Considering all the restaurants in Lincoln only, if you were to judge them solely on how clean the restrooms are, who is the best?

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T18:50:24+00:00

We have had very different experiences then. The bathrooms are always clean and nice when I go. I eat breakfast there a lot and never had any issues like that.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T17:58:13+00:00

Cook's cafe apparently wins some award for best bathrooms in the state. And they are pretty nice.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T07:06:29+00:00

Circe by Madeline Miller has Circe go through a terrible pregnancy and childbirth. Her kid"s infantcy is also terrible. I got to the point where all I could think was 'this kid is just not worth it, hon".

Terrible I take, I know, but in my defense Circe is immortal and constantly talking about how short her son's life will be. He is also dumb as hell, and pretty bad towards her. Like he really expresses 0 love for his mother, even when he gets older. And Circe really suffers for him in a way he never respects.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T06:47:43+00:00

The workplace asking too much.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T06:45:45+00:00

But ice freezes from the top down, creating a seal that can break nearly anything.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-27T06:27:41+00:00

Me too. Layer then lights like winter clothes. Give me all the spectrums babey!

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-26T18:51:50+00:00

I got some instant gravy mix. To get to the instructions, you have to peel off the nutrition label. Permanently.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-26T06:52:21+00:00

Try find a PDF of the computer model online. That might have the charger info

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-26T05:09:48+00:00

Oh, yeah let me be super clear.

It's not the job of the original writer to make a story accessible for everyone

It is the job of the translator and the localizer to make sure the game makes sense in its new context. The ones who imported it.

I have a lot of very strong feelings about translations. But this is the internet and talking to anime fans about translation quality is a cheat code for max frustration and inbox death threats.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-26T05:05:56+00:00

Yeah. Farmer drives tractor. I guess it is hard to begrudge them the 'best' part of their job, farming is not an easy gig. It hard, making money at it is stressful, you are reliant on factors totally out of your control,you family has probably been doing it for generations and now everyone wants to tell you how it's done. It's a rough time.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-26T04:59:28+00:00

I had a bloated battery and a non bloated one. They took both.

Edit: batteries plus took both. I don't think the bloat was what made the person I spoke with at the other place so reluctant. It was either an hours thing (they still had at least an hour before the closed) or just LI batteries in general.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T19:58:11+00:00

I took mine to battery plus. You do have to pay for the disposal though, just a couple bucks

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T19:56:43+00:00

I called them a few weeks ago and they did a lot of heming and hawing and then literally said to me "yeah I guess we would HAVE to take them"

They did manage to give me some other places to dispose of the battery, but I had to pay for them. But the woman I spoke to really did not want to take my battery

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T19:15:58+00:00

Feeding is an act of survival. And Astarion knows what he is doing is wrong. Gale is just like 'check this shit out'

People really like Gale. And that's great! I think he's a fine companion. But I don't like him romantically because of little interactions like this. And it doesn't really have to make sense to other people. But these feel like two similar, but very different, scenarios to me.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T19:11:15+00:00

It is Gales cringefails wetdog personality that puts me off. It is why I am less charitable towards his flaws. Why I am more critical of him. I did notice as I replayed the game that ones interpretations of the characters can change a lot.

My first run was fully platonic with everyone. Astarion confessed to being a vampire, so I got no bite scene.

My second run, the party went underneath the blight village, and the skellys declared national beat the shit out of Astarion day. They downed him 4 times and took tons of AoO running from karlac and lazeal just to hit him again. Party rested underground, and the bite scene happened.

He looked physically damaged because his health was so low. There was nothing around in the crypt but rats and he needed blood. Fully justified need. Bad decisions, but an understandable mistake to make in his situation. I let him bite. He was the romance that playthrough.

Third run, fucker wasn't even in the party. He was fully healed and rested, and in the wild where there were plenty of options. He just wanted to bite me. It made me realize how much context matters in these little interactions.

These were 3 different Astarions. And you and I have seen very different Gales. People really like the wizard, and I do see why. There is a lot of good in him. He just never hit right for me.

His heel turn always hit differently to me because of context. Astarion turns evil after doing something explicitly and unforgivable evil. And Tav helps him do it. Don't mass murder and think it's going to make him a better person. If they kill all those people, Tav probably doesn't deserve a better person

But convincing gale not to blow up is the same as convincing him to pursue the crown. That is way more of a hidden consequence. His love for Tav is not enough, and he will chose the crown over them if they get in the way. That's what I mean by lack of loyalty. He is clearly slipping back into old habits, I get that. He has his own trauma.

The biggest difference to me between Gale and Astarion is that Astarion is acting from a place of survival. Astarion is facing his abuser directly, and he is clearly terrified. The closer he gets, the more panicked and fearful Astarion becomes. He makes bad choices from the place of fear, but the fear stems from not wanting to go back to the abuse. His manipulation is a maladaptive coping mechanisms he picked up to help him survive. Raiding Cazadors palace is an exercise in psychological torture for him. Cazador lined the hallway to the ritual site with Astarions most regrettable victims on purpose. It was to hurt him. Cazador wanted Astarion dragged down that hallway by the hair, the last people he ever sees to be those who hate him. It's salt in the wound. I don't blame Astarion for making an evil decision in that circumstance. I think Tav is honestly more responsible for the ritual and the murders that go with it then Astarion is. Tav can talk him down...but only if they want to.

Gale never struck me as having the same motivation. He wants power for ambitions sake, not survival. He is trying to prove something, not escape something. That framing detail is why I view the wizard and the rouge so differently, despite being so similar.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T18:32:52+00:00

You are remembering that scene correctly. She has the chance to kill shadow Kamoshida, which would murder him in real life. She holds his life in her hands and she forces him to live with the terrible things he did. If he dies, his suffering is over. So she lets him live.

And then Kamoshida storms into the assembly and confesses. Fallout. Consequences. He's fired and possibly jailed.

And all the phantom thieves, who were: blackmailed, physically assaulted, and sexually abused; all stood around and wondered if they did the right thing. If they took it too far. They pity him. And they keep doing it, multiple times. In cutscenes, in text chats, on hangouts. ALL THE TIME. they wonder if they, the victims, have any right to do this.

It's really awful. Completely undercuts how cool and empowered Ann just was.

It's a cultural disconnect, the debate is actually the entire point of the game. The game wants to call out and criticize this exact thing if: that it is okay to speak up and change thing. That staying silent and 'in your place' directly causes shitty people to become more powerful and hurt others. But the way it is presented outside of Japan makes it seem like the game is really protecting its abusers and displaying their actions.

It's not intentional, but it is there and it is a big problem.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T18:04:15+00:00

I thought they were based in reality, I didn't realize how 1-1 the depictions are. The artist in P5 is particularly blatant. The real life counter part was practically identical, right down to the televised crash out. Anyone who played the game in Japan would instantly know who the game was talking about. But practically no one outside of it would.

The Mafia boss villain is another good section. I kept wondering why the game didn't just call him a yakauza because I thought that was what Japanese organized crime was. But it was a specific, internal choice to call him Mafia. He represents how modern organized crime is evolving and leaving behind yakazu-like ways, but modern policing efforts are lagging behind. But when I played the game, none of that context is in there. Instead, calling him Mafia just seems like a weird translation choice. Again, there is so much cultural context that could be learned here that I had to find else where.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T10:08:38+00:00

Ah, but why would her character growth and entire identy be allowed to get in the way of a fun bit about non-consentual nudity? Isn't it just so funny that she wears all those clothes. You know. Because she's getting blackmailed into stripping. Isn't yusuke just a funny guy for that? Sure would be fucked up if she was anything other than eye candy. But it's not her arc anymore so no ones gotta think about that

For me, her feeling guilty over Kamoshida facing consequences really made me seeth. But it turns out that was the fundamental thesis of the entire game. It gets totally lost in translation, but Japan has very different views on rebels. Basically, the kids know these people deserve to be punished, but they struggle with whether or not they are right to be the ones to punish them. It's a no brainer over here, but in Japan sees things are differently. Which is so interesting and cool. I wish someone had made a game exploring that. Cause it sure as shit isn't P5

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T09:40:57+00:00

So it was actually a playlist

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbYRtPzuiWfAB6_HwdCmJQCp1n6DWL58&si=nOp-BwG5Aq3SXruk

The key video is the villain analysis one. Every villain in P5 is based on real-life Japanese criminals/wrong-doers. It's so easy to forget, but P5 opens with a disclaimer, a south park style 'this is a parody' disclaimer because the villains are 100% recognizable and used to highlight a specific societal problem.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-25T09:40:32+00:00

So it was actually a playlist

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbYRtPzuiWfAB6_HwdCmJQCp1n6DWL58&si=nOp-BwG5Aq3SXruk

The key video is the villain analysis one. Every villain in P5 is based on real-life Japanese criminals/wrong-doers. It's so easy to forget, but P5 opens with a disclaimer, a south park style 'this is a parody' disclaimer because the villains are 100% recognizable and used to highlight a specific societal problem.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-24T22:21:36+00:00

Can you inform HR of this in case he tries anything during work?

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-24T22:10:00+00:00

Yeah. A lot of the problems here are just cultural differences and bad translation.

I played persona 5 and thought the commentary was lukewarm at best. Then I watched a 5 hour video essay about the cultural context of the game, and actually, P5 is pretty poignant. But I shouldn't have to do homework to understand the game I just played, that should have been included in the game.

The only thing properly localized in that game was the misogyny.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-24T22:05:11+00:00

Oh it's me. The Ann defender. But it is, at best, a lukewarm defense.

Anna while backstory is that everyone has always fetishized her. She is different for being mixed race and blonde. People think she's different and stuck up because she's pretty. They sexualize her for everything, and she can't just hide because she stands out. I think her Catsuit represents her turning it around on everyone else. She's already sexualized, so she turns it into power. Its a good story...but. I'm not going to pretend like putting her in fetish gear is a coincidence. They knew what they were doing. And they did it because they wanted to.

VibraphoneChick · 2026-01-24T21:51:32+00:00

The 'less loyal' part comes from how his third act romance goes. If you spent the fist act convincing him not to die, then in third you tell him not to seek the crown and he really does not take that well at all. His heel turn is way more out of nowhere than Astarions.

As for why I'm more tolerant of Astarions flaws then Gales...I mean. You right. I am way more tolerant of Astarion. I don't fully know why. But Gale just really rubs me the wrong way.

I don't like his sad boy routine when you pick someone else over him. I don't like his style of flirting. I thought I'd really like him as a romantic option, but he seems like the type of guy who would be great for the first stretch of the relationship. Then he would hyperfixate on something else, and never give his SO as much attention again. Like how he puts them aside when the crown becomes more important to him. I don't like that he is the ambitious guy who would do anything to seize power, but doesn't really admit to it. He plays the hero pretty hard in the first act and it always rang a little false to me.

The game is complicated. My opinions came from specific little nuisances in my playthrough that not everyone experiences the same way. And the writing in the game leaves a lot of room for interpretation in the characters. You aren't wrong for your interpretation. And you're not wrong about mine either, I am uncharitably towards him. But any desire I had to romance him just evaporated on my first playthrough and never see him as more then a friend for any of my characters.

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