You Drew That Whole Thing In Only 1.5 Hours?

The "Christmas Mindfulness" Episode

(This is a story concept for an episode of an ensemble-cast TV show, or maybe a webcomic or something. @homunculus-argument posted a story concept back in October that reminded me of it, but I decided not to put this on a reblog of that, because really, the only similarity is vibes.)

The story arc revolves around two characters: one is relatively new to the story's Found Family, and absolutely loves Christmas, or at least believes in spending "the Holidays" with people one loves. It helps if they're also either cheerful, a bit pushy, or both. I'll call this character "Willy."

The other character, for self-care reasons, always spends Christmas alone. By their own deliberate choice. For them, being alone at Christmastime is their way of celebrating their escape from their abusive family, or from some other tragic backstory that makes Christmas traditions especially distasteful or triggering. It helps if this is also a fairly introverted or pessimistic character. I'll call this second character "Wonty."

This is Willy's first or second Christmas with the Found Family, and Willy's excited about it, but they also learn that Wonty always chooses to spend Christmas alone. Willy sees this as tragic and concerning, and decides that Wonty needs their sympathy, company, and guidance. Either the rest of the group doesn't realize what Willy is planning to do, or Willy doesn't listen to or believe the others.

Willy prepares a quiet, low-key Christmas experience just for Wonty, designed to "fix" Wonty's attitude toward Christmas, then invites themself over to Wonty's home. You see, Willy doesn't understand that Wonty is enjoying spending Christmas alone. That possibility hasn't even occurred to Willy. In Willy's mind, they are making a noble sacrifice by skipping the Found Family's Christmas party, and instead trying to bring Wonty around to the joy of Christmas.

Wonty, answering their door, declines to invite Willy in. Wonty explains that they prefer to spend Christmas alone, celebrating their safety and independence. Willy brushes this off, and insists on being invited in, insists that Wonty needs this, until finally Wonty relents and decides to try and get this over with.

As Willy practices Christmas upon Wonty (if the narrative is set in modern North America, I like the idea that watching "Die Hard" together is Willy's plan), Wonty just gets more and more miserable every moment. Willy can see this, and gets more and more anxious and desperate to cheer Wonty up and change Wonty's mind.

Eventually, out of frustration and confusion, Willy does something that's inappropriate, something that crosses a boundary of some sort, just to try and reach Wonty in Wonty's deepening funk. This leads to a moment in which both characters are shocked by what just happened, then Wonty firmly asks Willy to leave. This bit probably depends a lot on how the actual characters would navigate this situation, but Willy does leave, whether immediately or after trying to salvage their plan.

Afterward, Willy ends up at the Found Family's annual Christmas party. Willy has themself a pity party over what happened, and expresses deep concern over Wonty's lack of Christmas spirit. The rest of the Found Family, or perhaps just a Heart or surrogate parent character, explains the details of Wonty's tragic backstory and reasons for isolating themself from Christmas celebrations, and lays down some home truths for Willy about boundaries and respecting differences. Some people just aren't going to see the world the way we do, and that's okay, and worth respecting.

There's no real reason Willy can't figure out some of the above paragraph on their own, except the concept has to come through to the audience somehow. Also, Willy now realizes that Wonty did try to explain all of this, but they steamrolled Wonty and didn't listen. Willy spends the rest of the evening processing all of this.

The next time Willy meets Wonty at their shared experience, or some other place Willy can approach Wonty in public, Willy presents Wonty with a thoughtfully-chosen peace offering, something they've found out, after some effort, that Wonty will genuinely enjoy. Willy apologizes honestly to Wonty and acknowledges what they did, promising never to visit them on Christmas or try to "fix" them, ever again. Wonty points out that the honest apology and clear contrition make a great deal of difference, and forgives Willy.

Hooray, everyone is okay again, and we grew in the process! The end.

Olivia's -- and Nix's -- incredulity as she discovers one by one the various shenanigans Open and Shut got up to in Season 1 is a beautiful thing... I am going to miss her reactions at the end of this arc! I hope the next guest player gets similarly surprised...

Good morning, fellow Americans! Are you enjoying each having a house and two cars? I like to mow my lawn

Oh, right.

I watched this a couple weeks before I came up with the bit about a triple-A publisher launching a video game that "plays itself for you," because they're that out of touch.

Must have still been kicking around my skull when I watched that Oxbox video about disturbing trends in the video game industry. The cringey XBox reveal in it prompted several pointed, well-reasoned comments, that was the other seed.

GAMES NEED AN EASY MODE.

Or maybe they don't. Today we look into it.

@is-it-a-man But... if Amaury Guichon makes himself a really, really good pair of wings out of chocolate...

I swear to god one of these days were going to see a video of Amaury Guichon and he's going to be making some wings and they are going to look dope as hell, the detail of each feather will be breathtaking, he'll spray paint them to perfection, but as the video goes on, he's not building any sort of winged creature, just the wings. And then there's a human-sized harness (also made of chocolate, somehow, he can do it). And he's attaching the wings to the harness. And he's putting the harness on and he demonstrates how he can flap the wings. And then he'll be off. Out the window and up and up and up. And we'll be looking at the livestream (it's a livestream now) and we'll scream "No, Amaury, the sun! It's going to melt the wings!". But he knows this already. And he is free.

I imagined a dyscalculic child, who isn't getting any help or support in learning math, nobody understands that they just don't get it...

Nobody understands that the child tries to solve math problems by making up stories about the numbers and operational symbols, fascinating, beautiful mythical or fairy-tale stories, and "drawing" the ending of the stories where the solutions should go.

Every math problem is a hypothetical situation involving stock characters, and the child believes they have to parse exactly what the situation is supposed to be, given the limited "shorthand" consisting of numbers and operational symbols and the arithmetical frameworks, and work out what the result would be.

And nobody, or almost nobody, ever gets to hear the stories.

Perhaps... perhaps Sauron could have become anything he wanted to, anything at all, with all that power, but he chose to become a gigantic glowing red eye simply because he couldn't comprehend that it looked ominous, he thought it looked great, he wasn't intentionally trying to scare or intimidate anyone. He was just that divorced from reality, and nobody dared to tell him otherwise.

Kind of like bureaucracies and corporations that commission terrifying and oppressive Brutalist architecture think it looks "rather nice, actually," because their aesthetics are skewed that far away from how ordinary people see the world... so far that "oppressive," "looming," and "unsettling" seem like positive traits.

Been awhile hasn't it

From episode 90 of the podcast "Lingthusiasm":

More power to that guy, he is a kindred spirit, but also

why is nobody talking about the little man-box??

NGL the idea of being properly seen unlocking one's latent superpowers is a pretty banger concept

Absolutely astonished that while helping a lady today she turned and said, “Your eyes are different colors!”

Reader. My eyes are different colors but it’s so subtle that I’ve had close friends who couldn’t tell the difference. I’ve excitedly told people only to have them clock it and go, “That’s it?”

I’ve had multiple people I’ve known for years see my eyes in sunlight and go, “Oh! Your eyes are green!”

Mom mother still calls me her blue eyed girl.

But here comes this beautiful lady. Who I’d only known for five minutes was just gushing about how cool it was that one of my eyes was greener and the other bluer and how she desperately wanted a dog with heterochromia and how she thought it was super noticeable.

My day is made. I feel like an anime protagonist. I could leap a tall building. I think this unlocked superpowers, probably.