allformsofisolation

Latest Posts by allformsofisolation

"This film was an incredible opportunity for me. And more than anything, I thought it was an opportunity for me to write a love letter to cinema, to all the things I love about going to the movies. [...] In many ways it's most important movie I've made, straight for me to all of you." - Ryan Coogler

SINNERS (2025) BEHIND THE SCENES (1/2) Dir. Ryan Coogler

the big three questions of media analysis: what the author wanted to say, what they actually said, and what they didn’t know they were saying

The evolution of (trans) man.

(Well, this one, anyway.)

Age 9: "Tomboy"

Age 15: Strictly enforced femininity

Age 30: Hitting the mental limits of being closeted all his life and about to crash HARD

Age 47: Fifteen years now since starting transition. Far more good days than bad, no regrets.

The world may be full of uncertainty and danger, but I resolve to continue to find joy in who I am. Be joyful to be kind to yourself and be joyful to spite the bastards who would tear us apart.

Been wondering if Tommy might go back to using 'Buck' to refer to Buck when next they meet, given the circumstances of their most recent parting, so... Bucktommy nation, what name will Tommy use for Buck when they see each other again in the two-parter?

I must explain to my American followers. Follow me on this thought experiment.

Read these questions. You do not need to answer, just read them.

Who is the current head of government of Ethiopia?

Are they a king, queen, president, prime minister, dictator, or tsar?

Are they generally liked or generally disliked by their people? Why?

Are they seen as conventionally attractive?

What was their most recent scandal?

What’s a weird outfit they’ve worn while in office?

What are their interior design preferences?

Has anyone tried to assassinate them? How many times?

What’s their favourite food?

Does Ethiopia have a national anthem?

What are the top 3 most iconic symbols of Ethiopia?

What’s the most prevalent religion in Ethiopia?

What are 5 Ethiopian TV series?

What languages are spoken in Ethiopia?

What are 5 Ethiopian celebrities?

Can you draw the Ethiopian flag?

What are 5 rights or privileges granted to citizens of Ethiopia?

What structure do Ethiopian school systems follow?

What are 5 Ethiopian foods?

What are 5 Ethiopian exports?

What countries are allied with Ethiopia?

What is one topic in Ethiopia that you are more educated on than in America?

What are 3 Ethiopian stereotypes?

Does Ethiopia have States, Provinces, or neither?

Where is Ethiopia’s government capital?

What currency is used in Ethiopia?

What animal is the Ethiopian symbol? Do they have one?

What is Ethiopia’s ethnic majority?

Who was their first government leader of Ethiopia? What is an interesting fact about them?

Who has Ethiopia gone to war against? Why?

Can you name 3 wars Ethiopia was involved in?

Can you name 3 Ethiopian women famous for their beauty?

What is the current Ethiopian political climate?

What areas of Ethiopia are considered rural or urban?

Can you name 3 major Ethiopian landmarks?

Can you name 3 Ethiopian amusement parks?

Can you name 3 Ethiopian national parks?

Can a civilian openly carry a gun in Ethiopia?

At what age can a person begin drinking Alcohol in Ethiopia?

What is the age of consent in Ethiopia?

Can you name 3 infamous Ethiopian criminals?

Can you name 3 Ethiopian comedians?

What was the most recent major natural disaster to hit Ethiopia?

Is Ethiopian culture as a whole generally considered more conservative or more progressive than your own?

Roughly how much money goes into the Ethiopian military budget? Millions or billions?

What are the staple crops in Ethiopia?

What is something that was invented in Ethiopia?

Who are 3 famous Ethiopian businessmen?

What are 5 wildly popular Ethiopian musicians?

What was one viral fashion trend among Ethiopian youth?

If you could correctly answer around 40 of these, then congratulations! That is what every other English speaker feels like living in proximity to America

That is the extent to which American media leeches into everything

Yes, it is weird

Being like. Post-suicidal is so strange. Like hiiiii everybody im new I spent a good chunk of my life languishing and have like 3 or 4 lived experiences. But now I'm ready to fuck and party or whatever. Can we be friends. Im so happy to be here. Can we be friends

Things worn down by people.

i think the near-extinction of people making fun, deep and/or unique interactive text-based browser games, projects and stories is catastrophic to the internet. i'm talking pre-itch.io era, nothing against it.

there are a lot of fun ones listed here and here but for the most part, they were made years ago and are now a dying breed. i get why. there's no money in it. factoring in the cost of web hosting and servers, it probably costs money. it's just sad that it's a dying art form.

anyway, here's some of my favorite browser-based interactive projects and games, if you're into that kind of thing. 90% of them are on the lists that i linked above.

A Better World - create an alternate history timeline

Alter Ego - abandonware birth-to-death life simulator game

Seedship - text-based game about colonizing a new planet

Sandboxels or ThisIsSand - free-falling sand physics games

Little Alchemy 2 - combine various elements to make new ones

Infinite Craft - kind of the same as Little Alchemy

ZenGM - simulate sports

Tamajoji - browser-based tamagotchi

IFDB - interactive fiction database (text adventure games)

Written Realms - more text adventure games with a user interface

The Cafe & Diner - mystery game

The New Campaign Trail - US presidential campaign game

Money Simulator - simulate financial decisions

Genesis - text-based adventure/fantasy game

Level 13 - text-based science fiction adventure game

Miniconomy - player driven economy game

Checkbox Olympics - games involving clicking checkboxes

BrantSteele.net - game show and Hunger Games simulators

Murder Games - fight to the death simulator by Orteil

Cookie Clicker - different but felt weird not including it. by Orteil.

if you're ever thinking about making a niche project that only a select number of individuals will be nerdy enough to enjoy, keep in mind i've been playing some of these games off and on for 20~ years (Alter Ego, for example). quite literally a lifetime of replayability.

The Art and Making of Hannibal: The Television Series.

I feel like we need a refresher on Watsonian vs Doylist perspectives in media analysis. When you have a question about a piece of media - about a potential plot hole or error, about a dubious costuming decision, about a character suddenly acting out of character -

A Watsonian answer is one that positions itself within the fictional world.

A Doylist answer is one that positions itself within the real world.

Meaning: if Watson says something that isn't true, one explanation is that Watson made a mistake. Another explanation is that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle made a mistake.

Watsonian explanations are implicitly charitable. You are implicitly buying into the notion that there is a good in-world reason for what you're seeing on screen or on the page. ("The bunny girls in Final Fantasy wear lingerie all the time because they're from a desert culture!")

Doylist explanations are pragmatic. You are acknowledging that the fiction is shaped by real-world forces, like the creators' personal taste, their biases, the pressures they might be under from managers or editors, or the limits of their expertise. ("The bunny girls in Final Fantasy wear lingerie because somebody thought they'd sell more units that way.")

Watsonian explanations tend to be imaginative but naive. Seeking a Watsonian explanation for a problem within a narrative is inherently pleasure-seeking: you don't want your suspension of disbelief to be broken, and you're willing to put in the leg work to prevent it. Looking for a Watsonian answer can make for a fun game! But it can quickly stray into making excuses for lazy or biased storytelling, or cynical and greedy executives.

Doylist explanations are very often accurate, but they're not much fun. They should supersede efforts to provide a Watsonian explanation where actual harm is being done: "This character is being depicted in a racist way because the creators have a racist bias.'" Or: "The lore changed because management fired all of the writers from last season because they didn't want to pay then residuals."

Doylism also runs the risk of becoming trite, when applied to lower stakes discrepancies. Yes, it's possible that this character acted strangely in this episode because this episode had a different writer, but that isn't interesting, and it terminates conversation.

I think a lot of conversations about media would go a lot more smoothly, and everyone would have a lot more fun, if people were just clearer about whether they are looking to engage in Watsonian or Doylist analysis. How many arguments could be prevented by just saying, "No, Doylist you're probably right, but it's more fun to imagine there's a Watsonian reason for this, so that's what I'm doing." Or, "From a Watsonian POV that explanation makes sense, but I'm going with the Doylist view here because the creator's intentions leave a bad taste in my mouth that I can't ignore."

Idk, just keep those terms in your pocket? And if you start to get mad at somebody for their analysis, take a second to see if what they're saying makes more sense from the other side of the Watsonian/Doylist divide.

i dropped by my favourite secondhand bookstore and found what is possibly the most incredible knitting book iver ever seen. that teaches you how to knit little gardens and sew them into a massive quilt 3d. the photos i took are atrocious and do NOT do this book justice

thats a PRIORY GARDEN WITH MONKS

IT EVEN TEACHES YOU HOW TO MAKE ALL THE TOOLS ABD BASKETS AND POTS AND PLANTS

LOOK AT THE SOME OF THE FOLIAGE

i have never been more upset to not have $30 ready to buy this. its incredible. i have to find it online somewhere. i knew the moment i saw this i had to share it with EVERYONE

Saw this on Twitter and I obligatory need to share it

everyone in the world is either a democrat or a republican. everyone in the whole wide world is a democrat and a republican and america is the largest and most populous country in the world and america is easily the most culturally diverse country in the world because the middle class white people in my state (like a little country) are very different than the middle class white people over there (another little country, once more called a "state") and you could never understand how bad it is in america, the main country in the world. where are you from again? it's bad in america and america is bad but the way that america is run is the only way a country could possibly be run unfortunately. i don't like it but it's the only right way for a country to be run and you don't get it because the main victims of the main country are all here and you aren't. where are you from again? they never told me about that place. i don't think you get that real people live in america. probably because you're a republican. real people live in america and real people are hurt by america but what can you do? god said america has to be like this. god said this because god is real so god is american. you don't get it because you're over there and we're all here in america, the realest country in the world. where are you from again? how can you talk like this with what's happening in america? you're a democrat, right? where are you from again? my country is so large it stretches over yours and presses down hard. it's not my fault that they never told me about that place. my country covers the world. you don't understand how bad this will be for real people in the real world, the first world, the only world. they never told me—where in america are you from again?

Made a mouthwashing animation yayyy

i dropped by my favourite secondhand bookstore and found what is possibly the most incredible knitting book iver ever seen. that teaches you how to knit little gardens and sew them into a massive quilt 3d. the photos i took are atrocious and do NOT do this book justice

thats a PRIORY GARDEN WITH MONKS

IT EVEN TEACHES YOU HOW TO MAKE ALL THE TOOLS ABD BASKETS AND POTS AND PLANTS

LOOK AT THE SOME OF THE FOLIAGE

i have never been more upset to not have $30 ready to buy this. its incredible. i have to find it online somewhere. i knew the moment i saw this i had to share it with EVERYONE

“in order to create loving males we need to love males” means teach boys that they can be themselves without being less of a man. it means being encouraging and nurturing of their emotions so they don’t become cold and hateful. it means showing boys, early in their lives, that they have value outside of what our society deems proper masculinity. what it doesn’t mean is that it’s our job to handhold men who see women as walking sex toys through the concept of empathy, and maybe if we’re really really nice to them and don’t say things that hurt their feelings they’ll stop killing us for saying no

THE GLOVES 🙌 I made these back in spring this year for a friend and I think they're so gorgeous. It was my first ever full project on dpn and my 2nd stranded color work. They were such a joy to make

Pattern by EricaHeusserDesigns on Etsy!!

Want to learn something new in 2022??

Absolute beginner adult ballet series (fabulous beginning teacher)

40 piano lessons for beginners (some of the best explanations for piano I’ve ever seen)

Excellent basic crochet video series

Basic knitting (probably the best how to knit video out there)

Pre-Free Figure Skate Levels A-D guides and practice activities (each video builds up with exercises to the actual moves!)

How to draw character faces video (very funny, surprisingly instructive?)

Another drawing character faces video

Literally my favorite art pose hack

Tutorial of how to make a whole ass Stardew Valley esque farming game in Gamemaker Studios 2??

Introduction to flying small aircrafts

French/Dutch/Fishtail braiding

Playing the guitar for beginners (well paced and excellent instructor)

Playing the violin for beginners (really good practical tips mixed in)

Color theory in digital art (not of the children’s hospital variety)

Retake classes you hated but now there’s zero stakes:

Calculus 1 (full semester class)

Learn basic statistics (free textbook)

Introduction to college physics (free textbook)

Introduction to accounting (free textbook)

Learn a language:

Ancient Greek

Latin

Spanish

German

Japanese (grammar guide) (for dummies)

French

Russian (pretty good cyrillic guide!)

a big lesson for me was learning that most things are not as fragile as I’d believed. missing a class, or turning in a bad assignment, won’t instantly destroy your professor’s opinion of you. accidentally saying something harsh won’t make your friend want to end the friendship. it takes work to repair these things - it takes effort and research and sometimes a sincere apology - but you can do that because they’re not irreparably broken. what you’ve worked to build, in academia and in relationships and in life, is stronger and more enduring that your mind may teach you to believe. don’t let imagined fragility lead you to giving up

hard lesson to learn but it has been important for college: ask professors for extensions BEFORE you desperately need it, rest BEFORE you're exhausted, skip class BEFORE you're too exhausted to go to class, cancel obligations as soon as the vibes are off, etc

there's been five times so far where I was like "Should I ask for this extension/go home early/skip this class?" and each time I've been incredibly thankful I did it and I felt better afterwards.

One of the stranger things about training brand new nurses is explaining how to min max small talk. It feels very weird to coach people on how to chat.

Life tip for the 18-26 crowd: if you’re considering a career in a field where the big selling point is that soon all the [Generational Cohort] will retire and all the jobs will open up, don’t do it. And don’t get a Masters degree in it.

Moreover, unless you have family or spousal money to fall back on, stay away from fields where management weaponizes employees’ “passion” against their need for a wage commensurate with COL in their area.

Get an MBA, get project management experience, learn about organizational psychology, and start getting those experiences as soon as you can.

I don’t regret my choices; they’ve led me to the very exciting place I am now with a book coming out, and some amazing interviews lined up. But if I knew 12 years ago what I know now, I would have made some alterations.

CINEMA'S BEST SWEATERS

Basic Instinct (1992) · Let's Make Love (1960) · Scream (1996) · The Big Lebowski (1998) · Lucky Number Slevin (2006) · A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) · The Holiday (2006) · The Devil Wears Prada (2006) · While You Were Sleeping (1995) · Home Alone (1990) · Good Will Hunting (1997) · 21 (2008) · Sweet November (2001) · Knives Out (2019) · How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) · Ocean's 8 (2018) · The Matrix (1999) · Mystic Pizza (1988) · Bridget Jones's Diary (2001) · Clueless (1995) · House of Gucci (2021) · The Lighthouse (2019) · When Harry Met Sally... (1989) · Awake (2007)

I was on a retail website on my phone recently and I was trying to get to some information it did not seem to want to provide -- and just in case, out of desperation, I clicked on the little "universal sign for wheelchair user" logo in one corner.

It pulled up this menu, which was intriguing...

[ID: A website sidebar menu, headed "Accessibility features"; it offers the option of turning on a number of features including those for blindness and colorblindness, epilepsy, motor skills disorders, dyslexia, and crucially for me, ADHD.]

I'm not someone who uses digital accessibility tools much but still, I don't think I've ever seen such a visible accessibility function on a website before, and I've definitely never seen one that offered ADHD accessibility. What did that even do? So...I clicked it, and:

[ID: A screengrab of the website with the ADHD accessibility turned on; most of the site is greyed out, including a header listing my subscriptions and a subscription ID. A narrow bar of the site is illuminated in normal white, showing my next shipment is July 25th and offering me the option to view or skip it.]

The damn thing darkens the entire page except for a narrow "light" bar that highlights whatever your looking at, which you can drag up and down the site with your finger. Honestly it's super cool. It's not something I desperately need, but I may go looking to see if there's an app I could acquire that would do the same for me across browser and e-reader functions on my phone.

so i just spent $355 dollars paying for standardized tests i need to take to apply to graduate school. for 2 tests. i’m salty as hell because its not cool that schools require you take these tests to apply, then the testing institutions can charge whatever they want because you have to take the test. more proof regarding how its hard for poor people to pursue a higher education, keeping them poor

a reminder for those who currently need it.

i feel like this little reminder is really necessary right now. this is a little cheesy and sentimental, but it’s so important. as you know, there have been some horrid things happening throughout our world recently. the killing of christina, the mass shooting of the gay nightclub in orlando, the rape of the unconscious woman, the syrian refugee crisis, and so many other awful things that happen day-to-day such as suicide and terminal illness. all of these things are undeniably awful and i for one have been personally saddened by all of them. when events like this happen, many people become affected. many people become hopeless. many people become lost. if the event is horrible enough, some people even lose their will to stay alive. 

for any of you that are feeling alone, upset or forlorn… i want you to understand that this world is a beautiful place despite what has been happening lately. there is so much wonder and pure beauty in this world, even though it can be hard to see. in times like this, i want everyone to remember that you are loved and that there are so many great things in store for you + the rest of your life. in times like this, keep in touch with what keeps you going, whether it be a band, a role model, your friends and family, anything. in times like this, look after others and hold on to your hope. these times do not last forever.

&ILOVEYOUTOO<3

I’m high functioning! Just ask all of my neurotypical friends! I’m high functioning… until I misplace something. Or I hear a loud noise. Or I reach an unknown area of the social script. Or I can’t stop feeling an unpleasant tactile sensation. Or someone treats me badly. Or my electronics won’t work. Or I’m hungry. Or I’m tired. Or I don’t have a solution for someone else’s pain. Or I have to engage with a task without being given time to analyze it. Or I’m not permitted to use a familiar system to handle a situation. Or things just don’t make sense. Or I’ve just been through too much in the past five minutes. Hour. Day. Week. I’m not high functioning. That’s just a term neurotypical folk use to not acknowledge or straight up minimalize my issues on the occasions that I manage to avoid all of the above.

Audrey Sterling, about autism (via somatizadxs)

I HATE feeling like an outcast. I HATE feeling like an alien. I HATE having to try hard to appear as normal. I HATE how my way of thinking makes me so strange. I HATE feeling and being different. I HATE feeling and being alone. I HATE being autistic.