Phoenix

Appreciate you having the courage to share this.

I don't write a lot, but since I started writing erotica several years ago, I think this might have been the first time I've written about something I would find unpleasant. My writing often starts with an idea, a fantasy that I'm trying to give form, even if it's just in that limited way that words in print can yield. More often than not it takes on a life of its own as I write and ends up evolving into something else. That was the case with this short piece, but at the same time I knew how it would end, as it were, given the writing prompt.

Edit: thinking about your daemon concept, I'm always found the legend of the succubus fascinating and oddly erotic. Maybe that will inspire my next piece. It's kind of unpleasant, but not, since it would involve death, but what a way to go!

Yeah, this was well outside my comfort zone for writing erotica. Probably a big part of why I took on the prompt to begin with.

I mean, I love gentle femdom in general, but this would be unpleasant, to say the least.

Really well done, thanks for posting it.

Thanks, @Timberwolf.

@hirondelle, on a couple of my podcasts there's been a lot of discussion recently on the move away from reporting into opinion in popular media. I do tend to avoid those persons that are simply contrarians-for-hire or otherwise out there for shock value (Rush Limbaugh, Louise Mensch come to mind). I try to focus on those who do the actual reporting. I'm still bummed because Chris Arnade left twitter, and I don't blame him--when you don't fit neatly into partisan politics, you get it from both sides. I'm not familiar with the other two names, but I've seen some of Milo, and while I do think he has some fair criticisms about social activism on the left, I have little patience for someone with hate speech towards any group.

Yeah, I was thinking of using the N4 exam materials there as an option. I'll just have to not be very hard on myself if I go that route, as my textbook isn't geared specifically toward the JLPT.

Yeah, that's how I ended up with my current wardrobe, heh.

I didn't mean literal presentations. Whenever I did lectures or presentations in grad school and late undergrad, it was usually by way of expanding on a rough outline I'd have in front of me, freeflow. So that's how I would plan to do it--writing out an outline with enough detail to be able to present off of it. I would kind of rehearse a "presentation" in my head as I went through it, and if there was anything that didn't come to mind smoothly, I would write it out explicitly in my notes. I hope that makes sense.

My flashcard system could work as slides of a sort, listing grammar details that I often forget (it's always the details!).

That's about where I'm at with struggling with it. I can read (not necessarily listen, another problem) the language much better than I can produce it myself. The workbook has been challenging me to do that, but I feel like I need more. And that I need to read more sentences so I'm constantly reinforcing the grammar.

I'm close to the end of "beginner" level and entering into "intermediate," so I think I'm close to being able to read children's books and things like NHK Easy News. Once I get to that point, I think I'll do so much better, but my English-to-Japanese is probably going to suffer until I find someone else to correct me. But...that involves...people.

I have all the katakana memorized, so I hadn't thought about that. I suppose one could set up flashcards for them easily enough, though; flashcard creation is pretty simple. And yes, I could import other sets if I wanted. There isn't an easy way to export my set, though, which bothers me since that's a lot of unrecoverable work if I had a hard drive crash or something. I should probably go digging into the files and manually back up my set while I'm thinking about it. Haven't done that in a while.

The learning's going slow, which is my fault as much as anything. I had a lot of zeal for it when I first started earlier in the year but that's subsided a bit. It's also a lot more challenging now than it was when I was in full review mode, too. I probably need to spend some time reviewing my process and seeing what I can add and/or streamline. That just requires so much work, though!