Having never really played this much, it’s interesting to see how much of his strategy seems to just be planning to allow himself access to any possible point that the next dot might spawn and using his tail to prevent it from spawning in an inaccessible place. Makes me wonder how robust this is against other possible spawn combos. Is he able to do this consistently? Is there such thing as an unbeatable game?
Apparently it’s Trans Day of Visibility…
*looks through the more recent pictures of himself, finds none he’s happy with*
Me, at an art store: I need a paint marker with low toxicity and a delicate tip.
Employee: What kind of project are you working on?
Me: It’s for a research project. I just need bright colors.
Employee: What medium are you using? Canvas or paper?
Me: uh….spiders.
Employee: Plastic or felt?
Me: ….live spiders. Like, from the forest.
Employee: ….
Employee: I have to get back to the counter.
also I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the commentor says “I absolutely have experience with eating disorders.” and not “people coping with eating disorders” The mindset among people like that is that you aren’t working with a person, you’re facing an eating disorder, and the trick is to discover and isolate and destroy it. The person is only relevant as the thing you’re saving from the eating disorder.
But eating disorders…aren’t tentacle monsters? They don’t have people in their clutches, they are experiences people have. There are a lot of things about them that are unpleasant, definitely. They can kill you, though so can backcountry skiing.
And if you had a friend who goes backcountry skiiling alone, you’d say to them “have you sprung for one of those avalanche beacon things? do you wear a helmet? won’t you find a buddy to ski with?”. You might say “I think your trip is a bad idea and I’d love to help you plan a safer one.”
You wouldn’t say “oh no he didn’t, everyone stand back, he just asked which suppliers sold backcountry gear to enable the addiction that is going to kill him, to save his life you have to cut him off from those kinds of suppliers, and frankly by asking he’s just looking for validation, you can’t give it to him or he will die. I want you to seriously consider how everything you said will be used by that kind of person as encouragement.”
Because if you did, you’d lose that friend.
Talking people into thinking more about what they’re doing – and calling them out on bad choices – is part of friendship. Treating your friends like that? Isn’t. When it comes to eating disorders everyone immediately forgets that peoples’ lives are theirs to live, not yours to save.
frankly by asking he’s just looking for validation
aaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Everyone needs validation! It is a basic human need!
And the thing is that validating people is a technique for behavior change. On its own, it’s not very good (except for a few specific purposes), and of course you shouldn’t say things you don’t believe. But every behavior has *some* valid element to it, otherwise people *wouldn’t do it.” And validating people makes them feel like they’re on your side, like you get their struggle, and like you know what the fuck you’re talking about. A simple “it makes sense that you’d want to restrict, given the way you feel about your body” goes a long way to making people actually listen to you, and makes it so they’re a lot more likely to listen to the “but you’re harming your body by doing it.”
A 19-year-old reddit user sought the advice of his fellow redditors after a spontaneous gay hookup with his best friend last month.
“I had a gay experience with my friend I thought we were both straight,” he writes. “Feeling confused and don’t know where to go from here.”
The teen shared his experience in full detail hoping to get some guidance from users of reddit’s relationship forum. He writes:
Some background for the situation: I’ve known my friend Danny, the friend in question, since we were 14. We were part of a group of four guys and we all got along really well. Him and his best friend and me and my best friend would all hang out together all the time after school and on weekends, play video games together and go on adventures, you know, just teenager stuff. Anyway, at the end of high school we all went to different colleges across the country for different reasons. Danny and I both came back to our hometown for the summer, but my best friend and his best friend both stayed at their schools to work and take summer classes and such.
I’ve been hanging out with Danny pretty much every day since we got back. My parents repurposed my bedroom to a workout room almost as soon as I moved into the dorms so I live in my basement and usually he’ll come over and we’ll play games or watch tv or listen to music, and then he’ll crash on the couch, go home in the morning and then come back over in the afternoon, rinse and repeat.
Last night we were watching some shitty movie, or really more like just talking with the movie on in the background and there was a sex scene. I asked him if he managed to get laid at all at college, and he said no. I admitted that I hadn’t either. We started to talk about sex a little. I could feel myself getting excited but I didn’t really understand why. The conversation kept up to the point where I said something along the lines of “I would really love to know what it feels like to have somebody suck my cock.” He said “what if…” and then blushed. One thing led to another and next thing I know he’s blowing me. I felt weird and conflicted about it but it was so good. It was like my mind switched gears in the middle of it and all of a sudden I was so turned on by him. When he finished me I asked him to let me return the favor. Afterwards we kissed, and then he awkwardly said that he should leave and went home.
As soon as he left my mind went into overdrive. A lot of things clicked into place in my mind but I’m still confused about a lot of things. I don’t look at porn often but when I do it’s usually women, but I’ve never met a woman irl that I was actually attracted to. I thought it was because I have high standards, but what if it’s because I’m not into women? I can’t make sense of it. I was super horny this morning, I’ve jerked off three times already today and I tried to think about women and look at straight porn but my mind kept drifting back to Danny’s body, Danny’s dick, Danny with his mouth around me. It’s crazy because I’ve never once felt attraction to a man before, never noticed guys in a sexual way at all, but now all I can think about is him.
I’m really worried that this will fuck up our friendship. I don’t regret what we did, but what if he does? What if he’s been scoping me out this whole time, waiting for his chance to pounce? I don’t know how I would feel about that. Also if he decides he doesn’t want to be around me anymore, I’m going to be alone for the rest of the summer. None of my other friends are in town. And then what happens if we do decide to get together, become a couple. What happens when we go back to school? What do we tell our other friends? Hell, what would I tell my parents?
I texted him earlier, just a simple “Hey” and I haven’t gotten anything back yet. I’m kind of losing my mind waiting on an answer. I would really love advice regarding what to say to him when I talk to him next. I want to continue to explore my relationship with him, but I don’t want to scare him off by coming on too strong. I need to feel out his thoughts first.
Does anybody else that’s been in a situation like this have any advice to offer? What should I say to him? How can I salvage our friendship if it turns out that he doesn’t feel the same way as me? I’m looking for any general advice regarding sexuality and figuring yourself out as well.
tl;dr: Thought I was straight, ended up engaging in mutual oral sex with a friend that I also thought was straight. I want to figure out my sexuality and continue to explore this new territory with my friend, but stay friends with him if he’s not interested. How do I approach the topic so as to not scare him off? And how do I figure out if I’m bi or gay, just for my own personal peace?
EDIT: He just texted me back and asked if he could come over. I said yes. Wish me luck!
A few days later, he provided this update:
I’m getting a lot of update requests, and Danny just headed home so I figured I’d go ahead and post. I have exciting stuff to tell you guys! First I wanted to say thanks to everybody who commented, you all really helped me calm down and stop overthinking everything. I appreciate it a lot.
When Danny showed up we were both really nervous and awkward at first. I was really scared to say anything, but I broke the tension by telling him how much I had enjoyed the night before. He broke out into a huge grin and turned bright red, lit up like a christmas tree. He told me he was so relieved, and that he had been obsessing over it all night worried for the same reasons I had been.
I told him that it was my first sexual experience ever and that I was questioning my sexuality now. He told me that he had been questioning his sexuality for a while, and that he had feelings for men before, but had mostly seen me as just a friend until last night, when he realized that I was kind of sort of coming onto him in a really roundabout way. It’s funny, I didn’t really think of myself as coming onto him but I definitely made that statement hoping something would come of it…
Anyway I told him that first and foremost I valued our friendship and wanted to stay friends whatever happened between us. He agreed strongly. He asked me if I was okay with working out our feelings together (read: having sex until we figure out how we feel) and I told him yes. After all this heavy conversation we decided to play some CS:GO together like we usually do but we ended up in bed together instead. Afterwards we talked some more and discussed the possibility of a relationship. He said he feels like we know each other well enough that he wouldn’t feel like we were rushing in, and I agreed with him. He asked me to be his boyfriend, and I said yes! I’m so happy about it, too! I’ve never felt so attracted to anyone before.
We haven’t told anyone yet, but decided not to go out of our way to keep it a secret. The area we live in is reasonably tolerant and neither of our parents are anti-gay, which I am grateful for. I am worried about telling my sister, who has recently become a born-again christian and had a lot of horrible things to say about the supreme court ruling on FB. I’m also a little concerned about telling our other two friends, but I think after the initial shock wears off, they’ll come around.
Now, I’m not super duper concerned with slapping a label on my sexuality and calling it a day (thanks to you guys, I appreciate all the advice in that regard!) but the more I think about it, the more I think that I really am gay, or at least gay-leaning bisexual. It kind of feels like the best time to be realizing it with the gay marriage ruling happening. Every time I think about it I feel giddy.
tl;dr: Talked it out, sexed it out, we’re a couple now! Thanks for helping me stay sane, reddit!
Omphaloskeptomai 