Reading

Post-Shadowbringers adventures continue. Last week I did all the Nier raids (my beloved) and Eden 1-8, which I only paused on as you can't do 9-12 until Thancred and Urianger leave the First. I also did 5.1 this week - I really like 5.1 as it wraps up a lot of quandries leftover by SHB itself in that you don't really get a lot of time to see Eulmore out the other side of their leader abandoning them and their recovery from the influence of meol. You see a little, Alphinaud asks the important question of the next step being the most important one to take, and it is somewhat understandably rushed to keep the pacing, but it's largely reactive, and not on a day to day basis - how do they keep the change to their society going? How do they reach a stage that I, the player, can feel confident in giving the benefit of the doubt to them, when previously I hated being in Eulmore for any length of time due to being so disgusted by it? 5.1 answers that. Ran'jit gets one throwaway mention in npc dialogue, proving how pointless he was to the narrative at large. 5.1 also majorly introduces a cure for tempering being put on the table, something that has been dogging the wol since Ifrit in ARR, and Alisaie truly is the kindest person in this entire game ;w; she is always thinking of others before herself and her own well-being, always.

I started Bozja this weekend! Partly for glam, partly as Khlip has to go for Prih lore related reasons... an eagle for an eagle... I did try to queue in for Gaius weapons, but after 25 min at peak times I had to give up... I do really enjoy there's a bunch of side content for SHB that's introduced to you in msq and voiced, it makes it feel more mandatory, and a lot of it is on the Source so you get to catch up on the war with Garlemald that the wol has largely been absent for. I should maybe-hopefully get through to 5.3 during this week, although I am not looking forward to Elidibus wol... I've done this fight twice legit and remember nothing of it due to the sheer amount of pain it caused me so we'll see how bad it is for me past graphic update.

Overwatch had its launch, rewards are bugged (lol) because ofc they are. This means if you wanted to get both branches of rewards for the lore event you can't, they've been broken for four days of seven, yay :) couple this with unplayable lag on psn for day one, endless disconnects, five new heroes and a bunch of genuinely new players and tourists and it's been a little hellish. Due to the servers being so flunky I haven't touched stadium yet this season, as competitive points are also bugged and no way I am relying on up in the air promises of retroactively applied points for that, no thank you. Aim assist promises also did not pan out... there has been no new lore bites since launch, I'm antsy about Ashe but even more "okay but you should really do a lens for Overwatch the organisation atp given the attack on their main base, surely???" but no, no.

Sanrio is not my thing but Kuromi Widowmaker has invaded my brain, she's so cute. She has moogle wings (to me).

Of the new heroes, I have ended in the wild state of... not liking the three female characters at all, LMAO. ( in my boys era )

Once the bugs are fixed (maybe??) I will get my gold weapons and decide what I want this year for comp... I have to add to the girls list, and seemingly Mizuki at this rate... the Crimson Wolf red looks much better in game as expected, except for the caveat of the Talon watermark all over the weapons, woops. It looks okay on thin weapons or designs where the red isn't applied to the bulk but the wrapping instead, which does mean it looks good on Ashe's mythic gun, and that's important to me. It also looks good on Wuyang P5 Joker, I may have to do it for Joker... and perhaps some of the other "evil" skins we have like Infinite Empire, Mirrorwatch Talon/normal Talon, we'll see.

They did however change 2/3rds of my mains in stadium so we'll see what the climb is like when I get back to it. I may have to learn stadium Orisa in earnest. Here comes horse.

Right after US Thanksgiving last year, a popular and well-regarded gunpla shop announced it was closing. A bummer, but not a huge surprise. This is not an ideal environment to an import-heavy small business. The plan was for a gradual phase-out but on Friday the owner announced someone will be buying any remaining stock, time for one last sale and the site is closing Monday. While there wasn't much left, I did grab a few things, including an MG 00 Raiser.

That shop is also still running a contest and intends to keep the community discord around for fun, so we'll see how that goes.

The minor cold I mentioned a few days ago has progressed to minor obnoxious coughing, so hopefully I'm towards the tail end and it'll shuffle along in a few days. After how sick I was a year ago, when I had the flu, I'll take this minor annoyance.

Both of my Star Abyss models arrived and their boxes are gigantic. ^^;; I'll need to bust them out at some point later and do runner checks. Finished up the little Trans-Am Clear 00 Diver Ace that I guess I subconsciously built for Valentine's Day. It's really pretty but if I ever do another one or get fussy, I'll change its eye color. Pink eyes when everything else is also pink don't really work. Really pretty kit, incredibly difficult to photograph.

Last... autumn? I had picked up the Daban copy of the unobtainable MG Destiny Astray and promptly did a runner check, planned to build it, and... Anyway, started building it now and yeah, a lot of issues and annoyance but I haven't completely broken anything yet. I expect it to be a bit of a grenade when finished but if it looks good on the shelf, I'll be happy. On the off chance work ever tries to kill me with overtime in the next year or two, I'll buy a real one. (But I'm also still brainstorming/building what I need for the 30MM contest diorama!)

Working slowly on archiving and am going to try to shift to cleaning out what's in the WIP folder instead of mirroring what's on AO3. The latter isn't as important. Though I will keep mirroring KH stuff since there's so much and small-dosing it has been working for me.

Need to do some words (mostly written, need typed) and replies...

Last edited: 16 February 2026 — Additions and made number notation more consistent.

( FFXIV talk )

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( Health talk )

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In other news, today I'm going to check out where my classes for this semester are located. It's approaching Autumn down here, so it's finally cold enough for me to wear my new jacket out (it's got very cute embroidery)! Not that I can wear warm stuff long if I'm walking around. I heat up and sweat very easily, which is annoying but I suppose means I don't have to cover up my nicer clothes with jackets in winter? lol

Hey everynyan! It's me, Samifer, posting... on Dreamwidth...

I'd really like to get back into the habit of checking my reading page... :') Maybe next week... In the meantime I thought I'd use this post to write down some stuff I'd like to get done soon:

• Start working on commission stuff I've been putting off (sketch for one; concept for other)
• Make a page for Citrus Con 2026
• Crosspost stuff I haven't crossposted to teamflare
• I'm like 99.99% sure there was something else I meant to include but now I can't remember it anymore

My hope is that my next post here will be my Official 2026 To-Do List (No Pressure But Still It Would Be Nice To Get That Stuff Done)... Until then, to try to get into the habit of posting art here, I'd like to crosspost my entry for perfworldweek! It's a comic I've had sketched out since December, but I used the ship week as an excuse to finally finish it. I think overall it took me a week-ish to make, which seems fair enough for a six-pages B&W comic with shading and some backgrounds.

I've actually been getting back into making comics FOR REAL since Legends Z-A came out, which is nice. Not all of them have been multiple pages long but I did draw a two-pages one, and I have two other thumbnailed (one is another two-pages one, the other is four-pages) which is more than I can say I've done comics-wise since like. 2022 probably. So, you know! Progress!

Anyway, here's the comic. Putting it under a cut and all of that. Be warned that it contains spoilers for Pokémon Legends Z-A!

( troisième homme )

The comic has also been posted on Bluesky, Tumblr, and even AO3, if you want to check it out there!

Another thing that's on my 2026 agenda already is finally archiving my old French fic on AO3... I've made a pact with a friend who's doing the same thing. I don't know if it's going to help but it's nice to have someone to back you up. We're doing a buddy goal on the app Finch (no idea if anybody else who's subscribed to me here uses it, but it's one of those habit tracking apps... you take care of a little bird... it's not guit-trippy at all which is cool. It's actually helped me build some morning habits, I think???)

That's about all I've got for today... I hope you're doing well, as usual! You should definitely check out what's been made for the ship week, there's some good stuff in there! \o/

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

Starting off the random thoughts tag with a TON of stuff. Most of these would not be able to take up a post themselves, and I think it might be a bit annoying to have an avalanche of miniature entries XD I did wonder if I should just limit this to the thoughts with meat on their bones, but I want at least one post that sort of captures parts of my brain that might only show themselves in my replies to other people most days.

Some thoughts were caused by certain convos/events, others were purely from my mind. May discuss sensitive topics vaguely.

Positive

Love when artists put their names/signatures in places that you wouldn't necessarily notice and thus wouldn't be likely to get removed by thieves. Usually I see this in fake logos, but I've also seen it in hair highlights if it fits the style. (If you've seen my art, you might have seen me do this with the humanoid Sonic piece I did.)

I didn't know wood fibre installation existed. It sounds very handy, if only for being safer to handle than other common insulation materials like fibreglass.

RSS feeds are very cool, and I'm glad DW can be used as a reader for them.

Two of the profile pics that give me the most pleasant vibes are Joker from Persona 5, and Link from The Legend of Zelda.

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Neutral / Mild

For me, it's quite awkward to read about or watch sexual acts in media. I feel that I am intruding on something, though I am perfectly happy to 'spy' on literally everything else.

Managing plans/events doesn't sound fun at all, but I'd rather do it thoroughly if I have to do it at all. I would not tolerate being made the de facto planner.

I don't feel that I need all my friends to be physically present for me to connect to them; certainly, I feel lonely and insane if I can't get touchy with people, but they don't necessarily have to be the same as the people I converse with. Emotional connection and physicality are not super intertwined for me.

Honestly, Malaysian food is way too greasy for me nowadays. I really like the texture of fried stuff, but the greasiness should be minimal.

I do consider cutting my hair very short/shaving it all every summer, I don't handle heat well.

It's a shame that people don't write more romances between characters of the same height, or even build.

I never leave movies half-finished unless I genuinely did not like it enough to continue it, and I don't willingly restart games I didn't finish unless I somehow fucked it up really bad — if I forgot the story or how to play, I'll just watch some videos or tough it out. My reasoning is that movies tend to be in that time-range where I either commit or I never start, and I hate losing progress on things, including games.

Circadian rhythm and brain stuff is strange. Like, whaddya mean if I have a normal sleep schedule and wake up for a 6-8am breakfast, I can't eat anything too heavy or greasy right after I wake up, but if I sleep a normal amount of time but just wake up at a different meal time, like 6pm, then suddenly I can eat whatever the fuck I want without nauseous consequences (just can't eat as much tho)??? I'd assumed it was just that I wasn't ready for that to be the first meal, but I guess it's just so associated with morning time that my brain ignores whatever grievances it has at night.

It's wild how many people I've been talking to recently where they have such poor memory (of conversations) that it genuinely sometimes makes me doubt if I have memory problems because I'm like 20x better in comparison. Realistically, of course, we can all have memory issues of differing intensities, affecting different types of memories.

I sorta wanna play Mario Kart World because the normal tracks look wild (lowkey they make me feel stupid just watching), but I'm too lazy for pirating and I don't want to give that much money to Nintendo.

Some people never consider changing the playback speed of videos, but I almost always use 1.5x or 2x speed. I forgot that not everyone is like me.

Though I've had the Discord display name "Llymlaen de la Noscea" for quite a while at this point, I've only just now used a water-related profile pic, which is funny.

While there is arguably evidence that my crush like[s/d] me back, it's actually impossible to tell for me, given the 'weird' relationships I have with my friends.

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Negative

I've never felt particularly "stuck in place"; I'd say it's close to being carried along a river, alternating between positive and negative locations, but always a bit too fast for my liking.

I do not like hearing "I'm sorry you felt that way". Some people act like it can replace an apology, which it can't. As a condolence, it feels condescending or insincere, especially if the person saying it is the individual I am upset with. It has the same effect on me as "just calm down". I can't calm down just because you say to, and I don't care if you are sorry or offer condolences if you're just going to continue with the behaviour that pissed me off in the first place.

Scolding people for mistakes is not productive. Failing to provide suggestions for a way to circumvent or lessen the occurrence of known mistakes is not productive. Scolding people for problems they could not feasibly have been responsible for is cruel and ignorant.

FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026
FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026
FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026

Yes, that's right, the Kiss Battle is back! The premise is simple: folks leave a prompt, others fill those prompts. The fill MUST include a kiss of some kind - your interpretation of what that means is open! And this is not just for fanfic - fan art is welcome, too!

COME PLAY WITH US!

FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026
FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026
FINAL FANTASY KISS BATTLE 2026

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

1. Who was your first kiss?: Mike Wayt. There was a spark for me, no idea if he felt it. It usually means a person is one of your soulmates.

2. Who is the last person you kissed?: Craig Owens. Long time ago, I kept falling in his mouth and it pissed him off. I can't help I have a tiny mouth, yeesh.

3. What is the story of your most romantic kiss? No idea, it would be Mike Wayt. He taught me how to kiss kinda. My next adventure is my fiancee.

4. What is the story of your worst kiss?: Nick Blackburn. Zero chemistry.

5. Who do you want to kiss right now?: Josh, my Fiancee.

Copy and paste to your own journal, then reply to this post with a link to your answers. If your journal is private or friends-only, you can post your full answers in the comments below.

If you'd like to suggest questions for a future Friday Five, then do so on DreamWidth or LiveJournal. Old sets that were used have been deleted, so we encourage you to suggest some more!

I guess I'm making tags for lists of interesting things I find around. Only positive today!

Note: I don't think I have to say this, but I will this time — I don't know everything about the people/organisation/etc I might mention, so please forgive and inform me if I erroneously recommend something unfavourable.

( Stuff under cut )