"AIGHTY! General question fer all yew folks able to bite th' dust."
"When you die, who're th' 6 carryin' yew to yer dirt bed?"
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"Wait by association am I a part of the rogues gallery? Like, I've been pretty friendly with villains. Oh no. Ooh no. Like I know my sister is an antivillain and she's marrying Eddie...and I've humored the idea of flirting with Black Mask once (okay maybe twice). I don't like how this math is added "
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probably time for this story i guess but when i was a kid there was a summer that my brother was really into making smoothies and milkshakes. part of this was that we didn't have AC and couldn't afford to run fans all day so it was kind of important to get good at making Cool Down Concoctions.
we also had a patch of mint, and he had two impressionable little sisters who had the attitude of "fuck it, might as well."
at one point, for fun, this 16 year old boy with a dream in his eye and scientific fervor in heart just wanted to see how far one could push the idea of "vanilla mint smoothie". how much vanilla extract and how much mint can go into a blender before it truly is inedible.
the answer is 3 cups of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup milk alternative, and about 50 sprigs (not leaves, whole spring) of mint. add ice and the courage of a child. idk, it was summer and we were bored.
the word i would use to describe the feeling of drinking it would maybe be "violent" or perhaps, like. "triangular." my nose felt pristine. inhaling following the first sip was like trying to sculpt a new face. i was ensconced in a mesh of horror. it was something beyond taste. for years after, i assumed those commercials that said "this is how it feels to chew five gum" were referencing the exact experience of this singular viscous smoothie.
what's worse is that we knew our mother would hate that we wasted so much vanilla extract. so we had to make it worth it. we had to actually finish the drink. it wasn't "wasting" it if we actually drank it, right? we huddled around outside in the blistering sun, gagging and passing around a single green potion, shivering with disgust. each sip was transcendent, but in a sort of non-euclidean way. i think this is where i lost my binary gender. it eroded certain parts of me in an acidic gut ecology collapse.
here's the thing about love and trust: the next day my brother made a different shake, and i drank it without complaint. it's been like 15 years. he's now a genuinely skilled cook. sometimes one of the three of us will fuck up in the kitchen or find something horrible or make a terrible smoothie mistake and then we pass it to each other, single potion bottle, and we say try it it's delicious. it always smells disgusting. and then, cerimonious, we drink it together. because that's what family does.
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According to NBC here in the US, the missing titanic sub has been found. As debris. Off the bow of the Titanic wreckage.
And it looks like the sub suffered what we all suspected, and what was undoubtedly the more merciful of the two options: a catastrophic implosion from the pressure.
Also, more info has come to light about the fishing trawler with the hundreds of migrants that sank cataclysmically off the coast of Greece, indicating that the greek coast guard knew about the vessel AND how much trouble the vessel was in, and were towing it at a speed that made it capsize, at which point they unhooked the tow line and watched the trawler sink without helping the passengers to safety. Despite a bunch of other ships trying to help as well throughout the whole ordeal.
So a lot of people are dead, all because of regulations (and the lack thereof) regarding sea-faring vessels and rescue protocols. People shouldnt be allowed to make a business charging a ton of money for a ride on an uncertified, unsafe, un-seaworthy ship going deep into the ocean with no distress beacon or tether to the mothership. People also shouldnt be allowed to enact laws that criminalize the ferrying of refugees, which then force the refugees to hitch rides on fishing trawlers, and which also prevent people from helping those fishing trawlers full of refugees due to fear of legal consequences.
Hopefully BOTH of these events spark changes on an international scale in terms of what is legally allowed to be sailed, who is legally allowed to be the passengers, and what the rescue protocols are in the event of disaster for any seafaring vessel, illegal or not. It shouldnt be just the global 1% who get 24/7 search parties and remote-operated submersibles helping rescue them.
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More skater au but its just about Vriska because of course it is.
Vriska is only about three years older than John (the same age as Dirk), which is probably one of the closer Coach/Athlete age disparities in the figure skating world, but Vriska's circumstances are pretty unique.
Vriska was one of Abraxas' athletes, and had been with them since she was 10 years old, when her mother signed her away to them. Vriska had spent basically her whole adolescence under Doc Scratch's thumb, and her personality and work ethic reflect that.
This was, of course, common knowledge in figure skating spaces, and so, when Latula "Redglare" Pyrope and her young cousin/apprentice Terezi first approached Vriska when she was around 14 to talk about her life with Abraxas, Vriska wasn't surprised. She was, however, greatly annoyed when the b8tch started asking more personal and damning questions about the relationship and the conditions she lived in.
This is the first instance of many in the coming years where Pyrope tries desperately to get Vriska to testify against Doc Scratch and Abraxas, because with just a few back and forths, it becomes glaringly obvious that Vriska's testimony would be absolutely essential to finally killing ahem getting the guy off the streets.
It takes a long time. Vriska is absolutely passionate about skating, and knows (because Doc Scratch tells her so) that if she steps out of line, her career is over.
It's only when Vriska turns 18 that the scales tip. The absolute pressure coming from Abraxas and Pyrope, the stress of training, the upcoming competitions, and the deterioration of the relationship Vriska had formed with Terezi against all odds, causes Vriska to perform an acrobatic triple lutz off the handle.
Aradia Megido and Tavros Nitram were two Abraxas skaters Vriska's age that Doc Scratch had pitted her against. Vriska hated them for how easy their lives seemed compared to hers (Vriska was the Favorite, but that also meant added pressure and obligations), and she especially hated Tavros who was just. UGH. The W8RST!!!!!!!!
Needless to say, shit went down. There were some stairs no one warned Tavros about, very sad. Aradia tried to stop it, but was also injured (thank you bystander Sollux with random minor explosive). Terezi saw the whole thing, broke up with Vriska about it, lost her sight about it, and then tattled to Redglare.
...And also, unfortunately, a whole room of other people. Whoops. Can't see, remember?
The scandal blew up, and the Figure Skating Committee (vague name is vague) who had been looking for an excuse to get rid of Vriska for multiple reasons, immediately banned her from competition for life.
As a result, Vriska was utterly devastated, and extremely volatile. In any other scenario, it would have been extremely easy for Vriska to turn on Pyrope and destroy any chance the prosecutor had of getting her testimony. Considering her cousin's hand in Vriska's downfall, it's what Redglare expected. But F8 was on her side, and Redglare was able to get to Vriska before Doc Scratch could cement her against them. She talked Vriska's hatred and desire for vengeance away from herself and toward Doc Scratch.
Look at what has come of all the training he's put you through. The horrible diets, the dismissed injuries, the 18 hour days. What has it come to?
It was a long and emotionally exhausting discussion, but by the end, she had her.
Abraxas would pay.
And afterwards? Maybe she could get Vriska an in back into figure skating...
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October 22-28 is Ace Week 2023, so I’d like to give a spotlight to some manga I have enjoyed that have also touched on asexuality.
I Want To Be A Wall by Honami Shirono
A 3 volume Josei manga about the lavender marriage between Gakurouta, a closeted gay man who pines for his childhood friend, and Yuriko, an aromantic, asexual BL fangirl.
She Loves To Cook, and She Loves To Eat by Sakaomi Yuzaki
An ongoing yuri Josei manga with a TV adaptation about two women who bond over food. The series recently introduced Yako, an asexual lesbian, and it’s possible that protagonist Nomoto may be on the ace spectrum as well.
Is Love The Answer? by Uta Isaki
A single volume josei manga about Chika, a young college student who has always considered herself an “alien” because she has no desire for romance or physical intimacy, but finds community with people like herself.
Our Dreams At Dusk: Shimanami Tasogare by Yuhki Kamatani
A 4 volume Seinen manga about a closeted gay boy who gets to know the patrons of a drop-in center who all turn out to be part of the LGBTQ community. Someone-san might be considered a deuteragonist of the story.
I’d also like to mention two yuri manga I haven’t finished yet- I have only read the first volume of both- but because of what others have said I know they feature asexual characters!
Catch These Hands! (murata)
Doughnuts Under a Crescent Moon (Shio Usui)
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One of the biggest ways young girls are exploited in the global South is via the “house girl” culture. I’m speaking on how it works in Nigeria as that is my experience but I know it happens all around the world.
“House girls” are domestic servants, usually late teens though I have seen girls as young as six or seven, employed by middle and upper class families. They do everything from cooking and cleaning to caring for the elderly and young children and get very little wages. Most times these girls never see a penny of their wages- it’s all sent to their families. In Nigeria, these girls tend to come from very impoverished families living in border towns and often times do not speak the language before being sent to these families that exploit them.
Due to their young age, lack of any family nearby or money, poor education, and Nigeria’s legal system, these girls are overwhelmingly subject to sexual abuse at the hands of their male employers. In fact there is a common trope in media of the “husband cheating with the house girl and replacing the “madam” of the house. And when these men impregnate these girls, they are sent back to their villages in shame while the cycle continues.
They also face lots of other abuse. One of my mother’s friends was a “house girl” in the 70s when she was just thirteen and she was only given mouldy food and left overs to eat for most of her childhood. she once told me of a time where she was so thirsty, she drank the dirty water her abusers had used to wash their hands. I have also seen “house girls” physically beaten by their abusers and subject to horrific punishments- once as a child I saw a very young girl forced to ride in the boot of a car while all the employers children threw their imported backpacks at her.
There have also been situations in which families immigrate and arrange to bring their house girls with them. They continue to abuse them and when these girls manage to break free, they face deportation and further exploitation.
Of course such experiences are usually less common but the hiring of house girls is not viewed as the exploitation it is. Some people, my parents included, seem to view themselves as saving these girls from their lives in the village where they would get married young and live in poverty with lots of children. But how is it saving them to deprive them of education and enslave them? It is said that it is easy to recognise a house girl: shaven heads, old and dirty clothes and a scarily small stature. They look nothing like girls who have been saved.
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