Hansel And Gretel (2007) | Dir. Pil-sung Yim | South Korea

Amélie (Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain) (2001)

Viciousness in the kitchen! The potatoes hiss. It is all Hollywood, windowless, The fluorescent light wincing on and off like a terrible migraine.

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I'm doped and thick from my last sleeping pill. The smog of cooking, the smog of hell Floats our heads, two venomous opposites.

from Lesbos by Sylvia Plath - The New York Times

How to Tumblr

or, things I wish I’d known when I joined:

I know there are a lot of other how-to posts out there, but with new folks joining all the time (hello, new friends!), here is my short list of “how to tumblr” – things that took me a while to learn and that I wish I’d known when I started two and a half years ago.  Here we go…

1. Download x-kit.  X-kit is a browser extension for Chrome or Firefox that will save your life. It makes this ridiculous website useable and allows you to do all sorts of things.  A few of the big ones are:

Wrap tags for easier reading.  People often ramble in their tags, either about fandom or about personal things, and having all tags appear in a block of text with a post is much easier than trying to scroll across.

Add tracked tags to your sidebar so you can see as soon as a new post with that tag is posted. This is helpful for communicating with people and for keeping up with fandom; for example, I have fleurdeneuf and nine x rose tracked so I know when someone has tagged me in a post or if a new Nine x Rose fic has appeared.

Blacklist tags for things you don’t want to see on your dash.  If you follow people who have different interests than you, you can block posts about things that you don’t care about to keep your dash cleaner and more manageable.  Blacklisting a tag is also useful if a certain topic might trigger you.

Save sent posts to an outbox!  (This only works on the computer you’re using, so if you send messages at the library or at work, you won’t see them in your outbox on your personal computer, and vice versa.)

2. Open your ask box.  Tumblr doesn’t do this automatically, so if you want people to be able to send you messages (“asks”), you need to go into your settings and open your ask box.  You can also choose whether you want people to be able to send you messages anonymously. I’ve always had anon turned off, but it can be useful if you have shy followers or if people want to message you when they aren’t logged in.

3. Tag your posts.  Tag your posts.  Tag your posts.  Tagging is good etiquette for a few reasons:

If you create original posts (fic, art, gifs, even just publishing an ask), tumblr tracks the first five tags.  This is how people (whether they follow you or not) will find your posts.  With that in mind, the first five tags should include important info, like ship (ficandchips), pairing (nine x rose, ten x rose, etc.), and any groups or people you might want to notify of the post (the person you’re answering in an ask or tagging in a meme, the group you want to see your new fic, etc.).  Tags six through twenty will appear in the new catch-all search feature, but not in the tag tracking system that most people use.  So in general, tags six and above are good for rambling, your own blog’s organization, and your followers’ dashes.

Tagging is also important when reblogging posts.  Reblogged posts’ tags don’t track in the search engine, but they’re still useful because they allow you to keep your blog organized for your own purposes, and they also help the people you follow (the same rules as for original posts’ tags six and above).  Your followers can find your posts on a topic (for a doozy of an example, see my Christopher Eccleston tag), and also block posts that they don’t care about or that would bother them (see the note on x-kit Blacklist above).

Tag your hate.  It’s generally accepted practice on tumblr for a specific character or ship tag to be for posts that are positive.  For example, ninth doctor is the Ninth Doctor tag, and that’s where you post Nine things, and where you go if you want to find Nine things.  Nothing negative about Nine should be in that tag.  On the other hand, if you don’t like a character or a ship (or a showrunner…), tag it with “anti” first (for example, anti moffat).  

4. Start a queue.  This isn’t mandatory, of course, but if you post a lot, it’s nice to spread your posts out over the course of a day rather than spamming your followers with a bunch of posts all at once.  My queue is typically set to 15 posts per day, but you can set yours anywhere from 1 to 50.  This is also why people use special queue tags, to distinguish between posts queued in advance from those posted in real time.

5. Keep your commentary in the tags.  If you really like someone’s post, your opinions usually belong in your tags.  You can ramble and flail as much as you want there.  If you add a comment to someone’s post, that comment is going to appear on the post of anyone who reblogs it from you, and anyone who reblogs it from them, and so on, which clutters a post and the OP’s notes.  If your comment isn’t vital to the post, it belongs in the tags.  There are exceptions to this rule, of course; if you’re having a conversation with someone, for example, or if you want to @ mention a friend to make sure they see a post. But by and large, feedback such as “This is awesome!” or “LOL” does not need to be attached to a post forever and should be kept to the tags.

6. Don’t repost.  Reposting is when you copy someone’s original post and paste it into a new post of your own.  It is stealing from the OP and it is generally a ploy to get lots of notes. Don’t do it.

7. If you reblog an ask meme from someone, it’s polite to participate in their meme.  This isn’t an official rule, but it is a personal preference and a friendly rule of thumb.

8. Tumblr is buggy.  Seriously.  TUMBLR IS BUGGY.  There will be times when you @ mention someone in a post, and it won’t work. There will be times when someone tags you and it won’t show up in your tracked tag.  There will be times when you send someone an ask and will never get a response because tumblr ate the ask instead of sending it to them.  These things happen to everyone.  Roll with it and try again.

9. Tumblr is weird.  Seriously.  TUMBLR IS WEIRD.  It is hard to create an account and jump in.  It is hard to meet people when it seems like everyone already knows each other. It is hard to follow people and reach out and not get a response or someone following you back.  It is hard to reblog a meme and get no feedback.  It takes time and perseverance and luck. Tagging your posts so people see them helps.  Saying hi to people whose blogs you like helps.  Reblogging posts and flailing in the tags helps.  Participating in other people’s memes (and eventually doing some of your own) helps.  Talk to people, be polite, and give it time.

Robert De Niro photographed by Santi Visalli in NYC, 1973

The Devil’s Rejects (2005) 

David Castañeda & Robert Sheehan - The Umbrella Academy Red Carpet | HOLR Magazine

I like you to be exactly the way that you are, because in all my experience, I have never known anyone like you.

Tennessee Williams,A Streetcar Named Desire (via thelovejournals)

Withnail and I  (1987)

... This is a film that will never be tarnished by age, and neither is it limited by repeat viewings. It is a very accessible film, despite its largely English humour, and ‘Withnail’ remains one of the best films about friendship. Certainly a one off, “Withnail and I” is a must see film that will not disappoint. 

Bong Joon-ho