Shaleesh [she/her]

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Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: June 20th, 2021

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  • I was working at this media store where I rode out the beginning of the pandemic and my transition, it was a weird time all around. Not the worst by any means but still retail.

    There was this one dude who walked up to me when I was running cash, looked me in the eyes, then down to my tits, then down to my nametag, then back at my eyes and did the sign of the cross. He would later come in on a regular basis to use our restrooms and go to every section, display, and employee that he found objectionable to shake his head and then do the sign of the cross. I had the unfortunate habit of always being there when he came in. He found me objectionable. That guy didn’t piss me off as much as the one dude who started laughing at me as soon as he walked up to my register. That was honestly the first time in my life that I felt rage and indignation over how others treated me for my gender identity, before then I just assumed that I somehow deserved it.

    I have a gazillion stories but the full realization that the company I worked for profited off the dissemination of material that called for the abuse of women, children and minorities was a moment for me. Of course we couldn’t send those books back or anything because of the freeze peaches policies the company has. That, and the not-insignificant share of income reactionary and “christian” material represented.





  • I love silly mods like the googly eyes mod for Darkest Dungeon and the smiling leader portraits mod for Hearts of Iron 4. Those are truly one of the best genre of mods.

    MC Tammer’s NIF bashed weapons pack for Fallout 3 and New Vegas is totally awesome. Theres a gazillion guns of all sorts including a lot of non-lethals, it adds some extra attatchments and ammo types too. All of the weapon models are made up of parts of weapon models from the games themselves so they actually match the aesthetic pretty well. Highly reccomend the mod itself since its well integrated with the game with NPCs selling and carrying the new guns. One of the custom vendors (which are all optional) is a stereotype of russian people (think FPS Russia but hes a gunsmith) and that was kinda cringe at times.






  • I can definitely say that the rest are pretty good, if not better in some ways. I can’t say anything about the plot without spoiling but Harrow the Ninth is partially written in second person, like “you did this” and “you felt that” and it can be really offputting but once you figure out why those chapters are written that way it’s a really cool twist on the story. Nona the Ninth is also good! I haven’t finished it though, it has a very different tone from the other two books.


  • Regarding audiobooks/regular books I can make a reccomendation.

    Gideon the Ninth is a very fun peice of space fantasy that has a great mix of humor, worldbuilding, characters, intrigue, and drama.

    Every few generations the greatest necromancer and the greatest swordfighter from each of the nine planets are summoned to an ancient palace to uncover the mysteries that are contained within. Gideon the Ninth is the story of one of those events, told from the perspective of the person who is by far the least qualified to be there. The main character is a lesbian, and there are a couple of other gay characters as well and it takes place in a world where being gay is NBD. The author, Tamsyn Muir, is a lesbian.

    Spoiler-y Content Warnings

    ___Major character deaths occur as well as the deaths of a few children, however I think the author handles the subject carefully. There are some depictions of disability as well as terminal illness, IIRC there is some drug use and alchohol, a little bit of sexual themes too but nothing explicit.

    Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant (a pseudonym for Senan Mcguire) is a suspensful cryptid horror story about a bisexual marine biologist that seeks the truth of what happened to her sister, who was attacked by mermaids.

    A little bit Jurassic Park a little bit Atlantis: The Lost Empire and a little bit X Files. It’s at times very tense, a little goofy and always pretty nerdy (to be clear its a “scientific journals and cosplay” nerdy rather than “bazinga and funko pops” kind of nerdy). Overall the story is a romp and I read it in like three days.

    Content Warnings

    Major characters die, the hunting and killing of animals is portrayed, people are drowned, ableism, meat is eaten in some scenes, theres a few segments where the reader takes the perspective of someone who struggles and dies, there’s some depictions of past ableist and homophobic parental abuse. Thats all I can recall off the top of my head.


    (Sorry for the word vomit, I wanted to talk about a couple of my favorite books)

    Addendum:

    In Into the Drowning Deep there are a pair of deaf characters. I am not deaf and I can’t judge whether or not those characters (written by an author who is also not deaf) are good portrayals. However I want to mention this because those two characters, and the scenes from their perspectives were some of my favorite parts of the novel.