1. 3 Favorite things you like about spring?
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- - Watching the trees wake up again.
- - More time during daylight to do fun stuff outdoors. Like camping. I love cold weather camping, but it does put a damper when literally half your hours are spent in the dark.
- - The return of skirts, sundresses and tanks tops. To me the female body is no less a beauty of nature than birdsong or blooms, and Spring is when all these treasures come out to play.
2. Who's going on vacation, holiday or weekend getaways this spring?
Going to my GF's HS reunion this weekend. A couple weeks after that to NYC to see the revival of Camelot as a gift from my mom, who took me to a touring production when I was a kid - then backstage to meet Robert Goulet!
3. 3 Outdoor activities you enjoy in the spring?
- Driving with the windows down, walking with my jacket open.
- Fighting Dagorhir whenever my schedule allows. That means dressing up in hand-made historically accurate viking garb and swinging foam weapons full force at my friends ... and usually getting beat by the kids half my age with better cardio. But this old dog still has some bite, and it's fun to occasionally be a force on the field.
- Camping and as my GF puts it, "Lumberjacking around". That means taking care of our forest - killing invasives, clearing dead or unhealthy trees, reducing snake habitat, etc.
4. Something you enjoy doing in the upcoming month of May?
It's my birthday month, so... hm... do I really enjoy that? Kinda. We usually wind up doing something cool, and I enjoy that even though the month is hectic with other events, and I don't really relish any fuss being made over me. Or over my increasingly impending mortality.
6. A new 2023 song you're enjoying?
Um... I'm not going to say all music today is shit because it isn't. there's great stuff out there. But as important as music has been my entire life, I just can't be bothered to chase it down anymore because it takes so much to sort it out from a bunch of shit that just isn't for me. So right now the main song on my mind is the one I'm currently practicing on guitar, which was released 8 years before I was born. So not really new.
7. Anyone going to a concert this spring?
Maybe. I am seeing the Broadway show mentioned above.
8. Do you use sunscreen?
I hate the stuff because it feels icky on my skin. Also, I sweat easily in the heat and shave my head, so it's always rolling into my eyes. Instead, when I'm going to be out in the sun I tend to wear a broad-brimmed hat and a light linen long-sleeved shirt. These items also protect somewhat from bugs: gnats, mosquitos, and the like are attracted to dark colors and they don't like to fly immediately under an overhang like a hat brim. Protip.
9. Anyone sunburned this spring?
Just a bare wee touch. I'll probably catch it at least decently bad at least once this year because I forget to apply or re-apply that sunscreen, or just stupidly think "what the hell" and do without.
10. Do you do spring cleaning?
Kind of. I always keep the house generally clean with occasional blitzes at a big task - mopping the whole place, or cleaning the windows, or really giving the bathrooms the what-for. There's no "spring cleaning" per se, but opening the windows up tends to inspire such bouts of productivity.
11. Favorite new movie or movies in the new year?
The D&D movie is supposed to be super fun, and I still want to catch that in a theater before it's entirely gone.
12. A springtime smell you enjoy?
Petrichor. That's the smell that the ground or even clean concrete gives off after a rain when it's previously been warm and dry.
Allergies make flowers and blooms a mixed blessing, but I swear I can smell chlorophyll in the air on the right day when everything's just greening out, and I love that.
13. How did you spend your Easter this spring?
I'm literally not sure which Sunday was Easter...
14. Question for the stoners, how did you spend your 4/20 day?
Just taking a moment here to note that while pot can be great, I'm sick to death of 420 culture. Imagine if the average bourbon fan went on like stoners do! And no, your drug of choice isn't particularly special, making it somehow unproblematic to get intoxicated every day. That's not a lifestyle, it's a problem, regardless of the substance.
Also, I've supported legalization my entire life, but I never imagined that it would mean I couldn't reliably walk more than 4 blocks in any city without having to smell weed. And that sucks.
15. 3 of your favorite hobbies?
- - Making music, just for myself.
- - Dagorhir, as mentioned above.
- - Crafting. These days that's usually restoring old hand tools. Here are two axes I've restored. The first is from sometime between WWII and the early 80's . The head was rusty and needed to be entirely re-profiled, and the excellent handle was cracked and in great need of refinishing. The second was a totally rusted out old head so bad that I couldn't read that it's a classic Knott Klipper that may be a hundred years old! After cleaning that up and totally reshaping the bit, I special ordered a specially select handle which I reshaped - thinning and tweaking and polishing it before finishing it with my own blend of pine tar and oils, and hanging the head on it.
Unless you can spend hundreds on a hand-forged new axe, old axes are almost always better once given some love!
16. Favorite beach?
I like beaches OK, but they're nothing special to me. The best thing about them is bikinis.
17. Tell us something we don't know about you?
I'm a socially anxious introvert. I come off very gregarious and am good with people because I like them and am skilled with language. Yet while I'm empathetic to a fault, so not spectrum at all, I still had to learn a lot of social signalling by rote and am never confident that I'm reading things right. And ultimately being with folks takes energy out of me that I need a good deal of alone time to replenish.
18. Question for the models! Tell us something about your next set. (Question for the members favorite type of set examples cosplay outdoor multi?)
My favorite sets are naturalistic. Shot without artifice, modeled without pretense. I like high concept stuff, too, especially kind of abstract visual art, but accurately catching the simple beauty of a woman being herself is really harder - the same way that writing a really hummable tune is harder than recording a deeply layered arrangement. I want to see the varying textures and shades of skin, the body implying movement or embodying stillness, the kind of grin or sparkle in the eye that just can't be faked.
19. Who's in love and who's looking for love in the new year?
I love my GF very much, and am looking to love her even more in the new year!
20. Ask a question or add something to my questionnaire.
I'm going to be lazy and ride @vivianbliss 's question because it's so good. Thanks to her also for tagging me!!!
What's your primary love language?
I think I cover the bases pretty well, but acts of service are how I most truly express my love. I want to do for her. Not because she's not capable, or to make her dependent, but because an act of service is inarguable. Before I loved her, her kitchen lights were ugly and made it hard to see what she was doing: now that I love her they are beautiful and help her do what she wants. Before, garbage was a stinky, unpleasant fact of her life; now that I love her garbage is just a place she throws something to not deal with it anymore.
I'm also good at physical touch, and words of affirmation. Though I don't always remember the words often enough, when I do they are good and true and distinct enough for her to hear them fresh the thousandth time I say the same thing. And I'm a damn good listener, too.
Oddly, that's not how I need to be loved. I don't care much for acts of service, but I need that physical touch, and to a lesser extent to be told.
"I want someone to follow who doesn't lead the way,
I want someone to listen who won't repeat what I say."
- - Edie Brickell
@sheashannara, @fredhincanada, @capsblazem, @Bunnyhla, and @nebula you're up!
VIEW 24 of 24 COMMENTS
dwam:
Thank you for your super enthusiastic comment on my set, it's so nice to read such things :)
fullfeeling:
@dwam, I meant every word. I've been on a little break myself and I was SUPER stoked to see you back!