Circling The Drain - Tumblr Posts

watching @nanowrimo within a single hour:

make an awful, ill-conceived, sponsored post about "responsible"/"ethical" uses of ai in writing

immediately get ratio'd in a way i've never seen on tumblr with a small swarm of chastising-to-negative replies and no reblogs

start deleting replies

reply to their own post being like 'agree to disagree!!!' while saying that ai can TOTALLY be ethical because spellcheck exists!! (???) while in NO WAY responding to the criticisms of ai for its environmental impact OR the building of databases on material without author consent, ie, stolen material, OR the money laundering rampant in the industry

when called out on deleting replies, literally messaged me people who called them out to say "We don't have a problem with folks disagreeing with AI. It's the tone of the discourse." So. overtly stated tone policing.

get even MORE replies saying this is a Bad Look, and some reblogs now that people's replies are being deleted

DISABLE REBLOGS when people aren't saying what nano would prefer they say

im juust in literal awe of this fucking mess.

[for @xxx-chazwickthurman-xxx - continued from here, ten years late]

-

"Yeah," Blitz said, amusement making his tone both warmer and darker at the same time. "Yeah, you seen me on TV. That's totally the only place. We've definitely never met before, like when you were doing another job and trying to screw one of my employees over. Cause that would make this real fuckin' awkward." Today had been a weird one from start to finish, so it felt par for the course that he was running into Chaz now. Of course he was. Why not? He'd had an incredibly long day trying to get his latest contract wrapped up, and all he wanted was to grab a drink... but now he felt like he had grabbed something a little more interesting: an opportunity. Blitz was too damn tired and cranky and irritable to want to drive home tonight. Home was an empty, shitty place… which was honestly all the more reason for Blitz to be there, being the empty and shitty person that he was, but fuck it. Fuck it. He had the keys to a cheap motel room, a cheap cocktail in his hand, and enough self-hatred to make it ‘til morning.

All he needed now was a touch of violence.

This bar felt perfect. It felt like trouble, like danger had soaked into the woodwork somehow, ugly memories and uglier tomorrows blending into the kind of scum that no soap or hot water could ever scour away. Half the lights were out, the darkness felt half-alive, and the looks the people in there were giving him were less than friendly--other than the ones Chaz was giving him, anyway. Chaz. This fucker. The others looked like regulars. A tough crowd. Mostly sinners, but there were some Hellborn scattered around here and there.

Blitz leaned back in his seat, watching the shark, then tapped a claw on his plate of fried cheese dusted with salt and crushed eggshells. "I got dinner." Kind of. "You wanna sit with me, have a bite? Seems like you might, uh, do better if you have something in your stomach that's not just booze."

Like Blitz was one to talk.

Chaz was still charming at least. Maybe there was something missing there, or out of place–like maybe he didn’t completely belong in this miserable bar with these miserable fucks–but he was definitely charming. The way he smiled looked, at least to Blitz’s eyes, polished. Professional. Chaz knew he was a looker and he knew how to use that to his advantage, but he also looked like there were probably doubts in there somewhere, maybe an insecurity or two. Flaws.

And if he was flawed, then, fuck. He was fucking perfect. And he didn’t seem to already be here with anyone… and the way he smiled–was he looking to leave here with someone? Shit, picking someone up might be even more fun than just trying to get himself beaten into unconsciousness.

"Actually, you know what? Hold that thought. Sit down, hang out. I'll be right back."

Blitz took his time, trying to sober up enough that hitting on the pretty shark wouldn’t actually be offensive. He slipped back to the bathroom and washed his hands and face, rinsed his mouth out, and met his own eyes in the mirror…

Which was a mistake. The ugly, heartless, useless piece of shit staring back at him, who just broke anyone he cared about, made that much obvious.

He looked away from the mirror quickly, dried off, and headed back out.

“So.” Blitz sat back down with him, folded his arms over his stomach, and put on a warm, intimate smile. “What’s a handsome fucker like you doing alone in a shitty dive like this? You wanna get outta here, go grab some dinner that wasn’t cooked in year-old grease?”