taste- any other bag in my shop! Awesome right?

To enter you are allowed ONE REBLOG and ONE LIKE per day. Each note gets you one entry and I’ll use a random number generator to pick the winner. (I’m not responsible for any tumblr fuckary i.e. lost reblog’s or likes.)

You do not have to follow me to enter- however, if you like Star Trek enough to wear a one of these backpacks, I’d say you have a good chance of liking my blog. Also if, when I select your name, I see you’re following me, you’ll get a little extra in your package!

And speaking of something extra: if you place an order between now and the deadline, use the coupon code 10STARTREK at my shop and get 10% off your order! 

The giveaway will close on Saturday June 22nd at 9PM PST. The winner will be tagged in a post and I’ll also send an ask, so be sure yours is open. The winner will have 24 hours to respond to the message. If I don’t receive a response within 24 hours, I will select another recipient.

Good luck!

Asexual Sexual Orientations 101

Sex Positive: I don't feel sexual attraction but I do enjoy the physical sensation of sex. (Maybe even crave it!)

Sex Neutral: I can have sex but I don't need it. To be honest I have no strong feelings about sex. But a slice of pizza would be better.

Sex Repulsed: I don't like sex. I don't want to have sex. I'm not going to have sex with you. I understand that people enjoy sex but I do not.

The presence of a libido does not invalidate any of these orientations. Dicks jokes and sexual humor do not invalidate these asexuals. These orientations are a SPECTRUM and are very fluid. Asexuals can and do exist in between theses definitions.