each Valentine’s Day after the fall an extremely romantic and love themed murder display pops up somewhere in the world and Jack is just like “glad to know the cannibals are still in love and haven’t killed each other yet”
Greek myth fragment: Psyche
Orange—Psyche:
Your gentle hands, warm skin,
The soft bed, luxurious halls—
But to never see you
To live without your face—
I sleep beside you, trust in
Your kindness, the love shared nightly between us—
Long days alone in waiting for dark
To fall. I trust
Its The colonization
The first time I left the US was on a trip with my grandmother to Germany. My grandmother was always traveling. Always! Always off on some holiday somewhere, always bringing back tacky souvenirs.
I spoke a bit of German but was far from fluent. I’d been a little worried about communication but my grandmother assured me we’d be fine. She did this all the time, after all.
My grandmother left me in the hotel room one morning to sleep in while she went to the nearby bakery to get some pastries for breakfast. When she returned, she looked very flustered. She got me up because she had to get this off her chest. The woman in the bakery… didn’t speak ANY English. In her words, “Not a lick of English! Not one word!” I replied, heavy with sarcasm, “Really? In GERMANY?” She didn’t pick up on my sarcasm at all and just thought I was equally as astonished as her.
Turns out every trip she’d ever taken was with some pre-planned tour group for obnoxious white Americans. Never in all her years of traveling had she just gone into a small local shop and had to interact with a local whose entire business didn’t revolve around serving people like her. It was a genuine surprise to her that a person - especially a white person! - would actually not understand English.
I later went down to the bakery to apologize as well as I could in German. Fortunately the woman found it very amusing that the American woman just kept talking louder and slower instead of trying to communicate in some other way, and wasn’t bothered at all. But from that day forward I understood something about my grandmother (and a whole hell of a lot of other Americans) that I could never unlearn. That she literally saw everywhere in the world that wasn’t America like some kind of giant fucking Disney World and everyone who didn’t speak English as some kind of bumbling savage. I was embarrassed to be seen with her, ashamed to be there with her. This is very much A Thing and it’s fucking awful.
When I was young and traveling in the late 90s and to about 2007 I want to say? Every time we left the United states we were sat down and would go through some vocabulary that kids should know. Mainly thank yous, hellos and arbitrary pleasantries. I learned why this was so important the first time we went to France, we entered a port town after leaving England via boat. My Mother barely speaking French, it was nearing 9pm and we had missed the train because of a docking issue to get to our booked hotel. The ticket master of the ferry pointed us towards an old inn run by the sweetest woman I had ever met. She met us outside of it, waving us over and through my Mom’s poor French and the Innkeepers broken english the two worked so much out. And after signing us in before she went to prep the room herself. She brought each of my siblings a tea pot filled with some of the best hot chocolate I ever had. Because it was so chilly. The next morning she did the same. Every time I said Merci in french she’d just light up, she even help me learn a few extra things in the short time of breakfast. Apple, orange, tea cup. It’s one of my favourite memories as a kid and something I try to show to people who can’t speak English visiting America as I work retail. Because, expecting fluent English is rude. Appreciate people that can speak your language, no matter how small, because they’re doing their best.
I work at a non profit that specifically works with immigrant women. I can’t give specifics of any interactions due to confidentiality, but I can say that many of the white people I work with are impatient at best and downright rude at worst to the women who don’t speak English fluently. This sounds counterintuitive, right? That people working or volunteering at a centre for immigrant women would act like that to women who don’t speak English?
These white people travel or volunteer for their own egos, their own agendas. People are props to them, and people who don’t speak English (especially people of colour) are props that they can’t use.
The English language as a measure of people’s intelligence and/or worth is exactly what the colonists intended. Don’t let yourself be a part of that.
Once I was in Germany for a work thing and the only place I could manage to get a room was this old local hotel run by an old German lady.
I speak: Italian, English, and a tiny bit of French.
She spoke: German and Czech.
It was the most fun I’ve ever had.
When I visited Paris, everyone told me how rude the French would be to me and how they’d *hate* if I spoke English but would hate it even more if I tried to speak French.
My sister and I both are *okay* at French. We both studied it for a few years. And all the people I met in Paris were nice and friendly as hell to us. I remember one waitress in particular who was super friendly and happy that we made an effort to read the French menu instead of requesting an English one. Everyone seemed to appreciate that we at least, tried our best in French.
I honestly am now suspicious every time someone tells me how rude the French are, especially Parisians. I’m starting to think the tourists themselves were being rude first.
cc'ing this particularly for @petermorwood’s attention. :) …The “have the very basics if nothing else” approach – please, thank you very much, I’m sorry my [language of travel] is so terrible, where’s the toilet, I’d like another, etc – has taken us far and wide without a lick of rudeness anywhere. Especially not France.
(Disclosure: my few French words and phrases are left over from a fourth-grade experimental class: Peter had college-level multimedia French and still speaks it better than he reads it.) Even simply to walk into a shop and say “Bonjour m'sieur, bonjour madame” and then add, in resigned but cheerful-enough English “I’m so sorry, that’s all I’ve got, can someone possibly help me?…” has produced much cheerfulness in return… and immediate English that’s been lightyears better than my French. Trying counts, and is pretty much invariably appreciated.
Greek myth poem: Hera
Written January 25-26, 2024
Indigo – Hera
Sister-wife, queen of the heavens, Humiliated Goddess of Marriage To a brother-husband who found Pleasure everywhere but the sacred Marriage bed. But the King of the Gods can never be held Accountable for his never-ending Transgressions and so it is to the women, Mothers of countless semi-divine children, That her rage flows.
At the gate for my flight home from visiting friends and there's a woman here with a service Shiba Inu. No pics because he has a Do Not Disturb vest and taking pics of strangers is illegal but I need to stress how ON DUTY this animal is. Ears up. Eyes doing Lazer scans of everything. Examining everyone who passes within 10ft like a security guard. Ass planted on her feet. I have never seen a dog with such intense chivalric guardian energy before. He has tiny eyebrows and they are FURROWED with concentration.
Man behind me having unhinged phone conversation. There is an internationally famous dairy in the area I was visiting and he was commissioned by the lady on the other end of the phone to collect specific cheeses from there. The lady is very high strung about the type and condition of the cheese.
The man does not know from cheese. The man "ain't never seen no cheese but orange before" and "I showed ya list to the cheese lady so if it's wrong it's her fault ok?"
I am 80% sure she sent him there for a really specific bleu cheese, 40% sure he does not have the very specific bleu cheese, and 100% sure he's done with her shit.
Our flight is delayed.
He does not have the cheeses in a cooler, just a regular backpack.
I need to emphasize that there is no cooler bag in the backpack. He has Jansport backpack that is jam-packed with cheeses. There is apparently $405 dollars worth of cheeses in that backpack, which I know because he has been trying to get the lady to venmo him the expense, which she has failed to do. It is unclear whether his relation to the lady is romantic, familial or what, but I'm leaning towards "what".
Two more people have joined us. One is a very elegant man with a perfect manicure in a tailored business suit, the other is a neon-haired person of indeterminate gender wearing a fox kirigumi. The Shiba Inu has been staring at the latter for three minutes now.
Uh oh.
Cheese man has been demanding payment because apparently he went like six hours out of his way and paid with his own money and between the cheese and price of gas, he is pretty sure he does not have enough money in his account for an Uber home.
The lady is FLABBERGASTED that he is demanding payment at all, as she was under the impression he was doing this for her out of the goodness of his heart.
He's not having it. He's insisting she told him she would pay him back- he would have gotten her maybe one cheese somewhere closer to his business in the area out of love, but he went out of his way because she agreed to pay him costs+ extra to cover it.
HE RECORDED THE CONVERSATION IN WHICH SHE PROMISED TO PAY FOR THE CHEESE, SHE'S THAT MUCH OF A FLAKE.
I am about to offer this man cash for some of these cheeses because our flight is now more delayed.
"YOU ALWAYS DO THIS! YOU ALWAYS DO THIS AND I FALL FOR IT EVERY TIME! NO! NO! FUCK YOU! IF YOU'RE NOT GONNA PAY ME, YOU DON'T GET FANCY CHEESE."
"OR ELSE WHAT?"
"I'm gonna-? THE BABY SHOWER? MONICA CAN'T EVEN HAVE THIS CHEESE SHE'S PREGNANT!"
"The cheese lady asked if it was for someone because the mushrooms or whatever in the cheese are dangerous for the baby or something?? You wanna poison Monica?"
"WHY WOULD I LIE ABOUT THAT?"
"YEAH OF COURSE I GOT THE CHEESE, THATS WHY I DON'T GOT MONEY FOR UBER!"
"YEAH, GO TELL! GO TELL MOMMA I STOPPED YOUR STUPID ASS FROM KILLING MONICA OR THE BABY! FUCK!"
*hangs up phone*
*head in hands, borderline hyperventilating*
The man in the three piece suit is in the chair next to him. He waits a moment, then reaches into his carryon and pulls out an entire bottle of wine with the TSA pre check sticker on it, and taps cheese guy on the shoulder.
"If your friend doesn't want it, would you be amenable to having it right now?"
Naturally, I have volunteered my box of wheat thins and offered to buy one of the harder cheeses which should be fine if it makes it home.
Meanwhile, Kirigumi has noticed that the Shiba Inu is staring at her and is correctly intimidated.
1. This is some fucking great Camembert. I have compensated cheese guy accordingly. So have like six other people. He's recouped like half his losses.
2. Cheese guy is crying a little about the cash and opening up about his problems. The cheese lady is his younger sister. Suit guy is being very generous with his Pinot Blanc. We are having a picnic/improv family therapy session.
3. This is apparently the latest in a long string of his sister asking for something and then flaking when he asks to be paid back. Started with paying him back only some of what he was owed, then claiming something she paid for him was of equal value when it was not, then recently telling him his memory is wrong and he said it was a gift or that he'd do it for free.
"Yeah, the specific thing of trying to convince you your memory is unreliable is called gaslighting and it's really fucked up." I say
"yeeeeah. The other stuff I forgave because she's never really had a good job so she can't pay me back all the time but at least she was making an effort y'know? But that was. That was over the line."
"If you haven't already, check on the rest of your family's finances. My brother started trying to gaslight everyone when he started stealing from our parents." Says Pinot Blanc.
4. Shiba Inu Lady has purchased a cheddar. Apparently, the dog's name is Donut, and he's her service dog because she's severely visually impaired.
"Oh, he's a guide dog?" Asks cheese guy.
"oh, no." She laughs. "He's too short, and the way my eyes are, it's easier for me to navigate with a cane. No, the problem I have is that some morally impaired people see the cane and think they can get away with stealing my bag or assaulting me because I wouldn't be able to give a description- which is wrong, but rather than deal with that I got Donut, and he helps me by howling at anyone who gets in my personal space and biting anyone who grabs me!"
"Uh." Says Kirigumi. "He's been staring at me do I need to back up or..?"
"Ohdear! No, no- He wasn't looking at you! He loves cheese but he knows he's not supposed to beg so he decided the way to deal with something he wants but can't have is to stare in the other direction."
"OKAY!" Says Kirigumi. "I'm wearing fox pajamas and thought like. He thought I was another dog or something."
"No, no- he doesn't care about dogs, and you get a warning before he goes for the calves. Very helpful, when I was living in Italy!"
"Oh what part? I have family in Tuscany." Says Pinot.
"Does he want a cheese? There is still so much cheese." Says cheese guy.
Plane may be arriving. I am paying for in flight WiFi to keep y'all updated.
1. Cheese guy has sold all but two or three cheeses that he an Pinot are going to eat on the flight.
2. I know they're planning to continue because Pinot talked to the gate agent so he and cheese guy can sit together and talk about family drama and cheese.
3. Pinot has been teaching him about different types of cheese and how to enjoy them.
4. Cheese guy apparently repairs computers and other technology devices for a living and is currently doing the software version of scraping barnacles and other crap off Pinot'macbook.
5. Pinot is now convinced that cheese guy is the smartest and most interesting man in the world.
Greek myth poem: Clytemnestra
Written November 18, 2023
Blue - Clytemnestra
just because asexual awareness week is over doesn’t mean we stop spreading it
Greek myth fragment: Persephone
Green—Persephone
Long, slow winter in the darkness,
Clearing up the clutter, playing
Fetch with the dog, cuddling
Before the hearth with her quiet
Husband—a respite of which she
Never speaks because nobody else
Deserves to see the sweet man
Who swept her away at her
Own request
More reasons why Zuko being the Firelord is objectively the funniest thing on earth:
- HES SEVENTEEN
- He hasn’t been civilised in 4 years, his entire teenage experience consists of living on a boat and sleeping rough. The most stable bed he has was probably in Ba Sing Se he probably will just nap anywhere.
- He has customer service experience which means he probably uses his customer service voice on his minsters.
- Additionally he probably just wanders into to kitchen to get his own snacks and tea because he forgets what servants do.
- He probably has no idea why he can’t just chase after an assassin he used to hunt the avatar for Agnis sake why is the captain of the guard demanding he stay in his room he’ll find the guy first (he’s probably right)
- Katara probably has a free pass on Eco terrorism because what’s he going to do challenge her, she’ll beat his ass.
- If he saw a minster doing something shady he will either invite lady Beifong to detect their BS or commit B&E and look for evidence himself.
- He somehow found a baby dragon and raises it.
- He will be far to willing to give Kyoshi island anything they want cause he feels bad and Suki scares him.
- He randomly insisted on giving some earth kingdom village 100 ostrich horses.
- The Avatar will just show up call him Hotman and demand the go on adventures and the Firelord will just dip because he’s been confined to long and has the Zoomies.
- He takes far to much advice from Sokka and will genuinely believe if someone doesn’t get Sokkas plans they must be an idiot because Sokka is 16.
- Sokka and Zuko also get into a lot of teenage rebellion phases by accident.
- Toph just walks in breaks a wall of his palace and demands a field trip that always involves the Firelord having to explain himself to the cops.
- He somehow knows every dangerous teen in the world and they all come for tea uninvited.
- He has broken into both the NWT and Ba Sing Se.
- He has a really well documented facial scar and official portraits but still disappears to be Lee the tea guy like no one knows.
- HES SEVENTEEN.
Greek myth fragment: Eris
Yellow—Eris:
A simple fruit coated in golden dust
A party with no invitation to attend
A husband and wife who never insulted
But hosted those childish gods who did—
She bent slowly in the doorway, waiting
sea slugs. I stacked them sorry
Lady MacBeth fragments
Begun September 12, 2023
A COMINT !!
Greek myth poem: Ariadne
Written January 25-26, 2024
She watches the ship fade into the setting, Abandoned on an unclaimed island By the prince whose life and people she saved. No tears in her eyes as the sky weeps Her pain and fury, she watches the moon rise.
When the god comes to her, she asks for one thing. He vows to see it done and she sips from the sacred cup.
Across the sea, a prince forgets his words to His father so the sails are not changed.
the great thing about being a fanfic writer: if there's a certain fanfic plot you can't find, you can make it yourself.
the terrible thing about being a fanfic writer: now you *have* to write that fanfic plot you can't find.
Greek myth fragment: Medea
Begun November 18, 2023
Red—Medea:
In blood, I sacrificed for you home
I sowed bones to reap your kingdom
For you I gave away every part—
Family, fortune, future for your throne
...
I sacrificed for you my home;
Sowed bones in blood to
Reap your kingdom; for you
I gave away family, fortune,
Future—the path to your
Throne, I laid
Ghostbusters Afterlife (Jason Reitman, 2021)
GIFs by @hesawifebeaterdanusethegun