Hey there! My name is Jonathan. I made a post a couple weeks ago that didn't get any attention so I'm giving it a second shot. I'm hoping to find someone I can chat with and get to know with the hope that we could make something special between us.
A quick bio of me: I am a 6 foot tall white guy with blonde hair and hazel eyes. My hair is pretty short and I have a scruffy beard. Oh, and I wear glasses because I am basically blind. I can share a photo if you ask. I have my bachelor's in health sciences and I currently work as a physical therapy technician with the goal to get into a physical therapy assistant program. I work full time so I'm pretty busy, but in my free time I like to play video games, watch TV, and play card games. I also enjoy cooking and trying new recipes. I also like traveling and visiting new places. I like museums, zoos, aquariums, theme parks, and nature parks.
What I'm searching for: someone nice and funny who enjoys life but takes it seriously when they need to. I'd prefer dating someone 21+, but otherwise I don't have age preferences. If you're older than me, that's okay. What matters is the attraction (physical and mental). Speaking of attraction, I don't have any specific features I'm attracted to. I think everyone is beautiful in their own way. I'm also not worried about distance. I'd prefer you be from the United States because that's just easier, but I'm open to dating internationally as well.
If I interest you, send me a chat with a short introduction of yourself and tell me what your favorite show was growing up.

(29M) About a year ago I got out of an abusive relationship. My former partner(Female a year older than me) would not hesitate to be mentally abusive, and on some occasions physically. She was also financially abusive. And controlling. My former partner had BPD and knew lots of ways to manipulate my neuro divergent tendencies. Things like telling me i was stupid, I was nothing without her, I didnt have any friends ect. The instances of abuse were always framed as my fault because in her words I "just pushed her and pushed her and pushed her". a year ago I escaped that situation and since then have not really shown any interest in having an intimate relationship with anyone in that time. I was also in therapy and still am. Even though I didn't try to pursue an relationship, women would still show interest in me and these things have been detrimental to my self worth because these women show interest and then for whatever reason are deterred from ever talking to me again. The first instance was a girl that showed a lot of interest and even gave me her number with out me asking for it we texted for 2 months and she began to text me less and less. I eventually just asked her about it and said that she didn't want to give me the idea we could be more than friends even though she was the one who pursued me and wanted to talk about deeply personal topics like the kind you would if you were romantically interested in some one. I decided to just move on but this did make me feel really dejected and like I was unfit for anyone to really want to consider me as their partner unless they had ulterior motives of control and abuse as those seem to be the only relationships I've been in throughout my adult life. Which is only reinforced by my cycle of thinking as I didn't date or even have a lot of friends in my teen years. After this I met a girl at a bar who was actually working there. I know that bar staff are supposed to make you feel welcome and be overly friendly as I've been in quite a few, but this was different. I would come to this bar with a friend of mine and it was known and would be well on display that I was the designated driver. I've never really been much of a drinker, my friend on the other hand enjoys his libations. He tends to ask me to go because he knows I can keep him in check, and because I train martial arts can keep the situation under control if things get out of hand. Essentially he knows I can ensure he's safe and I can keep a conversation going. Anyway this girl notices I'm the dd because I'll only get a water when we come in and starts to leave from behind the bar and bring me a water when we walk in regularly. We also start to engage in conversation pretty heavily. So one night I came in by myself because my friends work schedule had changed I gather all my courage and ask her for her number. She seems pretty happy about this since we had been talking for the better part of 3hrs before hand and she even gave me a hug before I left. I texted her a little while after leaving the bar so she would also have my number. I received no reply. I figured she was busy so I didn't think too much of it. A whole week goes by with no reply. I finally decided to send a text jokingly asking her if she was ghosting me. I get a one sentence reply stating "heeyyy I've been busy" about an hour and a half later. I text her back "hey don't apologize I'm here when you're ready to talk" I meant it as a nonchalant reply like "hey no rush I'd just like to talk when your free" I wasn't upset or anything but I suppose it could've been misconstrued as being passive aggressive. That being said she never replied to me again. The feelings I mentioned previously creep back in and I don't even talk to another woman until almost 7 months later. This was also not a planned instance as I had gone out to a bar to participate in a kind of baby shower type get together a friend of mine was having. I didn't plan on talking to anyone who was woman, especially since the party I was going to was divided by gender as some celebrations of a child being on the way will be. I had already been at this bar for a few hours and was planning on leaving until my friends wife decided to bring her party over to the same bar and it ended up being just a casual hang out as the women that were involved with the mother's part of the get-together were now intermingling amongst us. As this was happening I had noticed one of the women had a tattoo of the avenged sevenfold logo on her back. I struck up a conversation with her about how I was a fan of theirs in junior high and so were my friends. We then continued to chat and I found out that we actually had a lot of things in common not just music taste,and that we both played guitar, but also stances on politics and humor and just about anything else we talked about. I talked to this woman for close to 8hrs we even went around the corner to a pub to get food. While we were doing this she invited me to come over to her apartment we then proceeded to sit on her couch and share different songs and genres we liked with eachother and talking about life, while smoking weed as she had a prescription and I suppose didn't want to be rude so offered me some. I'm not a smoker really but obliged. While this was going on I did disclose to her my financial situation and that I lived with my parents because I was trying to get back on my feet again. She seemed really supportive about this as well. We later started watching the show black mirror and were starting to get closer physically her legs were draped over one of mine. Her chest was over top of mine. My arm had slid behind her back and our faces were a bit close. I'm really cautious about consent and personal space because of the abuse I went through so I asked her "hey would I ruin the vibe if I kissed you?" Kind of nervously as I was a little high. She just kind of giggled and said she liked to take things slow. I said it wasn't a problem and respected her decision and we continued watching back mirror in the same position. Later she said she was going to go to bed and I said I would sleep on the couch. I kicked off my shoes and was laying on the couch still high. The door to her bedroom which was across the apartment from the couch only about 8ft away was open and I turned my head and asked "hey did you want me to come to bed with you?" She said yes so I promptly went into the bedroom and we began cuddling. I fell asleep. The next day I woke up and we still cuddling. We both kind of woke up at the same time. We talked a little while still pretty much spooning eachother. While we were doing this she kissed me. We then kind of softly made out, talked a little got out of bed sat on the couch, kissed a few more times, watched black mirror. This whole time I've gotten 2 calls from a friend of mine who I am in a band with we practice on Sundays and I was going to be late I considered not showing up but ultimately relented and decided I didn't want to be clingy and wear out my welcome especially since I hadn't planned on any of this and she had slightly been hinting about starting her Sunday routine and I didnt want to throw off her process to get her week started. So I decided to leave. I kissed her again told her I'd really like to see her again and left. A few hours later while I was at band practice I sent her a meme She replied about a day later. Since then our texting was really scant. She did disclose when we met that she wasn't on her phone a lot and didn't text that much so I chalked it up to that. I tried to really have a conversation going but couldn't. I also asked if she wanted to hang out that Thursday as I had the day off. She said she was busy which I thought no problem. Oddly enough I got an update on Facebook that she had posted in a musicians page I'm a part of about wanting to meet up and jam with other people that same day. Also we didn't add eachother on social media so she had no idea if I would see this. I though it was weird but didn't really think anything of it outside of "hey I play guitar too why can't we hang out and play?" After that I got sick and she happened to stop texting me. The next week I sent another meme and sparked a sparse text conversation that went nowhere. Then a few days after that on the advice of my therapist I decided to just ask her out on a date. I was ignored. This made me feel like utter fucking shit. As well as being confused as to why she would spend so much time with me, kiss me, and even half ass text me. To just ignore me. The thoughts I previously mentioned crept back into my skull and were very intense. I started to spiral and think why it would happen. I thought about my physical attributes, about how I was over six foot tall, about how I was in decent shape, about how even some of my male friends and people in a professional environment had told me I should be a model, tha I was "handsome". I'm kind and compassionate. I try to be a great conversationalist. It just didn't make any sense to me it didn't feel fair. I was heartbroken as I though I had met someone who actually appreciated my taste in music (she Even told me I had good taste in music), the fact I was kind of awkward. She liked my point of view and ideas on things. She liked that I looked out for my friends. She seemed to accept me. After all of that I didn't it wasn't even real I guess. Since then I was having a lot of negative thoughts I even found some old Facebook messages this girl had sent me when I was a teen in which she was emotionally manipulating me Essentially wanting me to be limerent (she had even posted on my wall about how she cared about me and was sorry she couldn't make it to my graduation that she never intended on going to) which added to all of this negative thinking I had been experiencing lately. (I even thought to myself I sounded like an incel which also was disheartening those people suck and I dont even want to be considered in the same catagory as men who would treat women that way) I really just don't know what my problem is and I just don't want to try to get back in to dating as well because I don't like this feeling of being dejected and not feeling worthy of some one else's love. I'm left with this deep hurt and I just want to say fuck it I'm done.

Closed for now, but I’ll reopen later!
Opening my island for a small giveaway:
-Fossils, items, clothes and a few DIYs on the beach to the left
-I have all the fruits and veggies
-Feel free to fish, catch bugs and shop
-Turnips are going for 61
-Be respectful of my island and other players
Don’t:
-Trample my flowers
-Shake my trees (except for fruit)
-Pick my weeds, glowing moss or vines
Comment your IGN for code!

I was completely sober for 3 years. I stopped drinking alcohol. I didn’t do drugs often. I definitely dabbled, the occasional party drug or weed. It started at a little health challenge and I just kept going. I slowly started introducing alcohol back into my life and it was fine. I felt ready. And then I went through a huge relationship breakup. I felt free. I felt like I could finally live my life. And I was, I experienced more in the 6 months post break up than almost my entire adulthood so far. And then I started dating an addict. I didn’t realize how bad it was, how bad their addiction was. It was fun at first. And then I got sucked into it. Now I’m addicted to drugs and alcohol and I don’t know how to get out of it.

At the world’s top college of magic and technology, every day brings a new discovery -and a new disaster. The advanced experiments of the college students tend to be both ambitious and apocalyptic, with the end of the world only prevented by a mysterious time loop, and a small handful of students who retain their memories.
Surviving the loops was hard enough, but now, in his senior year, Vell Harlan must take charge of them, and deal with the fact that the whole world now knows his secrets. Everyone knows about Vell’s death and resurrection, along with the divine game he is a part of. Now Vell must contend with overly curious scientists and evil billionaires hungry for divine power while the daily doomsday cycle bombards him with terrorists, talking elephants, and the Grim Reaper himself -but if he can endure it all, the Last Goddess’s game promises the ultimate prize: power over life itself.
[Previous Chapter][Patreon][Cover Art]
“Four years on and the headache still sucks,” Vell groaned to himself.
Though most of the loopers had managed to make it to midnight alive, they had nothing to show for it but headaches. They had not succeeded in digging Cane out of the rubble, or investigating his apparent ghost theory in any other way. That was a complication, but not a fatal one. They had some leads to work with, at least, and Vell knew where to get started on the ghost angle. Vell gladly made the call that would get them started.
“Goooooood morning Mr. Harlan,” Harley chimed. “What’s happening?”
“Frog invasions, among other problems,” Vell grumbled.
“Oh, that’s a time loop headache if I ever heard it,” Harley said. She’d run into that affliction more than a few times.
“Yeah, it’s not great,” Vell said. “Listen, do you still have Garrett’s number?”
“Ooh, ghost problems, eh?” Harley said. “I’ll text it to you.”
“Thanks. I kind of got to get right to it, so I’ll have to give you the details later, alright? Love you, Harley.”
“Love you too, bud,” Harley said. “Say hi to Garret for me.”
Vell hung up the first call and braced himself for the second. He liked Garret, but he could also be a lot to deal with -a fact well-demonstrated by the phone call beginning with Garret’s theme music blaring over the phone. Once the bombastic rock and roll stopped, Vell was disappointed to hear a mechanical beep indicate the start of an answering machine message.
“Hi, you’ve reached Garret Geist, Ghost Getter,” the message said, in Garrett’s usual southern california drawl. “I’m currently on a long-term submersible mission to exorcise the ghosts of shipwreck victims who’ve been trapped undersea for centuries.”
“What?”
Vell knew it was a recording, but needed to voice his offense anyway. It was hard to truly be mad knowing Garrett was doing something so incredibly heroic, though.
“I should be back to the surface and ready to help in a few days, so please leave a message and I’ll get to you as soon as I can!”
The automated message clicked again and fell silent. Vell hung up the phone and let out a low groan of despair.
“Okay, we’re not screwed yet,” Vell said. “Just need to wait a bit.”
Vell brushed his teeth and rushed through breakfast, and then, right on cue, heard a knock on his door. He whipped it open to find a bothersome scientist once again at his door.
“Hi, good morning,” Vell said, as he opened the door. “You here to bother me about Quenay?”
“I- uh, I have some very interesting theories.”
“I’m sure you do,” Vell said. “If you can just hold on one second…”
Vell paused and waited. The bothersome student also waited, at least for a few seconds.
“What exactly are we waiting for?”
“This.”
Cane grabbed the student by the collar and yanked them away from the door. Vell invited him in and slammed the door shut behind them to really drive the point home.
“Thank you for that,” Vell said. “Did you need something?”
“Just to talk to you,” Cane said. “I was trying to get people together to hang out tonight. Figured you’d want in, if you’re not too busy.”
“I could probably make it, I just have to…”
Vell froze. He really should’ve come up with these lies in advance.
“You good, Vell?”
“I, uh, sorry, just losing track of things, mentally,” Vell said. “I’ve had a lot of people, uh, ask me for help with things.”
“What kind of things?” Cane said. “You need a hand?”
“Maybe.”
Vell contemplated how to proceed for a moment, and then figured he’d probably built up enough good will with Cane over the past four years he could just dive right in.
“You ever heard about frog ghosts?”
“Yeah,” Cane said, without so much as blinking.
“Oh, cool,” Vell said. “What about them?”
“Well, hold on, are you talking about frog ghosts as in the ghost of frogs, or a ghost related to frogs?”
“Either or, I guess?”
“Okay, because I don’t know anything about any ghostly frogs,” Cane said. “There is supposedly the ghost of a guy obsessed with frogs on campus, though.”
“Interesting. Tell me about the frog guy.”
“I don’t know all the details, it was kind of an urban legend even when my brother came here about a decade back,” Cane said. “All he ever told me was the this frog-obsessed sophomore died while studying, and he haunts the basement of the sophomore dorms, I guess. ‘Some say you can still hear faint croaking in the basement’ and all that horror story shit.”
“Interesting,” Vell said, again. “Let me look into that and we’ll circle back later, alright? I gotta go, see you.”
“Vell-”
“Sorry, kind of in a hurry, bud,” Vell said, as he left and shut the door behind.
“This is your dorm, dude,” Cane said.
***
“You were not exaggerating about this headache,” Alex said.
“We warned you,” Kim said. “Man, it’s almost better to die.”
“How do you have a headache, you’re made of metal!”
“It’s complicated,” Kim said. Her synthetic body did not spare her from the time loop headache, no matter how she rebuilt herself.
“Good morning everyone,” Helena said, as she whacked the door open with a crutch. “What did I miss?”
“Quiet down a little, please” Hawke said.
“Why?”
“Do you not have a headache too?”
“No, I died pretty early,” Helena said. “Got a frog on me.”
“You died from a frog touching you? What condition do you have that causes that?”
“Well it was a poison dart frog, so I guess ‘being alive’,” Helena said. Samson pursed his lips and said nothing. “What did you all get up to while I was busy being dead?”
“Vell found out the frogs were summoned by a weird frog-obsessed ghost,” Hawke said. “He apparently knows a guy who might be able to help.”
The loopers then proceeded to relax and chat about frogs, ghosts, and other miscellaneous topics for about seven minutes, which made it a lot less dramatic when Vell barged in and announced Garret would be unable to help.
“Oh come on,” Kim snapped. “What’s the point of knowing a ghost hunter if he never helps hunt ghosts?”
“He’s on some undersea mission to rescue lost souls,” Vell said. “Which makes it really hard to be mad at him.”
“And yet I manage,” Kim said. She didn’t begrudge Garret personally, but she had been hoping for their first easy win of the year. All the apocalypses thus far had been a major pain in the ass.
“Aren’t you people supposed to be able to handle things like this?”
“Yes, Alex, and we will,” Vell said. “Just would’ve been nice to have a professional on the job.”
“I’ll get the ghostbusting stuff ready,” Hawke sighed. He would’ve loved a chance to outsource their daily nonsense.
“Keep it on standby for now,” Vell said. “Ghosts have unfinished business or regrets. If we can help our ghost deal with whatever frog-related business he’s got going on, maybe we can fix this without having to bust anyone.”
“That’s your plan?” Alex said. “Be nice to the ghost that crushed a building and hope it goes away?”
“Yes,” Vell said, with a completely straight face. “And busting is plan B.”
“Bustin’ makes me feel good,” Hawke sang, as he grabbed all their various ghostbusting gear.
“True professionals at work,” Alex scoffed. Everyone else rolled their eyes and got back to work.
“Vell is an old pro at being nice to people,” Kim said. “Just ask Helena’s sister.”
“Don’t pat yourself on the back, Joan’s incredibly susceptible to manipulation,” Helena said. It was disturbing she’d say that, and even more disturbing she knew that. “That said, anyone dumb enough to get stuck as a ghost for decades will probably buy into your routine just as easily.”
“Thanks for your input,” Vell said. “I’m just going to go ahead and get started.”
He said that both because it was important and because it was an excuse to get away from Alex and Helena faster.
“Need any backup?” Samson asked, for similar reasons.
“I’ll check it out solo first,” Vell said. Historically speaking, he was the best people-pleaser, a dubious honor at best, but one that came in handy when dealing with a frog-summoning ghost. “I’ll let you know if I need backup.”
“Or busting,” Hawke said.
“Or busting,” Vell agreed. “I have to find out where the ghost is, for starters. I’ll be in touch soon.”
***
Finding the lair of the ghost was the first hurdle. As it turned out, the sophomore dorms had a lot of basements. Every building on campus had a lot of basements, so Vell was not all that surprised. At least these basements didn’t have booby traps or old experiment equipment in them. They mostly just had a lot of junk. Vell kicked aside some old food wrappers and scanned the room.
“Why do people treat these empty rooms like dumping grounds?”
“People are usually different when they think no one is watching.”
Vell whipped around and saw a transparent head poking through one of the nearby walls. A ghost if Vell had ever seen one.
“Oh, hi,” Vell said. “Uh, weird question, how do you feel about frogs?”
“I’m ambivalent at best,” the ghost said. “Are you looking for the frog guy? Because he haunts two rooms over.”
The ghost pointed to the right, down the hall, and Vell looked that way.
“Thanks,” Vell said. He took a few steps towards the door before spinning around to face the other ghost again. “Uh, do you need any help like, moving on? Finishing unfinished business?”
“Nah, we get wifi down here, so I don’t mind just chilling,” the ghost said. “Thanks for offering though.”
The ghost drew back into the wall and vanished from sight. While Vell was painfully curious as to how a ghost accessed wifi, he decided it was time to move on. The frog ghost was apparently close by, after all.
Vell followed the wifi ghost’s directions and hopped two doors down, barging into a subterranean room that was uncomfortably moist and smelled of mud and rainwater. Condensation dripped from the ceiling and onto Vell’s back, sending an unpleasant shiver down his spine. Unlike other rooms, this one was completely free of any garbage, but Vell took no comfort in that.
“Hello? Anybody home?”
A chill ran down Vell’s spine that definitely was not another drop of water. He waited two seconds, took a deep breath, and turned around.
“Hello.”
Vell was just inches away from another transparent face. This one had a slight green tint, with wide set eyes and a broad, flat mouth. Vell wondered if the similarities to a frog had been there during this person’s life, or if they just liked frogs so much their ghost had slowly shifted to reflect their passion.
“Hey! Hi, uh, nice to meet you,” Vell mumbled. “I’m Vell.”
“I’m Raine.”
“Neat, nice name,” Vell said. If Raine noticed the awkward hesitation in the compliment, he didn’t show it. “So, uh, I was wondering, well, I heard you were the guy to ask about frogs.”
The already wide eyes of the ghost got even wider, and visible excitement trembled through their spectral form. Vell began to think he may have made a mistake.
***
“So even though it’s the biggest frog in the America’s, the helmeted water toad is still only half the size of the Goliath frog,” Raine said. “Which must be wild for the helmeted water toad. Could you imagine crossing an ocean and finding out the people who live there are literally twice your size?”
“Must be pretty mindblowing, yeah,” Vell said.
“And that’s not even going into the real extremes,” Raine said. “Do you remember our pal P. Amauensis?”
“How could I forget,” Vell said, about something he had definitely forgotten.
“Not just the world’s smallest frog, but maybe the world’s smallest vertebrate,” Raine said. “Only seven point seven millimeters long, a literal fraction of the Goliath frog! Could you imagine meeting someone who’s only as big as your toe?”
“I actually did, once,” Vell said. “Shrink ray.”
“Oh. Was...was it weird?”
“A little,” Vell said.
“Wow. You almost know what it’s like to be a Goliath frog meeting a P. Amauensis,” Raine said. “I’m so jealous.”
“Yeah, I’ve done a lot of interesting stuff,” Vell said. “What about you, what’d you get up to when you weren’t studying frogs?”
Raine tilted his spectral head and stared blankly at Vell.
“You did do things other than study frogs, right?”
“Not if I could help it,” Raine said.
“Okay, uh...what did you like to eat?”
“Oh, I just ate food whenever I was hungry,” Raine said. “What I really liked to do was gather samples of different bugs and other frog dietary staples, so I could try to get a sense of their diet for myself.”
“Like, cooked bugs, or just raw, living bugs,” Vell said. He’d eaten a few different varieties of cooked bugs, just for the experience, but couldn’t imagine eating raw insects.
“If I could find them, yeah, live ones,” Raine said. “It got pretty hard after I got banned from the entomology department.”
“That’d do it,” Vell said. “So, did you, uh, go swimming a lot?”
“Oh yeah, all the time,” Raine said. “Until I got banned from the pools too. Trying to swim like a frog doesn’t work very well, and they got sick of having to rescue me, I guess.”
“You could’ve just swam like a person.”
“Why would I do that?”
“To...I don’t know,” Vell said. He was starting to feel like Raine’s entire life and unlife revolved around frogs. “Did you ever do anything, I don’t know, human?”
“Oh, I studied frogs,” Raine said. “Frogs lack the self-awareness to understand frogs. It’s their only flaw, really.”
“I see. So what’s your favorite frog?”
As expected, this set off a long rant, as Raine found it hard to pick a favorite and had to start listing pros and cons of various frog species. It was not exactly scintillating conversation, but it kept Raine talking instead of somehow summoning frogs. Vell kept reminding himself that was the real goal. He was not here to have a pleasant chat, he was here to prevent the frogpocalypse. Anything that kept Raine ranting was good. He was saving the world.
As Raine started ranking every existing frog species by maximum jump distance, Vell kept repeating that to himself. Saving the world, one frog jump strength at a time.

I didn't read the rules, and if that's a mistake, please just remove the post instead of banning me. I'm looking for powerful movies like "Dark City," "Fight Club," "A Clockwork Orange," and "Eyes Wide Shut."
"Spirited Away" "Princess Mononoke" "Into the void" I have 3.4TB of movies out of 4, and all of them are very thought-provoking and mind-expanding, making me think outside the box. In "Fight Club," during the scene with the chemical burn kiss on the hand by Tyler, I realized that he can see what he thinks, which makes sense as they are the same person. The quote "if our fathers were models for GOD and they bailed, what does it tell you about GOD?" really makes you think.
The Wondeful Wizard of OZ 1939 is one of my greatest mind-expanding and thougt-provoking,
a scanner darkly opened my eyes even more (about why we use substance)
I'm going to watch "poor things" "saint clara" and "the deer hunter" soon
when I fully recovered from weed addiction (two and half months clean), I still have dreams about weed And calling again to my dealer, the biggest enemy of getting clean is the headaches I will start reading a book once a week
I smoked 100gram of weed in three and half weeks and felt so bad I threw up green Puke then I said no more weed
I threw away the bang.
It seems like years since it's been clear.
2011-2024 smoking weed with no mercy
WORLD I LOVE YOU!!!!
say the word LOVE and be free!

Title says it all, this post is a deep dive into the Sonic Adventure 2 OST, specifically all the songs pertaining to Knuckles. This is for a few reasons that I’ll get into in a moment, but from what I’ve seen Knuckles’ and Rouge’s soundtracks tend to get overlooked or written off by fans (More so Knuckles’) unfairly so in my opinion.
This post will serve, not only to analyze the music itself, but also Knuckles’ characterization, as you’ll see the two are basically intrinsically linked.
Just a quick disclaimer, I’m not a musician nor am I that musically inclined, this isn’t an expert’s opinion or analysis, just a listener’s thoughts.
A bit of background of me before we start, I grew up around hip hop when I was young so I can really appreciate Knuckles’ soundtrack probably more so than a lot of other people.
Ever since I was a kid, Knuckles has always been my favorite character, I always found his complicated friendship and rivalry with Sonic to me a much more interesting dichotomy than Sonic and Shadow (I know, fight me).
That and I’ve always just adored his character (Before they forgot how to write him) he can be hot headed and stubborn like Sonic, but he’s got a bit of a Yin and Yang thing going on, with his Chill nature conflicting with his Quick and Explosive temper, as well as his questioning of his purpose in life and duty to the Master Emerald.
Anyway, enough context on myself, let’s strap in and get to the meat of this veeeeeery long post (My bad guys).

BACKGROUND

So for starters, I think it’s best we talk about the style and influences that are quite evident in Knuckles’ Music, that being Hip Hop/Rap, but it goes a bit further than that.
For some historical context, Sonic Adventure 2 came out in 2001, I’m not sure how many hip hop fans hang around the subreddit but by 2001 the Golden Age of Hip Hop had been firmly left behind. Biggie and Pac had been dead for a while, and the stars of yesteryear began to fizzle out as the young blood cropped up onto the scene.
The early 2000s Hip Hop scene was mainly dominated by the East Coast and the Dirty South, lots of stars of this generation of rap included 50 Cent, Ja Rule, Outkast, Ludacris, The Game, Three 6 Mafia and Xzibit, but you also had older legends like Nas and Snoop Dogg who were still culturally relevant.
This modern sound of hip hop differed greatly in sound to the early 90s, everything was a lot more clean and refined, samples were still used but weren’t as common as before and the West Coast sound that characterized the early 90s had been long gone.
It’s important to bring this up, because comparing SA2’s Hip Hop tracks to the climate it was released in, they sound almost out of place. Listening to Get Rich or Die Trying, or Stillmatic and then listening to SA3’s tracks you’d be convinced they were separated by many years.
The Tracks in SA2 are definitely rooted in early 90s hip hop, it’s very clear that those early Gangsta Rap albums like Straight Outta Compton and Black Sunday greatly influenced this part of the soundtrack. And you don’t have to take my word for it, go and listen to the instrumentals of songs like Express Yourself or Insane in the Brain and tell me that they’d sound out of place playing in one of Knuckles’ Stages.
Early 90s Hip Hop makes heavy use of sampling, primarily of the work of Black Artists of the past two decades, because of SA2K’s early 90s hip hop influences, it too has a lot of roots in 70s/80s Black music. Elements of Soul, Funk and Jazz are commonly heard in Knuckles’ Stages, think James Brown or Isaac Hayes.
So what Groups or Artists seem to inspire SA2K’s sound? Well the obvious choice is NWA, though specifically Straight Outta Compton, Elif4zaggin has a much different sound. However I don’t believe that’s entirely the case.
Whether it’s pure coincidence or intentional, Too Short (stylized as Too $hort) was a decently popular artist from Oakland, which is up in the Bay Area of NorCal which is the main inspiration for most of SA2’s urban environments.
Anyway, Too Short was actually quite a pioneer in Hip Hop as he formed the Dangerous Crew, a Hip Hop Band who played actual instruments instead of using samples, it’s because of this that I believe Too Short and the Dangerous Crew to be the main inspiration of SA2K’s sound whether intentional or not, not only are the two defined by their funky beats, but also their use of live instruments. I recommend listening to songs like The Ghetto, Sample The Funk and Just Another Day to get an idea of how his music influences SA2K.

UNKNOWN FROM M.E. (REMIX)

Honestly I find this track to be an improvement over the original, it definitely leans a lot more into the R&B aspect over the rest of the soundtrack but it’s still distinctly hip hop with the record scratches, drums and Hunnid-P rapping over it.
Speaking of, let’s address the Elephant in the room briefly. I know Hunnid-P or Hunnid-Pacent isn’t everybody’s favorite person on this sub, either on the track or behind the scenes, and while his antics aren’t relevant to this post, I don’t necessarily agree that he’s as bad as people say he is on the mic. Is he the world’s greatest emcee? Absolutely not, but he does his job pretty well, he has good flow and a pretty good voice. I think people clown on his lyrics too much, I’m not saying he’s an Inspectah Deck level lyricist but I think the guy has dropped a few bombs and this OST has some gems, but we’ll get into this in a bit.
Getting back to the song, the content of the lyrics is basically Knuckles’ inner voice, this is basically the entire soundtrack, though Unknown From M.E. is more of a general character overview of Knuckles, its standard stuff now but at the time it was a pretty deep dive into the character of Knuckles’ in a decently subtle way.
Most of the song centers around Knuckles’ self imposed isolation on Angel Island, his duty to his people and the world to protect the Master Emerald, but also him yearning for something more and the inner conflict that stems from that.
This song actually has some underrated lines, some standout lyrics include:
“Clench my fists tight, become more redder - I don't wanna hurt her, my passion observed”
The last line is in obvious reference to Rouge and an interesting insight into Knuckles himself. He clearly doesn’t like violence and isn’t interested in hurting anybody, but his duty as a guardian and his quick temper often means he can get a bit too carried away as the line implies, good stuff.
“Been lonely all my life, does it matter? - Here for the mission, whoever want, it bring it”
Here we can clearly see Knuckles trying to reason with himself here, specifically after meeting Sonic and experiencing a life that isn’t just his duty. Here we see the Guardian side of him, he’s always been alone and it’s never been problem before, why should it be now? At least that’s what he tries to tell himself.
“Don't approve of him but gotta trust him - This alliance has a purpose - This partnership is only temporary”
I’ll get more into this when we get to Death Chamber, but these lines are obviously alluding to Sonic and the plot of the game. It’s clear that Knuckles still doesn’t completely like Sonic, however the key here is that he trusts him, he’s gotten to a point now where he knows Sonic is well meaning and their goals align. However, just like real people, he’s accepted the arrangement but he doesn’t have to like it, he still believes Sonic is brash, arrogant and takes far too many risks, it will take more than a few adventures for Knuckles to fully change his opinion on Sonic.
Hunnid-P and Marlon Saunders do a great job of bouncing off each other on this song, their voices and cadences clash with each other nicely almost like how Knuckles’ inner turmoil is split in two.
The beat is tantalizingly funky, for starters that bass line is smooth as butter and the song has a nice tempo, you get the occasional organ flourish and guitar riff that crescendo and just help to enhance the song even further. Overall a really solid track in my opinion, the content of the lyrics is interesting and the delivery is great, all over an extremely funky instrumental.

KICK THE ROCK - WILD CANYON

Probably my favorite song out of all Knuckles’ Stages, this one is definitely the most Jazzy and parallels nicely with Rouge, but has a distinctly Knuckles Twist.
That Sax and Organ combo just cause an absolute eargasm and those drums form such a nice tempo that makes this track such easy listening. Honestly there’s not a whole lot going on with this track and that is not a bad thing at all. Its simplicity is probably its biggest strength and is quite noticeable compared to something like Unknown From M.E.
Some Lyrics I found particularly interesting are:
“I'm feelin her in mysterious ways - That's why I stay on point like every single day - I gotta protect this place, I do it for my race”
Yeah yeah I know everybody finds this line and the play doh line inappropriate and funny, I understand the latter but honestly I could never get the outcry over this one
“I’m feelin her in mysterious ways” honestly, in my opinion, it’s not what you think. I’ve never really seen it as a sexual line “I’m feelin you” is basically another way of saying I get you, it’s basically Knuckles saying he gets Rouge, but he doesn’t know why and that kinda bothers him.
The context matters here and the lines after do give my interpretation some weight. It’s basically Knuckles saying to himself “I get this girl and I kinda mess with her, but I gotta job to do” Knuckles is intrigued by Rouge, he’s never met anybody like her and he obviously has some feeling towards her, though because of his lack of interaction with others he struggles to understand these feelings and instead of addressing them, he tries to ignore them and remain true to his job as Guardian
“Who could'a did this, that snitch named Rouge! - When I catch her, I'ma get her with these tools”
More obvious than the last one, but it still shows that Knuckles, despite his various different feelings toward Rouge, knows he has a job to do and tries to center himself to stay committed
Honestly it’s hard to choose between this or Unknown From M.E. as my favorite Knuckles track but either way its up there and definitely something I can bop to on the regular

A GHOST’S PUMPKIN SOUP - PUMPKIN HILL

The one everybody knows and honestly I get it, it’s got that smooth piano/guitar I can’t really tell what it is but it definitely slaps. It has that distinct G-Funk whistle which pops up occasionally across SA2K that simulates that stereotypically ghostly sound nicely
It’s definitely in contention with Deeper for the most lowkey Knuckles track and that’s saying something.
Not much content lyrically, but I managed to find a few interesting lines:
“I ain’t gonna let it get to me, I’m just gon creep - Down in Pumpkin Hill I gots to find my lost piece”
Something we don’t actually see a lot from Knuckles, fear! Most of this song is about Knuckles’ fearlessness being tested, if you view this as Knuckles’ internal monologue (Which if you don’t at this point then I’ve been doing something wrong 😂) its less about the song telling us how tough Knuckles is, but Knuckles reassuring himself that he can do this.
He’s obviously trepidatious over being in Pumpkin Hill and he has to take a moment to center himself and reassure himself that “I’m Knuckles, I’m not afraid of anything” again this goes back to how Knuckles uses his job as Guardian and his duty to motivate himself and push forward through situations, regardless of his own fear.
“I’m hearing someone saying “You a chicken, don’t be scared!” - It had to be the wind, cause nobody wasn’t there”
Considering the haunted theming of this level, this very clearly (on the surface) seems to be Knuckles encountering a ghost taunting him, but I might present another angle.
This is just Knuckles’ inner thoughts again, though this time its doubt, he doesn’t believe he can find the pieces of the Master Emerald and he doesn’t think he can make it through Pumpkin Hill, yet he pushes through anyway. This one’s kinda far fetched but it’s a nice idea
I don’t adore this track as much as a lot of other people (ironically) but I can still Jive with it.

DIVE INTO THE MELLOW - AQUATIC MINE

First of all, this track does a great job at just sounding watery, the filtered organ and the echoey bass just make it sound like cave ambience turned into music
Most of this track’s lyrics center around Knuckles’ yearning to be something more than just the Guardian of the Master Emerald and to be his own individual, these are:
“Makes you wanna sit back, enjoy the life - And do things you like doing, get to shine”
Knuckles, if it wasn’t for all the enemies and hazards, obviously enjoys being in Aquatic Mine, so much so that it brings his thoughts of a better life to the front of his mind.
This shows what Knuckles really wants, to be unburdened from the Master Emerald and to just be free to kick it wherever, in a way he’s jealous of the freedom Sonic has and wishes he wasn’t tied down to Angel Island.
“I stay Knuckled up, I’m in a deep cut”
Knuckles, despite his ideals of peace and relaxation is always ready to do what he believes is right, again this whole OST is basically Knuckles reconciling his wants and his duties.
Again Knuckles isn’t really equipped to deal with these feelings and instead of addressing them, he pushes them down and buries them under his duty and tries to keep himself busy, though once he gets to Aquatic Mine where he’s forced to slow down and explore methodically, he’s suddenly unable to distract himself from his true feelings.
“In a maze, and I don't know what to do Guaranteed though, imma find the Emeralds”
Again an obvious allusion to the labyrinthine Aquatic Mine on the surface, though I believe this too has a deeper meaning.
Knuckles is lost and confused emotionally, he’s confronted by these different feelings that conflict with everything he’s ever known. His thoughts on freedom and his feelings for Rouge which he doesn’t quite understand both conflict with his role as Guardian and he can’t reconcile them.
“I don’t know what to do” in a rare moment of vulnerability, Knuckles admits that he has no idea how to manage these feelings and he’s grappling with the monumental task of managing his panicked thoughts.
Then, just as you think Knuckles is gonna start making a breakthrough, what does he do? “Guaranteed though, imma find the Emeralds” That’s right, instead of finally addressing his swirling thoughts, he pushes them down and once again distracts himself with his duty.
Honestly, like Pumpkin Hill, I know it’s a reach but it tracks with what we know Knuckles’ character has been up to this point and it gives him insane depth and really humanizes him.
A funky beat, a nice flow from Hunnid P and some really humanizing characterization of Knuckles, Dive Into The Mellow is definitely a hidden gem of the OST.

DEEPER - DEATH CHAMBER

Sooooooo chill, honestly this song is so calm and smooth, it’s so underrated on this soundtrack it really is another hidden gem like Dive Into the Mellow.
First off I absolutely adore the bass this track has, it sounds like it’s been bit compressed for a Gameboy and honestly I’m all here for it, gives it a nice techno Eggmany twist. The funky guitar and sax just enhances the mood, the song sounds almost echoey like you’re actually standing in a Death Chamber.
Lyrically this song is unique in that it’s basically just a long conversation between Sonic and Knuckles instead of Knuckles’ inner thoughts/monologue.
It’s an interesting dynamic where Sonic is actually the reasonable one, willing to put aside his and Knuckles’ differences aside for the greater good. Knuckles however is initially a bit more standoffish, but Sonic talks him into it by appealing to his guardian nature and calling him out on his stubbornness, basically forcing Knuckles to admit that Sonic is right and that they’ll be much better off working together.
Honestly not much to say, it’s pretty much all spelled out in the song, but interesting nonetheless. An understated and uniquely funky beat make this track stand out among the others nicely, definitely a great listen.

SPACE TRIP STEPS - METEOR HERD

Finally, the last song. In my opinion, Space Trip Steps is probably the weakest track musically. That doesn’t make it bad, far from it, I just can’t groove with it as easily as the others
This song takes a lot more inspirations from G-Funk than the other tracks which does give it quite a unique sound amongst the soundtrack, it wouldn’t sound out of place on The Chronic or Regulate… G Funk Era. The wavy synths and sharp base with the fast tempo give it an almost garage feel too, definitely not a sound for everyone but I think it does a good job at sounding very ethereal and space like
As for lyrics, this seems to be a turning point for Knuckles as a loner:
“Took a shuttle to space and left from our homes At least we're with friends and I'm not all alone”
Knuckles is in a completely foreign environment and feels completely out of his depth, however he feels comforted by the fact that he’s surrounded by the people he’s finally started to call his Friends, the first time he’s admitted such.
He’s forced now to acknowledge that he can’t do everything by himself, and that asking for help from his friends doesn’t make him any less of a man, he finally accepts that he can trust outsiders, but he still has a ways to go.
“Bad thing was that the Emeralds spilled - Gotta search space, man, time to get ill”
Still, Knuckles is bound and almost blinded by his duty, forcing himself to abandon his friends to search for the Master Emerald pieces that were scattered in space.
It’s clear now that Knuckles isn’t too happy to leave his friends, but as we’ve come to know him, he does the typical Knuckles thing of pushing his feelings to the side in the face of doing what he believes is right. This just tells us Knuckles still has a lot to work on before he can really come to terms with who he is.
Again, a pretty unconventional track so it can be an awkward listen and definitely not my favorite on the list, but it does something unique which I can definitely give it props for, Hunnid P even has a completely different flow, dragging out his words like he’s getting further away, hammering home that space theme.

CONCLUSION

And that’s it, if you made it this far through my long winded ramblings, then I’m extremely impressed 😂 I tried to trim the fat as best I could but I ended up getting a bit too attached to most of what I wrote
Honestly I feel like these songs have been unfairly painted as the silly crappy Knuckles rap songs with bad lyrics that are only good because of their instrumentals, and I just can’t agree with that.
I feel like in a lot of ways these songs do a much better job of characterizing Knuckles than SA1 or SA2, I really wish we got see more of his inner turmoil and him butting heads with Sonic in the game itself.
I think it’s a sad thought that for a long time, Knuckles has been a shadow of his former self (Har har) and has just been relegated to the token meathead that’s about as one dimensional as a square. Frontiers is definitely a step in the right direction and I’m excited to see what the new writing team can cook up with for his character.
But what are your thoughts though? Do you agree? Disagree? Did I manage to change your mind or have you always felt this way? Maybe you have a different take or something else to add? I’d love to hear it.
ML

Decided to not follow guides and just apply my own knowledge about the game. I was feeling so peachy. Then the winter break just started way earlier than I thought (I thought it would be like New Year onwards). I'm done with everyone but Yukari who's rank 2. Aigis will unlock in January and I hear she needs 11 days because one rank takes two days
I need 19 days to rank up them both to max. I only get 18 because I gave Junpei some dumbass weeds from the flower store trying to help him. Fuck you too, Junpei lmao
I prioritized school links but still couldn't do it, mostly because I took a breather for a few days to unlock Sun and later realized it's like mega free and you don't need to worry about unlocking it early
If I was way off I'd feel better but one day is just making me inhale a salt pile. I also need to twiddle my thumbs for two weeks because off-school links are already way done during exam weeks and holidays. I'm obviously max stats too so I have literally nothing to do but smash buttons at the arcade for two weeks straight
I maxed both P4G and Vanilla P5 without a guide by just using in-game knowledge and had plenty of time left over. Persona 3 Reload is much more frustrating because you have so much dead time with nothing meaningful to do, and then a very narrow window to finish a fuckton of social links
Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk
Edit. I was misinformed, Aigis won't take 11 days. Junpei will need that freed up space regardless for his last link episode though

Can use A I , animation,whatever pops,theme is redpill content,mgtow,manosphere.I want to most closely emulate creator” Shanon Rice Lewis” as far as content.Research also Taylor the Fiend or Locke the Bounty Hunter as far as prototype models however no COPYING them ,must make it original.These are ones that aren’t faceless ,actual men, but you can get an example of the content I want to exemplify are Better Batchelor,LFA,Aaron Clarey….you are free to use your creativity to make the video work but can not copy anybody word for word or get video unmonetized or no future gigs..start is 2 $ per video just so I know you are capable and it will increase depending on your video preforming,I can only do it by PayPal or cashapp

Harry Potter Hedwig's Theme Fingerstyle guitar tabs download as PDF and Guitar Pro on: https://paidtabs.com/search/wtHra9tFISY
Click here for a free preview of the score (first page)
This score has 2 PDF pages
Credit: this score was transcribed/uploaded by @Ignacio
If you cannot find the score, it might be because of a copyright issue. Click on "Request" button at PaidTabs.com to request and get the score.

Top Gear Theme guitar tabs download as PDF and Guitar Pro on: https://paidtabs.com/search/w7oEETOR_JM
Click here for a free preview of the score (first page)
This score has 2 PDF pages
Credit: this score was transcribed/uploaded by @SMT
If you cannot find the score, it might be because of a copyright issue. Click on "Request" button at PaidTabs.com to request and get the score.

The rules are simple, top 3 suggestions get added! (They could be characters, features or anything else, really) Top 3 commenters will also get the admin character and all the gamepasses for free lol Will check in 24hrs for top 3! (The game has no real theme btw, just as long as it ain’t a meme it works!)

The Dojo Haus is recruiting!
Attention all quality Guardians. We invite you if you are seeking a clan that offers:

1. -Activity and a home for all guardians
2. -Frequent Raids and Activities
3. -A friendly and supportive community

Look no further. The Dojo Haus is a rising clan, with numbers building fast so now is your chance to join up and help make this place be the best it can be!
What we have to offer:

1. A Fresh for Seasoned and / Returning but Experienced Guardians.
2. A Mature environment free of toxicity (Have to say it again, cause its a must).
3. Normal KWTD raids weekly for starts, MasteTriumphs after, done in a manner that you will enjoy raiding.
4. Voice Chat Channels to chill in and just talk with fellow members.
5. Dedicated LFG Channels for all your matchmaking needs.
6. Friendly all inclusive environment no matter your genderace/sexual orientation.
7. Open Staff/Sherpa Team (Looking for Quality Staff/Clan Merges/Sherpas)**.
8. Discord Giveaways.
9. Clan Events and Contests.

What we are looking for out of you:
Activity,

1. Real Life comes first, thats understandable. However we strive to recruit Guardians who will not only participate in our community, but help us fine tune our quality of members as well. We want you to try your best to make this place as active and inclusive as it can be.
2. While we have no age limit, specifically, we ask you to read the room and match the vibes and be able to handle yourself in an adult themed environment.
3. Be in our discord server and be as active as you can be in here, this is where the LFG's form so the more active you are, the more likely you will be able to participate and get the full experience of being in here.
4. Have a Mic for communication purposes in game or in discord.

If this sounds like the right fit for you and you are interested or would simply like to know or ask for more info please feel to reach out to myself (@Jak#0001 on Discord) ( Our discord here ) and I will do my best to answer any questions you have. Look forward to gaming with you all very soon.

Okay this is not specifically Taylor AND Travis, but I feel this sub would get where I am coming from.
Now I am not one to ever compare one individual's mental health conditions that may be with another person. Everyone has their own struggles and challenges they go through, even if the severity differs. However, in this situation, I would like to put my two cents in on a subject many of us already have started to discuss: Taylor's usage of mental illness, mental institutions, and just overall angst she has been harbouring since TTPD's announcement to present times. As others have pointed out before me, it has never been confirmed if Taylor has any medical condition or has any mental disorder. She did confirm back in 2019 though I believe, she has never gone to therapy as she sees her mom as the only therapist she ever could need (if it has changed since then, please let me know). To be honest, yes, it's not our place to know if she doesn't want to share, about anything involving herself, especially like mental health, as it's a personal subject for many, whether famous or not. Also I truly think therapy while super helpful for some, may not be the right for others in contrast. It genuinely depends on each individual on what they need and what works best for them. Alas, whatever we want to call Taylor is doing for the TTPD era with the usage and imagery of mental illness, personally I'm not only over it but disgusted by it.
For starters, we are led to think all this imagery and wordplay and overall presentation of mental illness and mental institutions and lobonomies etc are solely due to her broken heart over a former love (popular suggestion says it's for Matty Healy but some think it's still Joe and some think it's for other people completely or even other situations). We're left with solely her songs and her choices in words both in songs and in real life, to theorize what they could be alluding to. I have seen many Gaylors suggest these are influenced by the LGBTQIA+ was and have been treated in mainstream society. How, homosexuality was even listed an actual illness not so long ago unfortunately.
But for the sake of calling a spade a spade and being simplistic, I am just going to follow the popular belief that this era is just her choice of showing her reaction and feelings towards some ex-lover and feeling scorned by them, most likely it's Matty. Or least the grand majority of the songs seem to lean in his not so favour. That being said (and as someone who has been there with Taylor since Debut), she could have honestly chose a better direction. Mental illness isn't a joke to make people laugh at parties. It isn't a trend or the latest accessory to buy at the mall. It's not something you can just shake off and pretend it's done by the next album. It's real and it's really affects your every day life. Just as mental institutions are no joke. They're not fun playgrounds to meet potential besties at. It's literally a place that originally people were sent to against their will. Even in present times, some people are still sent to them against their will. Yes, some go now voluntarily, but it isn't always the case. I understand being heartbroken and something like ghosting can make one feel emotionally vulnerable and hurt on a multitude of levels. I just wouldn't justify making chronic word usage of "asylums", "madhouses", phrases like "they sent me away" or referencing coming straight from the hospital if she just meant it "symbolically". I get she could have easily meant Hollywood and stardom especially like she has experienced, is a crazy experience to endure, but in that case, it seems like her previous analogies of a circus works better without offending potential parties or people with actual experiences with mental institutions and/or mental illness. It reminds me of how several people say something like "I always wash my hands, I'm OCD" or "War time flashbacks, I got PTSD from *names a very underwhelming situation that disturb a person slightly*", It's careless and callous wording all around. The fact we have even seen some of Taylor's so-called fans start to make their own medical bracelets to play up this theme is disturbing in my opinion. Again mental illness isn't some necklace to show off like a diamond studded piece.
I'm not saying Taylor couldn't have felt maddened in a way by her experiences that inspired TTPD thus how she chose to display this era and such. In my own personal experience without going too much into it, I had my own ghosting experience a few years back that wasn't fun in any way, and it was with someone, who reassured me for months on end that they were going to stay and we'd always be in each other's lives so obviously my trust and faith were both shaken when I noticed one night, I got blocked from all their social media and they didn't answer any call or text I left. However, I didn't go around not only acting like a tortured Victorian woman, who was imprisoned against her own will in a sanitarium but marketing myself as one and even trying to trademark a term I clearly didn't create. Granted say Taylor hypothetically went through a whole bunch of worst case scenarios: loved ones dying, friends leaving her when she needed them the most, people she care for getting sick, potential bankruptcy, etc then fuck, I get her reason behind using all this theme and the imagery as well. But I am going to take the benefit of the doubt and say she really chose a serious topic and things associated with it, just because something went awry again with her and some person she dated unfortunately. And what makes it even more vulgar in my opinion is it's not even like her first break up. It's much more than her first rodeo at this game yet she chose to display all of her feelings for it this time in perhaps, one of the worst ways. She is being insensitive to the ones who actually have been in mental institutions, whether by choice or not, and/or are suffering from mental illness. Again maybe she has something too, maybe not but regardless, she seems tone-deaf to the bigger picture here, similar to her using soldier terminology despite never been at war or even in service.
Many musicians have used this imagery before as we've established but it doesn't make it any more right. Several artists in comparison have been public with their mental health situations and don't even choose to use this type of imagery for themselves. They'll mention it time from time, but it's definitely not treated like a personality trait from them. It's just an aspect of them but not the whole picture. The fact she's even referring to herself as "The Chairman of The Tortured Poets Department" sounds like the combination of one of the most pretentious and woe is me crock I have ever heard. We don't see Morrissey calling himself, "The Pope of Mope" (yes, the fans do but he doesn't) and I doubt we'd see Robert Smith call himself, "The King of Sad". Yet Taylor who has had what seemed like a well off childhood and many good things happen to her and never seemed to brand herself as anything less than cheery adjectives for more over a decade, it just sounds so off-putting now she's trying to play the tragic role like it's natural or genuine.
I find it important to note, one particular musician named Emilie Autumn, has been inspired by the Victorian era for her whole career and real life "tortured" writers , along with incorporating the whole asylum analogy long before Taylor, but in sheer contrast, it was documented she actually went to a psych ward in a book she published in 2009. In the book itself, she discusses what it was in both a fictional way and factual way of what she went through as well showcasing how women were treated there in present times compared with the 1800s hasn't changed that much. She wanted to write the book to empower women though and to rise above the turmoil and be stronger because of it. She was no victim here (nor trying to just use it "alt points"). She has since (and even before the book) been very open about her experiences with mental illness (she's openly bipolar and the abuse she's endured over the years, as well her songs show she's not afraid to tackle the harder subjects) and what's it really like to be in a psych ward. I feel Emilie Autumn accomplished making mental illness a subject we can understand and even relate to, without it feeling gimmicky or a cash grab until she comes up with another aesthetic. Again I'm not saying Taylor's life story has been nothing but peaches and cream though, I recognize it hasn't been. And again she isn't expected to tell us her entire medical history and every blemish she ever had, but I don't support nor think her going around at her concerts with her dancers dressed as nurses and doctors and her using mental institutions as settings when she has been so mum on the subject of mental health, whether hers or in general, is a good look especially if she's just doing it to songs about how a guy stopped pursuing her and they weren't even together for that long. It comes off disrespectful and even condescending to the ones, who really have mental conditions and we can't just shake it off with a dance number. I'm sorry she got hurt (whether she still is or was is debated), but it doesn't give her a free pass to use something as heavy as this as just an aesthetic and equally turning a blind eye when some of her fans think it's just a lighthearted thing too. I will never get over how so many are now using asylums so loosely, like "OMG this album makes me crazy, send me to an asylum next". That's fucked up to say the least. Ultimately, I just hope this phase changes fast, and hopefully, Taylor can heal from whatever she is or isn't singing about, and more people step in when an idea is just isn't a good one.

So on my 3rd streak leading up to two weeks. the energy and strength to continue has been very different- been weed and alcahol free for 3 months, daily runs, meditation, working out, healthy eating, reading , journaling- the whole shabbang. No edging, no looking at pron, even if i accidently see cheeks on instagram its easier for my brain to just go "hm whatever".
I'm very much now focused on pushing to the 3month mark to feel more of this power and even being mentally dedicated to only releasing once I find a woman which is worth my life essence. (ITS ME SEASON RN)
Now. Thing is, in the theme of getting more opportunies on this journey, I have recently found an opportunity online for a video editor role (been video editing for about 13 years or so now) for a Onlyfans agency, naturally the managers love my portfolio and my energy (LOL).
The work is easy and the pay is incredible. 3%-5% of what the model earns monthly (which is like 300k-400k). As I've been going through a spiritual awakening during this time, life has been LIFING harddd, so financially I am destroyed, lets just say that lol. An opportunity like this would not only put me back on my feet, but be very transformative in a short space of time.
I've done a few tests (not pron just SFW insta teasing stuff) which took about 1 hour to edit and sent it off to them and theyre happy with the work. Even during the editing process I still had that "hmm whatever its just work attitude" and didnt even feel horny while editing or anything. Thing is when I asked them to specify what type of stuff id be editing they said itd more NSFW solo stuff and of course from a editor stand point I said I was able to pull it off, but from the standpoint of a clean hearted semen retainer I was like urghhhh mannnn.
Work is work right, and even if I have to put a fkn padlock on my pants then imma do what I gotta do. But im just concerned about the deeper subconcious effects of editing this content over a prolonged period of time and whether my dopamine receptors are gonna be screaming in agony.
I don't really know what im looking for from positng this. I just cant really talk to family about this job for obvious reasons and just want some perspective, cos yeah I may be broke but feeling energetically broken is just as bas if not worse!

tl;dr As I really start to feel like a make progress, the demons throw me a curve ball.

I am setting up awesomewm and using Lua and Bash script for the first time. I was able to get this working, so on the one hand it might appeal to other beginners as an accessible project, and on the other this is a good juncture to seek out feedback from those who know better ways. u/digost explained to me about mkfifo yesterday and already that let me do something new in this.
wallpaper can be set up in rc.lua by adding the line awful.spawn.with_shell("feh --bg-scale ~/FILENAME.png"), so if this file is replaced with another png a different wallpaper will load
conky the system monitor is installed from pacman and it can be given its own background by following the installation guide to generate a config file at ~/.config/conky/conky.conf and adding or editing a line to the top of the conky.text section
conky.text = [[ ${image /home/dave/conkies/conkycar.png -p -50,0 -s 450x450}
Where 450x450 is the image size and -50 is an offset to get it to appear in the right place. These small images are about the same size as the cheapest generative-AI option, which I found for fractions of a penny and that's what gave me the idea. I will try not to promote or even mention the particular provider since it is non-Free.
conky configuration is something that some people spend time on as part of ricing. Although a basic process of pulling an image from the internet should stay the same across awesomewm themes, there could be limitless complexity in getting images to reliably visually-cohere. If the conky and the wallpaper come from related prompts into the same Model, then hopefully they can cohere at least sometimes, but for now I've just gone with colour red.
My first step is to create a salt list of theme words. I went to a free/non-passworded chatbot and asked it for a list of words to do with cars and trucks and fire and chrome. These go into a text file with a space at the start of each entry
conkies.top4salt.txt

 Automobile Vehicle Sedan Coupe {etc...} 

These salt words are used to make each generated image slightly different.
First a .json request needs to be generated to a chatbot-type API. This uses a template from their site
conkies.TEXTtemplate

#\bin\bash curl --request POST \ --url PUT THE URL OF THE TEXT-PROVIDER'S API HERE \ --header 'Authorization: Bearer PUT THEIR API KEY HERE \ --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \ --data '{ "max_tokens": 2048, "mode": "python", "model": "icortex-1", "n": 1, "temperature": 0, "text": 

The last field "text" is the prompt, which can be brought in from a separate textfile
conkies.prompt.txt

"A prompt for an artist to design a promotional photograph, of a luxurious red sports car, which must place strong emphasis on:- (1) an Arch, (2) flames, (3) a red background (4)[ 

The " at the start is needed for .json request's format - as can be seen from the other lines. The [ on the end is there as a delimiter but ended up not being used: the API just ignores it.
For this site this is enough to start with. The prompt is set up with a script, which is also used to launch the process once everything is in place:-
conkies.TEXTpromptsetup.sh

#!/bin/bash find . -maxdepth 1 -type p -delete mkfifo conkies.fifo -m 0700 echo $( cat conkies.TEXTtemplate > perl -pi -e 'chomp if eof' echo -n $(cat conkies.prompt.txt) >> echo -n $(shuf -n 1 conkies.topksalt.txt) "," $(shuf -n 1 conkies.topksalt.txt) "," $(shuf -n 1 conkies.topksalt.txt) "\"" "}" "'" >> sh conkies.TEXT-prompter.sh) > conkies.fifo & alacritty -e sh /home/dave/conkies/conkies.IMAGE-promptsetup.sh 

The first line clears any leftover fifo files from previous times the script has run. The main body of this joins the parts of the .json prompt together into a compliant format, in the file conkies.TEXT-prompter.sh The shuf commands pull three salt-words into the prompt. The perl command takes a newline off the end of the conkies.TEXTtemplate which otherwise breaks the format. There are some syntax marks at the end of the file, the " one needs an escape character.
conkies.TEXT-prompter.sh is then run; the data that comes back from the API of the service provider is written into the fifo; and a new shell is opened for the IMAGE prompter.
Hopefully the data that comes back from the API is a prompt. If it's an error-message or the money has run out the resulting images might be very strange!
The IMAGE prompter also has to be set up beforehand. The IMAGE provider I used had a slightly more complex format than the TEXT provider I used, so it had to be made from a start section, the TEXT-prompt, and an end section. The format was on their website and involved some intricacies to do with different Models being compatible with different versions of Lora.
conkies.IMAGEtemplate

#\bin\bash curl -X 'POST' \ 'THE IMAGE-PROVIDER'S URL GOES HERE' > conkies-$(date +"%m_%d_%y_%T").png \ -H THEIR API-KEY GOES HERE \ -H 'accept: */*' \ -H 'Content-Type: multipart/form-data' \ -F 'lora2_strength=.7' \ -F 'lora2=' \ -F 'lora1_strength=.7' \ -F 'prompt= 

example prompt from the TEXT-provider

"The artist should design a promotional photograph of a luxurious sports car, with an arch in the background, surrounded by flames. The car should be in a state of acceleration, with its fenders gleaming and its hubcaps spinning. The flames should be in shades of red, orange, and yellow, and should be emitting sparks. The background should be a deep red." 

conkies.IMAGEtemplate-footer

' \ -F 'width=512' \ -F 'height=512' \ -F 'steps=30' \ -F 'sampler=dpmpp_2m_karras' \ -F 'model=epic_diffusion_1' \ -F 'negative_prompt=ugly, tiling, poorly drawn hands, poorly drawn feet, poorly drawn face, out of frame, extra limbs, disfigured, deformed, body out of frame, blurry, bad anatomy, blurred, watermark, grainy, signature, cut off, draft' \ -F 'upscale=1' \ -F 'seed=4116668295' \ -F 'format=png' \ -F 'guidance=7' \ -F 'lora1=' \ 

These are combined together as follows by the second script:-
IMAGE-promptsetup.sh

#!/bin/bash cat conkies.IMAGEtemplate > perl -pi -e 'chomp if eof' cat conkies.fifo cut -f6 -d":" cut -c 3- rev cut -c 8- rev >> perl -pi -e 'chomp if eof' cat conkies.IMAGEtemplate-footer >> sh conkies.IMAGE-prompter.sh && sh conky-relaunch.sh 

They are launched at the end as conkies.IMAGE-prompter.sh, which downloads a timestamped .png file from the image provider.
and the last script sorts the images and relaunches conky with the most recent.
conky-relaunch.sh

pkill conky mv *.png ~/conkies/conkycars/ && cp -p $(ls -dtr1 "conkycars"/*.png tail -1) ~/conkies/conkycar.png exec conky 

To make wallpaper instead would need to change the image size in the conkies.IMAGEtemplate file and point rc.lua to the folder it's been downloaded into.
To generate a wallpaper and conky background at the same time I think it would be easiest to duplicate everything to another folder, so that the text prompts are not the same.
At the end on an unmodified conky with a free wallpaper from https://www.pixelstalk.net/download-free-arch-linux-background/ it looks like
https://preview.redd.it/iiscm9bifg0d1.png?width=1565&format=png&auto=webp&s=b836c7a6ba3c5df01768e5014d2c3a20ac5601fc
https://preview.redd.it/cbq17sfigg0d1.png?width=1596&format=png&auto=webp&s=72b889bce8fe995ce57a6e4bdd433de4f0c0b505
There are various problems. Any changes to the API will break it but that is in the nature of these things. Both API providers required accounts. With the text-provider I am on some trial limit they have which is more than enough free requests per month to make these conky prompts, but it might be monetized in the future. The image-provider I had to pay for but it's the minimum amount. It might be that the credits expire and my conky becomes a financial commitment. But for this $10 I could generate a lifetime supply of pictures of what AI thinks cars look like... with wing-mirrors only for the passengers :D
From zero-knowledge I've been able to use a named pipe to connect two APIs together, and used bash script to manipulate text into compliant formats for .json requests. I'm becoming conscious that simple tasks have to be broken down into more stages and more files than it initially appears and this becomes messy. I generally have nothing in place to check each script is outputting in the right form, or to give error messages. If I accidentally included one special character in the text prompt, that would break the image output, but if I include any comment lines to warn myself then the script will have to check for those and remove them... so I just have to remember.

hey, we have a private (no men allowed), heavily moderated subreddit for anyone that would choose the bear.
safespaceforwoman
FAQ: 1-how is it a safe space? because we vett everyone who requests to join. no men allowed, and no bigots, including misogynyists, transphobes, queerphobes, racists, no body shaming, no ageism, no ableism, etc...
2-how is it private? unless you are approved to join, you can't see any of the posts or comments in there. completely private
3-how heavily moderated is it? we have 9 mods who monitor the sub to make sure none of the above type of people somehow sneak in. we do allow discussions about most everything, though.
4-how do we vett everyone? i won't lie, this part is a bit creepy; we look through your post history, and make sure that you are a woman, and that you aren't a bigot.
5-do you allow trans women in your safe space for women? trans women are women. 'nuff said.
6-do you allow non-binary people in? that depends. femme leaning and neutralish enbies are allowed in, if they want to. this is not saying enbies are women, but it is taking into account that enbies suffer from the same issues a lot of women face, discrimination at the hands of men.
7-do you allow trans men in? in general, no. trans men are men. they are not "men-lite" and to say so is transphobic. if a specific trans man wants in, and he has a really solid case, due to some shared experiences, the mods will consider it. same goes for masc leaning enbies.
8-are we welcoming to the LGBTQIA+ community? duh. yes, we are. no men, of course, but whether you are gay, straight, pan, bi, ace, aro, or any combination of the above, you are welcome.
9-why is woman spelled with an a, not an e? safespaceforwomen was already taken, was a very low traffic subreddit, and was not private. so, we made do.
10-can non members see your posts or comments?-no. the sub is private. you have to be a member of the sub to see posts and comments.
10-are pet pictures required upon entry? no, but somehow, the pet tax became a theme, and now lots of our members post pet pics. but we don't just talk about cute, furry animals; we discuss serious subjects. we talk about issues around the world, and locally, without worrying that some dude is going to say "notallmen" or interject with their opinion, "acshually, the bear is more dangerous..."
if you are interested, please either go to the subreddit and click on message the mods (you can't actually see the subreddit, just the landing page that says "message the mods"), or reply to this post, or send me a DM, or send me a chat.
again, the caveat is that we will look at your post/comment history to make sure you meet the requirements for the sub, but i will say this: all of us mods have looked at hundreds, if not thousands of post histories over the past week or so when we started advertising the sub, and it's all a blur. i don't remember anything, at this point, from any individual post history.
side note: if you're a dude, asking if you can join the sub just to learn, the answer is no. this is a space for women, not men. learn to take no for an answer.
this post is mod-approved by the mods of lesbianactually
i should note that the last time we advertised the sub, we had over 2000 requests to join, and it took almost a week to get to all of them. i promise that we, the mods, will get to everyone, it just will take time.
this is not to take away from any other subreddit, this is an alternative space that is free of men.
mobile users aren't able to request to join, so just post a comment here, and we will get to you!