Same, kinda. This year I've been leaning into recreating that sense of childhood creativity in my writing/art; for me, it's about bringing back the earnestness and enthusiasm that got dulled in my teen/adult years. I think we're all still the same creative kid inside, we're just embarrassed now about our ideas being "cringe" or "unoriginal". Or we're making stuff to appeal to an audience instead of ourselves.
Foo Fighters - There Is Nothing Left To Lose
This month did fly by O___O
i think the quietness comes from the small crowd. Reddit is a internet cornerstone, despite its many problems, and unfortunately it's where the people are. It's difficult to convince the average Reddit/X/Tumblr/whatever user to jump to some new platform--for lots of reasons--but mostly because the community isn't there. There's a surge of activity in the beginning, then it dies down considerably, and people go back to what they're familiar with.
idk how to solve that, though ^^; maybe advertising to introverts? the quietness/small size of the community here could be appealing to people who mostly lurk in the larger fandom Reddit communities.
Mitchell, Manos, and Pod People are probably a three-way tie for me. Some of my underrated favorites are Girls Town, The Incredible Melting Man, The Giant Spider Invasion, Teen-Age Crime Wave, and Kitten With a Whip.
Presto is amazing!!! So much of their 90s-00s discography is so slept on.
Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti
Tool - 10,000 Days
Rush - Test for Echo
Metallica - Metallica
Rush - Clockwork Angels
Michael Jackson - HIStory
BIGBANG - MADE
[bodyendtag] - Information Superhighway
Kumi Koda - BEST 2000-2020
A Perfect Circle - Mer de Noms
I've never done "complete" worldbuilding (cause it's never been that interesting to me) so maybe I'm out of my depth here. I do enjoy worldbuilding when I tweak something about "our" world: adding soulmarks, magic systems, etc. It gives me a base to start with, and then I can extrapolate things from there. What would change? What would stay the same? Human greed and fallibility always shape the world, even if you have supernatural elements or beings in your story.
But my worldbuilding is usually "start writing and figure things out as I go along". Sometimes you only realize what your story/world needs when you're writing and run into a roadblock.
Chapter cliffhangers are fun! I want to be engaged and wonder what will happen next. If the story itself ends on a cliffhanger... I guess that kinda depends. Is it setting up for a sequel? Is the author leaning into ambiguity? Both can work if the author can pull it off. I don't think I would drop a fic for cliffhangers; I usually drop fics when I stop caring about the story/characters, or reading the story feels more like a chore than something fun that I look forward to.
~~Get out while you still can! Go make friends and have a real life! Don't repeat my mistakes!~~ XD
Jokes aside, I would advise to keep on keepin' on. :) And stop doomscrolling fanfic_rants trying to figure out what you shouldn't write based on people's pet peeves and annoyances. Yes, people are needlessly critical but tbh you're gonna be writing rarepairs and rare fandoms so readers will have to engage with your stuff anyway or make their own :P
I've gotten way more sensitive to clothing textures as I get older, and I don't remember having too much texture sensitivity as a kid (except for hating itchy tags). I'm also way too aware now of my clothes when I sleep, so sleeping in any kind of pajama bottoms or socks is impossible for me. That never used to be A Thing for me until a few years ago. It doesn't really impact my life very much though.