Booksmith sells online! They even have book mystery boxes based on other books you love. Let's show them (and others) that they made a good business AND moral choice.

WIBTA for taking advantage of my boss’ possible manic episode?

I know this already sounds bad but hear me out.

So I (30M) am the sole employee of this guy (62M) who’s honestly just a miserable boss and an even more miserable person. It sucks so bad working for him—the pay is horrendous, he’s verbally abusive, and the working conditions are awful (in the winter I literally have to stay bundled up the whole work day because he refuses to put the heat on in the office). He wouldn’t even give me holidays off if it wasn’t for the fact that there’s basically nothing to do those days because everywhere else is closed. I’m almost positive he unironically thinks poor people should die if they can’t work. His nephew (aka his only living relative and just the nicest guy) came by yesterday to invite him to Christmas dinner and he told him he’d see him in hell.

I cannot stress this enough—it’s BAD. I’d quit, but it’s been hard finding a better job and I’ve got four kids at home, including one with special needs.

Anyway, so here’s where I’m wondering if I’d be the asshole. Today was Christmas Day and he showed up at my house out of nowhere (huge red flag, I know). At first I thought he’d forgotten I had the day off and he was here to chew me out, which was worrying enough, but then his whole demeanor changed and he was super happy and excited and talking about how he was going to raise my salary. He even mentioned possibly making me a partner in the firm.

Now if that was it, I’d feel a little weird about the suddenness of it but it’d be fine. I’m not going to complain about having more money to feed my family. But then he started talking about how he wanted to pay our mortgage off. He talked about wanting to pay for our son to get the very expensive medical care that’s probably going to save his life. He mentioned at one point that he was going to be donating a huge amount of money to charity too—I knew he was rich but it staggered me. All this from a guy who doesn’t (didn’t?) even want to turn on the heat or the lights because it costs too much money.

It was such a sudden and drastic change that happened very literally overnight and now I’m kind of concerned he’s having a manic episode or something. I really, really want to accept his sudden generosity (I probably will; my wife is all for it and thinks he owes it to us), and I would love to believe that he’s truly had a sudden change of heart (an actual Christmas miracle lol) but I’m just worried about the possible consequences of accepting huge financial gifts like this from someone who I believe might be experiencing some kind of break from reality. Even if there’s nothing legally wrong with it, I’m worried about the ethics of it.

TLDR, my asshole boss might be in the middle of a mental breakdown. WIBTA if I accepted his offer to pay off my mortgage and my son’s medical expenses?

Update: I got the courage up to ask him about his sudden change of heart while my special needs child was napping in his lap (what), and he told me he was visited by three ghosts. So. Definitely not well. Still not sure I won't take the money.

Happy 100th Birthday Dick Van Dyke! It’s 2025 I need you all to know that this man is still alive and dancing

Bert from Mary Poppins was always a fav of mine, he made me laugh so hard as a kid and I think part of me still aspires to be a whimsical jack-of-all-trades type like him.

Gothic literature must be cursed to forever be misinterpreted by mainstream public because how did this happen

Dracula book: an evil count who only sees the world as a resource to be drained for his own pleasure is stopped by the group of people who deeply care for each other

Dracula in media: a tragic romantic hero, main love interest of one of the protagonists who must be liberated from her dull little life

Frankenstein book: any human has capacity for evil when completely abandoned and shunned by the world and the people who brought him into it

Frankenstein in media: don't play God because it's against nature's laws

Jekyll and Hyde book: repression and only caring about external appearances can cause your worst impulses to indulge themselves in dangerous ways if ignored for too long

Jekyll and Hyde in media: what if there was two of the same guy but one of them was evil and gross?

The Picture of Dorian Gray book: When your actions don't have consequences your most selfish whims will take hold of you, destroying not only yourself but anyone who has the misfortune to love you. Also being gay & obsessed enough can sometimes grant you power over life & death.

The Picture of Dorian Gray in media: Eternal youth! Beauty! Vanity! This man is so so vain and so so beautiful! And also wealthy! Forever! How sad!

historians say they were roommates

And Netflix says they were brothers (I’m gonna kms)

Hey! I wrote this into an actual fic! Now I have no one to proof read and im horrible at spelling so there will be mistakes I've missed. It has taken me over a year to write because I took so many break with it. So there will also be changes in stye of writing and some parts are better then others

There are talks of suicide, death, and other things as well but yeah.

It also goes into Religion and like I put in the notes, I am myself Religious and these are my beliefs as well! I'm a Christian. And I'm a firm believer that love is love! But I understand if stuff like that makes you uncomfortable, and you dont wish to read.

Anyways here it is: Tomorrow Comes

cosette and marius!

THEY ARE SO ADORABLE SHCDEGGSA

being so staunchly anti generative ai while everyone around you is "i used chatgpt" and "i asked grok" and google search is useless and every company is implementing ai and every single celeb is taking ai money and partnering with ai is like... it's so jarring. why can't you see the harm like i can? why are you so lazy? why are we making society this stupid? can we please stop? it's killing people does that not matter to you?

Okay, but can you stop being lazy and present, in clear and reasonable terms, why you are so staunchly anti-GenAI?

yes, I can. it's causing insane pollution in Memphis that's causing harm to the citizens just so people on Twitter can say "@/grok is this true" instead of doing the research themselves.

it's also using massive amounts of energy and water, a resource that is already becoming harder for people to get safely.

cognitive offloading is what it's called when people use AI instead of doing the research themselves or writing the paper or literally anything that people use chatgpt for

i don't need to be more clear than that to someone already hostile to anti-AI sentiment. make good on your post and leave tumblr if it bothers you so much :)

Fuck the idea that posting a little rant without sources is being lazy.

Especially compared to having AI do all your thinking! That’s much closer to what I’d call lazy…

Casting cats from the shelter I volunteer at in Les Misérables

Chester or Bert as Jean Valjean

There was lots of strong contenders for JVJ and I couldn’t decide between these two. Both very handsome boys who want love but were unsure how to get it (both have made massive progress and been rehomed since these photos were taken!)

Bob as Javert

Specifically Bob in this photo after he just arrived at the shelter and he was still pretending to be very scary (he’s actually a very sweet boy and has since been adopted!). I can see him making that face after being captured at the barricade and resigned to his fate.

Elsa & kitten as Fantine and Cosette

There was also lots of strong contenders for Fantine as I mostly work with mums and kittens but i feel Elsa is the best fit as she’s very beautiful and has that “I dreamed a dream” look in her eyes. That particular kitten is Cosette because she always looks weirdly forlorn (there’s nothing wrong with her, she just looks like that).

Maeve as Éponine

Maeve came to the shelter very unweight but she has a massive appetite. One of the most chatty cats I’ve ever met and very eager for affection. Definitely the sort of cat to walk into her neighbour’s apartment and start rummaging through his stuff, talking non stop. Maeve has also since been adopted!

Scruffs as Gavroche

Do not let his adorable face fool you, this kitten was a little terror. He loved getting into places he wasn’t supposed to be and rounding up the other kittens to cause mischief with him. He would definitely enjoying smashing street lamps and living inside a giant elephant.

Bonus: Moustachioed kitten as Theodule

Look at his awesome moustache

WIP — Picnic time with Favourite, Fantine, and little Cosette <3

Let's exchange clothes！

Eponine on the barricade 🫡

Ncuti Gatwa & Hugh Skinner - The Importance of Being Earnest (National Theatre London)

The lil point at someone in the audience on the line “anyone who knows me intimately”

Little Gavroche for @barricadeday!

I very rarely directly link any of my fics on here, but I just kicked ~6-months off writer’s block with a Les Mis ExR fic and the comments have been so nice that I’m saying ‘Fuck it, I’m proud, take a look’ and posting it here.

——

Let Me Down Easy

Pairing: Enjolras & Grantaire

Rating: Explicit

Summary: Grantaire is the last person Enjolras wants to see when trying to evade the police, but he proves himself reliable in his own way. Grantaire continues to surprise him, and Enjolras quickly becomes enamored.

——

I am always open to chatting if anyone wants to reach out to me about it here.

writing these are addictive

[Insert appropriate greeting] Barricade Day to you all. Here’s a little, er, early barricade cheer for our fandom holiday. ;) 

Hey, look! It’s a comic about someone who lived! For a change! That’s good, isn’t it? ……. ;) Anyway, this exists because of something @pilferingapples​ once wrote about how it was upsetting her that Marius was stuck in recovery for so long, by the time he was back up and running, “everyone else is long buried […] (bodies, June heat, etc) […] and after six months, surely everyone’s families/friends/etc would have been through their houses and cleaned up and cleared out personal belongings; landlords aren’t going to keep a tenant’s room as  memorial. […] The Amis aren’t just dead, from Marius’ POV; they’ve been erased.” And such a soulful, poignant lament simply begs to be illustrated, does it not? [Pilferingapples, I don’t know whether to use “credit” or “blame” in attributing this to you… ;) Take your pick!]

[Mind you, this is still probably a nicer alternative to what I’d originally had planned, before I changed my mind a little over two weeks ago… Which is not to say that it’ll never see the light of day either…]

Also - gasp! - Cosette openly displaying affection in public? The scandal! You will forgive me my artistic licence - I’d have drawn them in the privacy of their own garden, only it wouldn’t been as dramatic as having the Luxembourg for a backdrop. (And on that note, I couldn’t find enough information on what the gardens looked like back in the day - save that the statues came later -, so you will please pretend with me that it’s well, whatever I drew it to be, LOL).

Technical note: In case you were wondering about the weird size of page 3, it’s that way because, if it had been printed out, the page would’ve been rotated 90 degrees anti-clockwise.

[Yup, drew my fingers half off. Again. What was it you said again, Pilf? “You are an Icarus flying too close to the sun on wings of ambition and highly questionable time management XD”… Er. Yeah. At least I get a little credit for managing to finish it by 5th June this year? Heheh.] —————————————————-

And! Shall we make this a little more fun? The first person to send me an Ask note naming the character I’ve managed to kill off the most times gets a drawing of their choice. ;)