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I DID NOT KNOW THIS AND I AM DISABLED

FFS share this with every person you know

Wait what's a buildings fire evacuation plan if you aren't supposed to use the elevator to get down

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Oh look it's the "I Have Money But No Taste 'Murica" mansion

i'm losing my mind I cannot witness this alone. LOOK at dr phil's monstrosity of a mansion

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The smallest margin between longing and regret.

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Spice in Space

“Of course your food is a biohazard,” Zhee said while the security scanner approved our delivery.

“The label’s just a precaution,” I said. “Pretty sure this is mostly pepper.”

“Right, yes, the food flavoring that gives your meals the flavor of fire.” Zhee tilted his head, bug eyes looking at everything at once while managing to roll sarcastically. “Not a hazard at all.”

“I don’t mean the really spicy kind,” I said as the box slid out of the scanning machine. “Just the regular spices to sprinkle over eggs and whatnot.”

Zhee picked up the box in his pincher arms. “Right, because eating fire-flavored unhatched creatures is a perfectly normal thing to do.”

I laughed and followed him out into the spaceport. “It is where I’m from!”

“Absolute maniacs, all of you,” Zhee declared with a flick of his antennae. “Now where is that food stall? The briefing said it would be tiny.”

“Tiny and close,” I agreed, looking around. Once past the security checkpoint, this place was a riot of booths and pedestrians with an artsy wave pattern on the ceiling that seemed to dampen the sound. It wasn’t as loud as most spaceports I’d been in.

“I see a directory,” Zhee said. “Let’s just check that.”

“Wait, there it is!” I pointed to a little kiosk between full-sized restaurants. It only held enough room for tubs of ingredients, a gigantic hot plate, and the guy currently scraping food around on it with flair. The sign said “Earth Fry.”

“Of course,” Zhee said, moving toward it. “I should have just looked for the fire.”

As we maneuvered through the crowd of Strongarms, Mesmers, and miscellaneous others, the guy tossed the food with his spatula, caught it deftly in a takeout box, and handed it to the customer waiting at the side: another human. No surprise there. By the time we arrived, he was ready to greet us.

“Hello! Can I interest you in some Earth Fry?”

Zhee held up the sealed package. “We have Earth ingredients for you. Apparently they are hazardous.”

“Oh! Yes, thank you! That’ll be the hot sauce and other stuff.” He took the box and found a flat surface to put it on, then accepted the payment tablet I held out for him. “Thanks for being so fast. Somebody got a bit clumsy during the lunch rush and knocked over a few things. Paid for ‘em, but I can’t get all of these local.” He signed for the delivery while I tried to place his accent. Australian?

“Luckily we were just coming from a trade hub,” I said. “This stuff is straight from Earth.”

“Excellent. It’s been a while since I was home, and you can’t beat the real thing for spices.” He handed the tablet back.

“Very true,” I agreed. “Where are you from?”

“Melbourne,” he said while I congratulated myself on guessing right. “Still getting used to how little any of that matters out here. To the average offworlder, Earth is one place with one type of person.”

“And we’re all lunatics who eat poison, right?” I agreed with a sly glance at Zhee.

He spread his pinchers. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

“Hey now, the garlic is only poisonous to some creatures from Earth,” the guy said, pointing to an airtight tub. “And the onions. If you want the real toxins, the alcohol stores are that way.”

Zhee looked at the ceiling. “It’s like you all have a death wish. Or take pleasure in hurting yourselves.”

“Some of the pain tastes good?” I said with a wave toward the hot sauces.

At the same time, the guy said, “There’s a reason they call us space orcs.”

I laughed. “Do they still? I wouldn’t think enough people even know what an orc is.”

To my surprise, Zhee recited, “Mythological creature from your planet, famed for strength, durability, and lack of foresight. Rumors do go around.”

“I suppose that’s one way to put it,” I said.

“Nobody thinks that’s funnier than my family,” said the Australian. “I get no end of jokes about it. Especially from my mom’s side — she’s from the US, and thinks we all say ‘space’ funny.”

“Does she?” I asked. “Interesting word to focus on.”

“Right? She insists that it sounds like ‘spice,’ and I just don’t see what she’s on about. But!” He held up a finger and fiddled with his collar. “That did lead to my favorite shirt.” With a dramatic sweep of his overshirt, he bared a bright red T-shirt that said “Spice Orc.”

I burst out laughing. “That’s fantastic!”

“Mom was pretty proud of herself for this one,” he said. “Gave it to me for my last birthday.”

Zhee declared, “Appropriate. Entirely in character for your species.”

“And we even brought you spice!” I laughed.

“That you did!” he said, resettling his clothes. “Care to try some? The shredded beef dish is particularly tasty.”

I looked at Zhee, then turned back without waiting for a response. “We’ve got a couple minutes. I’d love some. With extra garlic, please!”

“Coming right up!” He spun his tongs like a gunfighter, and began tossing ingredients onto the hot plate where they sizzled madly.

Zhee just grumbled and looked put-upon, but didn’t object. I planned to make a big deal of enjoying the tasty fire-and-poison meal on our walk back to the ship.

~~~

These are the ongoing backstory adventures of the main character from this book.

Shared early on Patreon! There’s even a free tier to get them on the same day as the rest of the world.

The sequel novel is in progress (and will include characters from these stories. I hadn’t thought all of them up when I wrote the first book, but they’re too much fun to leave out of the second).

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Simple Moon Spell - One Dozen Wishes

Intent: To create a jar of potential wishes, to be used as needed.

Materials:

Small Jar

Whole Bay Leaves (12)

Moonlight

In addition to their usefulness in spells for protection, wisdom, and healing, bay leaves are a potent ingredient for wishmaking. This spell does not specifically create a wishing spell, but it prepares a small supply of leaves for future spellwork, using the fulfilling energy of the full moon to pre-charge the component.

Obtain a bag of whole bay leaves. These can usually be found in the spices and seasonings aisle at the grocery store, or you can order them from a botanical supplier if you wish. Prepare a clean, dry jar with a lid as you see fit. Select twelve leaves, as whole and unbroken as possible, and place them into the jar. Cap the jar and leave it to soak up the moonlight on the next full moon evening.

When you have need of some wishmaking magic, take a single leaf from the jar, write your wish upon it, and use it in your spell. The use of the leaf depends on your casting method - you can include it in a jar or sachet charm, cast it into fire or water, or bury it to help your desired results grow, to name just a few.

Use the leaves as needed and when the supply is exhausted, you can pick twelve new leaves and refill the jar.

Happy Witching! 🔮🍃

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If it keeps you from killing yourself it's not stupid. This applies to anything btw.

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btw while people continue to fight the system don't forget about Undue Medical Debt (formerly RIP Medical Debt), a charity that buys and forgives medical debt. on average a donation of $10 will forgive $1,000 of medical debt.

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Me: Wow I had so many panic attacks last night and I don't feel rested at all. In fact I feel as though nothing good will ever happen to me again. Floating Purple Seahorse That Appears To Me When I Haven't Slept In Multiple Days: you didn't take your meds yesterday because your phone was dead when your alarm would have gone off Me: Oh shit you're right. Thank you, Floating Purple Seahorse. FPSTATMWIHSIMD: also everyone you care about will die someday Me: Could have done without that reminder FPSTATMWIHSIMD: you don't own me

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"The circumstances clearly differ from person to person, I can recognise, travelling around the continent, that there is no standard reaction. I know a guy, for example, the most visible effeminate gay man you can imagine, who runs a hair salon and supports his entire family in his village; he openly has his boyfriend, husband, and it is never an issue. I recently met a young man in Mombasa who had been brought up in the most disconnected, remote village. On the last day of primary school his mom brought him a magazine of wedding pictures and it was like, 'Are you the husband or are you the wife?' He told me he pointed to the wife, and his mother said, 'Fine, no problem.' When he went to boarding school, he was completely open about being gay simply on the strength of feeling of his mother's sanction. And, perhaps because of the confident way he carried himself, he said it was never a problem. But then you equally hear of other cases, where people are told, 'Never come home again', or they are found wives and forced to marry." – Binyavanga Wainaina 

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you can get shockingly far just by giving people things

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I love the random replacements for clichés writers insert in science fiction shows. like when a 21st-century human would say "stop pacing you'll wear a hole in the floor" but in a space show the alien/future human says "you're oscillating like a Betelgeusian night badger" or some shit. like fuck yeah he is. amazing drive-by worldbuilding. I'm gonna spend the next half hour wondering why the Betelgeusian night badger evolved to do that

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TLDR: queer, trans, disabled couple living in a really conservative and unsafe city.

Edit: NO GOAL $/???? because our expenses are literally thousands; the goal is as much as we can reasonably manage. We are pretty much wiping out all of our accounts to get out of here.

Anyway, I can use every dollar to help toward moving costs because we're finally lining up to gtfo:

PLEASE do not risk ur financial stability for me!!!

I do not want $ from folks who can't afford to help!!!

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The Web of Light - A Community Ritual

In late January of 2025, I joined a group of witches online to conduct a ritual for the protection and healing of our communities and for hope to sustain us though the weeks and months to come. Many wonderfully talented people contributed to this working, and I was honored to present an invocation of Brighid and to lead the portion of the ritual where we created the Web of Light.

With the permission of the rest of the circle from that evening, I want to share my portion of the ritual with all of you. (I'm not looking for notes or feedback - this was purpose-built and it exists as it was written.) The more strands in the web, the more lights in the dark, the more love and energy we can give this spell and others like it, the better.

If you feel comfortable doing so, I'd like to invite anyone who is willing to help to join in this working, either by yourself or with your circle. You can do the full blessing, invocation, and casting if you feel comfortable doing so, or just the casting alone. Feel free to invite any helpful spirits, ancestors, deities (especially fire-related), and so forth that you work with to lend their aid.

All you need for this spell is a quiet place to sit and a candle. (Live flame or LED, either is fine, and if you can't find either one, a flashlight will do.)

Perform whatever opening steps you usually do to begin a ritual (preparing the space, casting a circle, grounding and centering, etc) and when you're ready, begin.

WEB OF LIGHT

Suggested Music for the warmup:

"Brighid's Flame" and/or "Brighid" by Kellianna "Imbolc" by Lisa Thiel

[BLESSING]

Into this sacred space, I call the light of creation, the light of inspiration, the light of healing, the light of the forge, the light of the hearthfire, the light of hope, which neither wanes nor falters, but burns bright and perpetual within and around us all. Bless those who are gathered here and may the spirits, deities, ancestors, and powers almighty that we invoke here strengthen our resolve, shield us from harm, and guide us in our workings, as we gather to do what is RIGHT, not what is easy.

[INVOCATION]

With the consent of those assembled, I invoke the name of Brighid and invite her presence in this place. Holy Lady of Cill Dara (pron. Kill Dahrah), protector of hearth and home, teacher, poet, healer, forgemaiden, flamekeeper, living link between the old ways and the new, be with us and lend us your aid.

Brigid of brightness, I bid thee welcome, Brigid of blessing, come thou in. Brigid of strength, I bid thee welcome, This night and every night, this day and every day.

Brigid of the threshold, come thou in, Brigid of the hearthfire, take your ease, Brigid of the cook-pot, sup with us, Brigid of all comforts, live in our hearts.

Ancestors all, I embody your legacy, Ancestors all, I ask for your blessing, Ancestors all, I offer Brigid’s flame To light the needfires of deep memory.

Brigid of the timeless flame, bless your [children]: Those who keep the circle bright, Those whose faith has never failed, Those who keep your name ablaze.

Brigid, lend your righteous sword To those who work for justice, To those who speak the truth, To those who seek a better world.

In the name of Brigid, who empowers the oppressed, In the name of Brigid, who released the enslaved, In the name of Brigid, who lifts up the downtrodden, May all our people be honored and free.

[Casting]

Tonight, we come together with courage. Tonight, we come together with hope. Tonight, we come together in common purpose, to turn our combined strength to save what can be saved, to shield what can be shielded, to heal what can be healed, to burn away what must be cleansed, and to keep the darkness of despair and hatred at bay.

Tonight, each of us is a point of light. We are the tenders of the hearth. We are the bearers of the flame which lights the way. We are the workers at the forge. We are the spark before the fire, the dancing light upon the snow, the seekers of snowdrops, the keepers of the healer’s tent, the knowers of the promise of spring.

For even as summer fades into fall, and fall into winter, so the cold and dark must one day yield to warmth and renewal. Even the longest night must end and we will see the sun rise again.

(Light your candle.)

Hold the light within you. Warm, bright, everlasting, a fire which burns bright but does not consume or diminish. This is a fire which shields the helpless, which offers illumination to the lost, which gives hope to those in sorrow. Each of us alone is but a candle, but together, we are a conflagration. 

Picture the array of us, spread out across the sleeping world, a scattering of earthbound stars twinkling in the night. Physically, we are apart, but in our hearts and in our magic, we are all a part of each other and of this world. We are the weavers and keepers of this spell, a web that spans mighty distances and connects us all. We are the beacons which will hold the darkness at bay.

Let the light of your magic spread out from you like the lines of a spider’s web, like the roots of a tree, like the paths of a river, like the crackle of lightning. Picture it spreading across the distances between us, each strand connecting one working to another, and another, and another, strengthening with each bond, growing until the space is covered. Each of us holds a line and weaves a portion of the web, and we are blessed to know that none of us walks alone. 

Like the roots of the trees, like the mycelium of the mushrooms, this web of light is not visible to all. Those that seek to harm, to disrupt, to oppress, and diminish, let them be blind, let them be powerless, let them find nothing. We give them NOTHING. But those who have need of us, those who need healing or shelter or knowledge or hope, we give them eyes to see. And those that see, let them light beacons of their own, until the night is bright as day and the sun comes up again.

(Extinguish your candle. If you ever feel that you need strength or hope or the time feels right to further empower the spell, light it up again.)

Suggested Music for the cooldown:

“Star Maps” by S.J. Tucker

(If you choose to share this ritual elsewhere, please credit me. Thanks!)

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Nature's perfect idiot fish

An aquarium in Japan was closed for renovations, and their resident sunfish got depressed not seeing visitors. So the staff put some uniforms with printed faces against the tank, and it immediately recovered.

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Reading fantasy again, I've started thinking about how odd it is how in books like that, the non-human races invariably scoff at human frailty and vulnerability, even those that they'll call friends. Like that's mean?? Why would you be a dick to your friend who you know is not capable of as much as you are, and it's not their fault they were born like that. That's mean.

Like consider the opposite: Characters of non-human races treating their human companions like frail little old dogs. Worrying about small wounds being fatal - humans die of small injuries all the time - or being surprised that humans can actually eat salt, even if they can't stomach other spicy rocks. Being amazed that a human friend they haven't seen in 10 years still looks so young, they've hardly aged at all! And when the human tries to explain that they weren't going to just unexpectedly shrivel into a raisin in 10 years, the longer-lifespan friend dismisses this like no, he's seen it happen, you don't see a human for 10 or 20 years and they've shriveled in a blink.

Elves arguing with each other like "you can't take her out there, she will die!" and when the human gets there to ask what they're talking about, they explain to her that the journey will take them through a passage where it's going to be sunny out there. Humans burn in the sun. And she will have to clarify that no, actually, she'll be fine. They fight her about it, until she manages to convince them that it's not like vampires - humans only burn a little bit in the sun, not all the way through. She'll be fine if she just wears a hat.

Meanwhile dwarves are reluctant to allow humans in their mines and cities, not just out of being secretive, but because they know that you cannot bring humans underground, they will go insane if they go too long without seeing the sun. Nobody is entirely sure how long that is, but the general consensus is three days. One time a human tries to explain their dwarf companion that this is not true, there are humans that endure much longer darkness than that. As a matter of fact, in the furthest habited corners of the lands of the Northmen, the winter sun barely rises at all. Humans can survive three weeks of darkness, and not just once, but every single year.

"Then how do they sane?" Asks the dwarf, and just as he does, the conversation gets interrupted by the northland human, who had been eavesdropping, and turns to look at them with an unnerving glint in her colourless grey eyes, grinning while saying

"That's the neat part, we don't."