#i think that is also a reason i love kam art so much (hi kam. waves)

[rainbowsparklecur]

hold on continueation from that first post i forgot to say. another reason i envy homestuck fandom in part with the different interpretations of characters is how like. you will see a dave strider that looks nothing like dave strider from homestuck comic but yeah its still dave strider. yeah shes a girl now and also black and has a totally different outfit and shes smoking weed or something but despite everything its still dave strider

[karmaajr]

HEYO Y'ALL!!!! I got bored and decided my last intro post was WAY too unorganised (even by my standards frfr 😔😔🙏) so i made a new one!!! hopefully this ones a bit better or else ima light somebody on fire 🥰🥰

anyways dms n asks r ALWAYS open and if ur new to my person/being/blog/existancewhatevs and wanna get to know me or smth then FEEL FREE TO SLIDE IN GIRLYPOPS!!! I'M ALWAYS BORED SOO 😭😭🙏 (might take like, a billion years to reply tho mbmb >:3)

and thus again, without any further ado, MY INTRO POST 😍

🎶 try to strike a chord but it's probably A MINOR 🎶 -> ✨️im under 18✨️ idm nsfw convos tho bcuz theyre funny :D

sooo tbh you can call me whatever you want? like ppl call me different things (eg senka calls me kam, bea calls me keke/kekere bcuz shes 🎶a meanie, a big meanie🎶 my irl bestie westie pookie poo calls me jeena CUZ HES A LIL BITCH) but MHM!!! CALL ME WHATEVER U WANNA <33 (as long as it dont feel masc bcuz my dumbass got issues w feeling masc for some RANDOM STUPID REASON 💀) (like im literally a cis girl why do i got problems w this....... but YAAAA 😭) (she/her btw!!! if that wasnt obvious!! ^^)

✨️i am cringe but i am free✨️

I SOMETIMES USE GENDERED TERMS LIKE GIRLY/BRO/DUDE/ETC BUT I DON'T MEAN IT GENDERED SO IF YOU FEEL IFFY THEN DONT HESITATE TO HMU N TELL ME TO FIX UP MY SHIT

btw im a tad bit of train wreck but if u enjoy the chaos then we'll get along js fine i think pooks 😋😋

anyways it came to my shitty little attention span one day when i was just being a silly lil girly that some of yall think im white when i say im british....... CHAT NOOO IM BORN N RAISED IN THIS TEA RIDDEN COUNTRY BUT ETHNICITY WISE IM BANGLADESHI!??!?! YALL IM LITERALLY A BROWNIE OMFDS 🤧

also a lot of this blog is a bunch of reblogs of shit im interested in BUT I DO HAVE OG STUFFFFFF, THEY'RE JUST IN THEIR OWN TAGS U GET ME??? anyways some of the tags!!!

karmaajr rambles -> for everything i post besides answers to asks :3

karmaajr answers ig :D -> answers to asks ^^

important thing for me to tag bcuz yes -> random thing i really wanna save (also im bad at tagging so sometimes thing has an "s" or tag has an "s" lmfao, ITS A RLLY USELESS TAG TO TRY SCROLL THRU ICL.... RLLY DRY AS WELL)

karmas mum mentions :3 -> i like to think this one explains itself yall 😘

daddy's unhinged -> anything about my sweet ol' pops (who totes cares abt me yall) 🥰

my sister and I -> anything my sister is involved in that i actually remember to tag LMFAO

NOT MY ASS MENTIONING PANIK -> me wanting to save things that r to do w my gf 🫶

BTW HIS @ IS @panikbutt0n AND SHE'S MY MAPLE SYRUP CHUGGING 4LIFER AND LITERALLY THE BEST THING SINCE RIPPED BREAD AND I LOVE HER SO SO SO MUCH SO ACC HIT HER UP PLZ 🙏🙏🙏🙏

btw yall, ur homegirl aint no gatekeeper so the group matching pfp thingy is from @tuturthecarvroom 's blog (n they very skibidi sbg art btw so i do reccomend frfr) and mY HEADER IS OFF GOOGLE SEARCH 😍😍

ALSO I AM CURRENTLY MATCHING WITH THE SILLIEST GROUP EVER FRFR, GONNA TRY @ THEM ALL BUT IT'S HARDDD (my memory is the shittiest thing since That One Time my friend shit his trousers on call w me 💪💪💪)

@lee1504 -> BRAINROTTED KING 🙏🙏

@d011zk1ll -> both kind af and somewhat unhinged??? like both "do a good deed to make somebody else's life easier ☺️" AND "im gonna eat a bicycle :p"

@sketchingwithlyn -> JUST THE CHILLEST GUY EVERRRR!!!!

@rot-decay-erosion -> gramps 🧓🏻 (also known as the desendant of our king garfield 😙✨️)

@afrogwhocantdraw -> RESIDENT BENLOR POOKIE

@low-senka -> the brokest senior citezen youve ever met 💔💔💔💔 (yall need to donate to my guy 🥺🥺🥺)

(also the thing below had me stuck looking at it for literally AGES so hehehehehhehehe GET TRAPPED IDIOT!!!!!! >:3!!!!!)

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(dots r fun)

anyways i have no clue what else to write!!! which is weird bcuz im a yapper frfr :D

ANYWAYS LOVE Y'ALL ✨️✨️✨️

WAIT

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.......... ᘛ⁠⁐̤⁠ᕐ⁠ᐷ ⁠⁠

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THEY 👥 DONT🙅🏼‍♀️ LOVE 😘 YOU 🫵🏼 LIKE I 👀 LOVE 🥰 YOU 🫵🏼🫵🏼🫵🏼

[ellethespaceunicorn]

Bright Like The Moon: Chapter 6

Chapter 6: Such A Funny Thing For Me To Try To Explain

Rating: Explicit, 18+, Minors - DNI

Fandom: Night Hunter

Pairing: Walter Marshall x Black!OFC 

Word count: 3.1K

Summary: Kamaria Mansfield is hired at the Minnesota Police Department as an intern. Detective Walter Marshall is overworked and unsatisfied. Takes place post-film.

Chapter Summary: Kamaria deals with some hard truths about herself, while Walter tells Kamaria how he really feels.

Chapter warnings: uncomfortable conversations, Daddy kink, non-barrier contraception (no condom usage), creampie, breeding kink, the itis

A/N: This chapter takes place directly after Chapter 5. Call it a continuation, if you will. Also, the last chapter was very Walter-centric and this chapter is about 33% Kamaria POV and 67% Walter POV. Un-beta’d, we die like people who tried their best.

Dividers: @firefly-graphics

Support/Reblog banner by me

Cover Art by me

Cross-posted on AO3

~*~Spotify Playlist~*~

Series Masterlist

My Masterlist

Kamaria’s POV

Early Saturday Morning

I am awakened by Walter’s strong arms wrapped around me, gently shaking me. Fuck.

“Kam, baby, wake up!” his voice quakes, as he turns my face to look at him. 

“I’m awake,” I mumble, my body still trembling.

“You were having an awful nightmare. I’ve been trying to wake you for some time now,” he began wiping a cold compress across my sweaty forehead, “You don’t have to tell me what the nightmare was about, but please know I only want to help you, baby.”

Well, here goes everything, I guess.

“My heart and my brain have begun a war between each other. My heart knows you care about me, but my mind is trying its hardest to figure out the how and the why. It is struggling to find the logic in how a man like you could like a girl like me. It leaves me in the middle straining to be heard,” I sniffle, letting him take my hands in his own, “I’ve had so many people in my life that have either left me or given me reasons to leave. My mother, my ex-lovers, and my friends. I have felt for so long that I am the one that gets left behind. I’m not allowed to have happiness and love. And then I met you and my world sort of imploded.”

“Imploded in a positive way, I presume?” he wonders.

“A very positive way, Walter. So positive, my psyche can’t understand it. And you literally said to me last night that you weren’t going anywhere and it was like a breath of fresh air. Almost like you knew what I needed to hear and you just said it. And I missed you so much all week but I didn’t want to bug you while you were spending time with Faye. I want you to have the relationship with Faye that I wish I had with my Dad,” I whimper, wiping at my unshed tears. 

“Please know that if you ever need me while I am with Faye, get in touch with me, baby. You are important to me, Angel. You can’t possibly interrupt my relationship with Faye, so stop thinking you are doing so, please. How did therapy go?” he questions.

“In yesterday’s therapy session, I kept bringing up our usual after-work hang-out time and how it has become kind of routine to me. And I think maybe I experienced a kind of sub-drop as a result of it not happening this week. So by Friday, I needed your company and I jumped at the first opportunity to have you near me.”

“I need to ask you something, baby,” he says, his hand moving to my chin to turn my face toward his, “Is sub-drop the reason we had sex last night? Would you have waited longer?”

As he searches my eyes for the answer, my hand comes up to hold onto his wrist. “The reason we had sex last night is that I was ready. I was ready to experience that with you. I will say that sub-drop allowed me not to feel anxious about asking for what I needed though. I was so nervous that you wouldn’t want to have sex this soon.”

“If I had my way, I would’ve had you our first weekend together but that would have been too soon. I just knew I wanted you. So I didn’t force you last night, then?”

“Not at all, Walter. You had multiple check-ins with me and you made sure I felt comfortable and safe and cared for. You were perfect.”

“Thank fuck, I got worried there for a minute,” he lets out a nervous laugh, “You can always talk to me about these things, love. That’s why I’m here. To help shoulder the burden of what that brain decides to throw at you.”

“I know, but I-”

“No buts. Come to me the next time you are feeling unsure about something. Especially when it is to do with me. I want nothing more than to put you at ease, Angel.”

I climb up into his lap and wrap my arms around him. “Thank you. I promise I will come to you the next time I feel off.”

“That’s my good girl,” he soothes, giving my lips a quick peck, “Now, I have a question for you, Angel. I wanted to ask last night but I was too busy in a post-orgasmic haze.”

“Oh, my goodness. What is your question?” I send a prayer up to the heavens that I can handle his next words.

He smiles at me, and it has this hint of flirtation and domination within it. I love it when he smiles like that at me. Just knowing he has that power over me, but also that he wants me to know I’m safe with him.

“So, does my baby girl have a breeding kink?” Oh, that old chestnut?

I shift in his lap and start to look down and he lifts my head back up so we are eye-to-eye. “I mean, I didn’t really have it before you. Just with how much you cum, and how good you felt inside me…I just, in that moment, needed to feel you filling me up. And then I thought if I told you what I fantasize about, you would give it to me. Not give me a baby, because that would be way too soon. But, at least, give me a creampie. And you came so fucking hard, and I was beyond turned on. It was so hot, feeling you explode inside me. Even now, I can still feel it.” I shift in his lap again, trying to find any kind of friction until he stills my hips.

“As much as I wanna go for another round, it actually hasn’t been that long. It’s only a bit past 2 in the morning, and I don’t wanna hurt this little pussy. Well, I do wanna beat it up but it needs rest. As do we, Angel. Come on, let’s get some more sleep, and when we wake up, I’ll make sure and fill you up, ok?”

“Yaaaaaaaaas. Thank you, thank you, thank you! The sooner we get to sleep, the sooner you can turn me into a creme-filled treat.” I laugh, making him chuckle behind me as he cuddles into me.

Walter’s POV

Mid-Saturday Morning

I wake up to the sounds of light snores in my ear. Needless to say, I arise with a smile on my face. I attempt to snuggle closer and embrace her a bit but in my morning daze, I just squeeze her and wake her up by accident.

Her little whimper as she wakes is possibly the cutest sound I have ever heard. I’m tempted to have her make that sound again but I decide against it.

“How long have you been awake, baby?” she slurs a bit, rubbing her eyes.

“Not long. Promise I didn’t even have time to watch you sleep all creepy-like,” I laugh, leaning back when she turns around to face me.

“Awww, you weren’t my favorite kind of creep? Rats. Next time, then.”

“You’re terrible, you know that right?” 

“Can’t be that terrible. You’re in my bed. I’m in your arms. That spells romance to me,” she leans in and nuzzles my nose with hers. Why do I feel feral over that gesture?

“Right, you got me there,” I smile down at her, “How romantic is it that all I’m thinking about is filling that pretty pussy with my cum? I mean, I did promise you I would do that when we woke up.”

I have never seen her move quicker as she climbs atop me. With that movement, I and my dick are fully awake.

“I’d say that is the most romantic thing I have ever heard, Daddy,” she moans in my ear and cards her fingers through my hair. I take the opportunity to grab her hips and push her back onto me, reveling in the noises coming from her as she adjusts to the size.

“Fuck, Princess. So hot and tight for me. Take what you need from me, baby. Daddy wants you to ride for a while,” I groan, drinking in her sexiness like a fine wine.

She places her hands on my chest and lifts and lowers her hips until she can get a good rhythm going. And when she does, I am in heaven. The feeling of the motion of her hips is unlike anything I’ve ever had. Like she’s dancing on my dick and I’m not in control. 

She has all of the control and I couldn’t be more pleased. The way she works those hips, the way she looks down at me. I could not have imagined that the girl I helped not to fall that day would be above me, writhing and moaning herself to an orgasm. I could not have imagined that I would be in love this soon. But that’s what they say right? When it’s right, it’s right.

With her, it’s so fucking right. I reach up and caress her cheek, locking eyes with her. When she smiles at me, her eyes sparkle and it’s like she can see all my flaws and she just runs with them. She knows I want to care for her, and she lets me. For the most part, that is. There are still moments that I wish she would come to me, but I’m a patient man.

It looks like my Angel isn’t as patient.

“Mmm, Daddy, please may I cum?” she pleads, swiveling her hips.

I can’t deny her anything and she fucking knows it. “Yes. Cum with me, Angel,” I say, grabbing her hips and planting my feet so I can pound into her. Not even a moment later, I can feel her walls squeezing me like a vice. I tumble after her, spilling inside her and fulfilling my promise. I pull her down to entangle our moans in a searing kiss.

We part to catch our breath, foreheads together and eyes closed. There is nothing better than moments like this, I find. When one or both of us are spent, all we can do is breathe and clutch each other. We melt into each other and become one. 

I need to tell her how I feel, that’s a given. But first, I want to show her how I feel. And the first step is to care for her, as usual. Especially as it looks like her bones have left the building, and so has her brain as she has gone quiet. 

I scoop her up in my arms and leave the bedroom for the bathroom, setting her on the toilet before turning on her shower. I can tell she barely registers what is going on but she allows herself to be maneuvered into the spray after I put her shower cap over her hair. I let her get adjusted to the water while she is still basking in her afterglow.

I finally see that fruity and fragrant body wash she always smells like and lather it into her with a loofah. If I spend a little extra time massaging in the lather over her breasts and ass, she doesn’t seem to mind. I rinse her body under the stream and can’t help but leave kisses across her espresso skin. 

I turn off the water and get out of the shower first and grab her towel, holding it out for her to exit. She allows me to dry her off from top to bottom, letting me kneel at her feet to dry them. Taking off her shower cap, I leave it on its hook. Wrapping her towel around her, I lead her back to the bedroom. Wordlessly, she points to her lotion and I pick it up before coming back to her. I tell her to hold it momentarily as I walk to get my phone from my pocket and queue up ‘Angel’ by FINNEAS.

I take the lotion back from her and let the towel fall to the ground as the song starts. As I massage lotion into her perfect skin, I tell her, “This song has been on my mind for a while now. Actually, I heard Faye listening to it this week and now it’s just part of my memory banks now.” I chuckle, she joins in soon enough.

‘Nothing good lasts forever

But nights with you are better

So go slow

I never knew I needed you

Before I found you for the first time, hmm

I'm out of step, I'm off my feet

I'm waking up inside a dream

Teach me how to fly’

As the song goes on, I moisturize her skin. It is as soothing to me as it is to her. Almost like a love language. Wait, are acts of service a part of my love language? We’ll come back to that later.

I kneel down at her feet to get her lower half and the song reaches its crescendo. I caress her skin and look up at her face. She looks so perfect as she smiles down at me. Her hands fall into my hair, something I’ve noticed is a bit of an antsy habit with her. She does it when I stare at her for a beat longer than I usually would, or when she doesn’t know what to say. I just love it so much, I never want her to stop.

“I love it when you play with my hair, Angel,” I close my eyes, leaning into her. Wrapping my arms around her, I kiss her belly. It is one of my favorite things about her. I could kiss and caress it all day long if she would let me. I’m sure she would. I would just have to ask.

“Well good because I love playing in your hair. I mean, these curls are like my Kryptonite,” she giggles sonorously.

“Angel, there’s something else I love,” I say, returning to my full height, “Take a guess.”

“Oh, that’s easy. You love me, right?” she throws her head back and laughs, and I can tell that she is joking and she has no clue just how right she actually is. I take her chin between my thumb and forefinger, tilting her head up so she can see the sincere smile on my face.

“I love you, Kamaria,” I search her eyes until she gets it and when she does, her eyes twinkle with unshed tears. And it breaks my fucking heart. I can tell she is questioning how and why I love her and I have to put a stop to that line of thinking. “I love you because you let me care for you. You allow me to be myself and not have to be grumpy and standoffish all the fucking time. I love your smile. I love your personality. I love the way you look at me as if I hung the moon. Let me love you, please?”

She’s nodding quickly as a single tear falls. “I love you too, Walter.”

I lean down and capture her lips. It is only then that I realize that we are both naked still. Being naked is being vulnerable. And we just took a giant leap in our relationship. I have to make sure she feels comfortable.

“Why don’t we get you into some comfy clothing and I take you out for brunch, yeah? We can hold hands and make annoying romantic faces at each other the whole time.”

She looks as though she breathes a sigh of relief before she smiles up at me. “Goodness, you really do love me. How else would you know I wanted some pancakes right now?”

“Well, I did hear your stomach grumble a bit while I was down there. But I know we’ve had sex twice in about twelve hours with no nourishment in between so it’s only right that I feed you more than my cum, ya know?”

“Oh, my God! I fucking love you for that one,” she walks away to her dresser.

“Say it again.”

“I love fucking you, I mean, I fucking love you.” she winks at me and before I can even think to punish her for that, I sputter into a laughing fit and have to put my hands on my knees to calm down.

“Damn, that was a good one. I can’t top that so I’m gonna put on my clothes and admit defeat right now.”

“Don’t worry, Daddy. I take the L so often. It was only right that I get a W at some point. Kinda funny it happens while naked during expressions of looo-ooove,” she sing-songs, pulling out a comfy sweater from her closet.

“Does the W stand for Win or Walter?” I wink as she rolls her eyes at me.

“Ya know what? I will dignify that with a response. The W does stand for Walter. I deserve you. I fucking deserve love and happiness and cheesy romantic moments! Now, put some pants on, and let’s go get pancakes and whatever the fuck a full English breakfast is.”

“We’re not getting an English breakfast that’s anywhere near as good as what I can make at home. Trust me. Let’s stick to pancakes and bacon and like, grits or something. Have you ever had grits?”

“Oh, hun. Yeah, I’ve had grits. I’ve had, like, so many types of grits too. Shrimp grits, cheese grits, creamy grits. Damnit, now I want something savory.”

“No one is saying you can’t have whatever you want, Angel.” I offer, pulling up my trousers and looking at her.

I see her catch herself before she speaks. “You know what? You’re so fucking right. I’m putting on my stretchy pants today. I am gonna eat to my heart’s content. Eat grease and butter until I need a nap. That is my ideal way to spend the rest of the day if you don’t mind?”

“I fucking love that idea. Get those stretchy pants on. And maybe pack an overnight bag? I have an idea for tomorrow and I want you there for it. Unless you have plans?” I suggest as I pull my shirt over my head.

“No plans for me. I’d love to stay the night and see what this idea of yours is,” she agrees, pulling out her overnight bag from her closet.

After she packs up her bag, we head to a diner on the way back to my house. We eat to our heart’s content and it is true. As soon as we get back to my house, we take a long nap. The itis, as Kam called it, had surely beaten us, and we were happy to lose. And I was happy to be holding the woman I loved, and who loved me, in my arms.

I am so fucking lucky.

Chapter 7

A/N: The chapter title is taken from ‘Crazy In Love’, the Sofia Karlberg version is on the Spotify playlist. I feel the need to apologize to not only Beyonce but to the Beyhive. I needed the slowed-down version, but I kinda hate the version Bey did. I’ll die on the hill that Sofia’s slow version is better. If this stops you from reading the story further, I completely underst-Call your dad, you're in a cult!

**Tag List**

@brattymum96 @ambinxe @avengersfan25 @kebabgirl67

@enchantedbytomandhenry @astheskycries 

@geralts-yenn @deandoesthingstome @liveoncoffeeandflowersss @foxyjwls007 @rosiesluv7 @livisss

Let me know if you wanna be added and for what plz  😁

[General Fanfiction (Everything), Henry Fanfiction, August Walker, Bright Like The Moon]

[beachknit]

MYSTERIOUS AUTHOR OF SIGNED, VENUS, "THE WRITER," FOUND

Sorry for the clickbait title. Pretty soon it won't be clickbait, though, and that's what this post is about!

If you don't already know, my name is Hayden. Welcome to my blog! Loyal readers might notice that all my old posts are gone… don’t worry, they’ve just been archived to a different site, and I will be sure to send everyone who was following before this post (which, honestly, wasn’t many people) a link so you can still read those old posts if you’d like. But for what I’m about to do, I think a fresh start and introductions are warranted!

Those of you who are from Coast Venus yourselves (which, I believe, will probably be the majority of you) will be excited to hear that the mystery we've all been keeping tabs on for the last ten years is about to be unravelled. Yes, that's right, I'm talking about the anonymous author behind Signed, Venus. The person, the myth, the Coast Venus legend themselves... The Writer!

To start this off with a bang, I have managed to identify and track down the slightly-less-enigmatic illustrator of Signed, Venus to their home here on Coast Venus's beach. Please do not try this at home, though, readers, for in most cases, it is rude to blatantly disregard the privacy and boundaries of others.

Now, I know what you Coast Venus skeptics are thinking, but rest assured: by the time you've finished reading this post, you will be completely convinced that I, Hayden, am the best and most worthy person for the job! But before we get to that, let me explain to our readers from out of town just why any of this matters.

Coast Venus is a little town in the country of Conclaire. If you've heard of us, it's probably because the town is known as a hotspot for authors and creatives. I copied this description from the town's official website, but we've been described as "Everyone's dream vacation, with breathtaking ocean views, world-class resorts, and famously friendly locals who will inspire with storytelling and poetry." The really important thing is that writing means a LOT to us here. You won’t find a person in this town who doesn’t at least read regularly, and I’m told that our local budget for literary arts is much higher than the international average.

The second most important thing to pay attention to is that, apart from Coast Venus, travel to other towns in Conclaire is generally off-limits. There’s a bunch of history behind that, blah blah, but basically for the last eighty or so years travel throughout Conclaire (except for Coast Venus, of course) has been almost completely unheard of. Almost.

Until The Writer did it. The first issue of Signed, Venus was published roughly ten years ago. In it, The Writer explained that they are breaking Conclaire’s travel taboo, going to the different towns, and recording what they find for publication here in Coast Venus. Signed, Venus is the only modern source of knowledge about what the rest of Conclaire is like. It’s such an important project for anyone who is interested in learning more about Conclaire, and The Writer conveys their findings with a unique and personal flair. Signed, Venus is my absolute favourite creative work, and I highly recommend that all of you check it out if you haven’t already.

Now, of course, there is a catch to all of this: nobody actually knows who The Writer is. We know that they’re from Coast Venus (or claim to be), and that they work with a local artist who illustrates and publishes each issue of the series. We know a bit about their personality from their writing, but we don’t actually have any identifying information other than that. Signed, Venus is published completely anonymously, and The Writer has only earned the moniker of “The Writer” from Coast Venus locals discussing their work.

Thank you for bearing with me through that explanation, Coast Venus readers, and you’ll be glad to know we’ve reached the part you actually care about. Here are the five W’s for your convenience:

Who: Me, Hayden, and my partner, Kameron, in pursuit of The Writer of Signed, Venus

Where: We will be going on a road trip throughout five locations in Conclaire, visiting sites that The Writer talked about. Specifically, we will visit Arabella, Sayre, Quidel, Mulani, and Urbina

What: We’ll be meeting and talking to locals of these different towns mentioned in Signed, Venus to ask them about their encounters with The Writer and their impressions of them

Why: The Writer is known for exaggerating. Instead of trying to go straight to where The Writer is right away, we want to try to learn more about what they’re like as a person as part of the process of uncovering their identity. Talking to those who have actually met him will be a great way to get a sense of what their character is really like off the page

When: This plan has been in the works for years, actually, but the first tangible step is happening today!

Okay, I know the “why” didn’t really answer the question you’re actually asking, which is, what prompted this? Why now?

The answer can be found in the latest issue of Signed, Venus, #44, in the final paragraph:

“… with my hammering heart and a tank full of gas, ready to head into what will likely be the last chapter of Signed, Venus, I want to thank those loyal readers who've kept up with my journey over the years. And, if my vain hope I've nurtured all this time ever comes true, that someday these journals will inspire one of you to set out from Coast Venus and explore Conclaire yourself, I'd like to ask that you not come after me or try to identify me."

As you can see, The Writer clarifies here that they have hoped for Coast Venus readers to someday be inspired by Signed, Venus to explore the rest of Conclaire. They then request that those of us who do make that journey do not try to find The Writer.

I believe that The Writer is being purposely facetious here (see issue #31 where they explain at length about their use of reverse psychology when talking to River). In the ten years since the first issue of Signed, Venus was published, no one has ever tried to find and identify The Writer. Sure, there has been plenty of guesswork done as to The Writer’s identity, particularly with astute readers comparing his writing style to the writing of other famous Coast Venus authors, or looking up records of locals who have left town, but no one has actually tried to follow in The Writer’s footsteps for the purpose of uncovering their identity. Also, there haven’t been a lot of attempts to travel Conclaire. The ones who have left end up either returning fairly soon after, discouraged by how this country isn’t exactly built for tourism once you’re outside of Coast Venus, or they create no written record of their travels so it’s pretty well useless to the rest of us. Keeping all of that in mind, it’s curious that The Writer would even bother to mention this, right?

Well, not really. If you’ve read enough of Signed, Venus, you’ll recognize this as a clear sign of encouragement. The Writer mentioned that readers travelling Conclaire is their hope because it’s something that they want readers to do. They love a good twist and a challenge (as we can see from the entirety of the series…), and they’ve been carefully creating a mystery around their identity since the very first issue. There’s a reason that here in Coast Venus we refer to The Writer as our town’s very own urban legend - that is exactly how The Writer wants us to feel about them. Telling us not to try to identify them just makes their identity even more mysterious and intriguing. The Writer knows that, and that’s the entire reason that they said it - they want us to look for them, and they want us to find them.

This morning, Kameron and I took the first steps on our journey. Like I said at the beginning of the post, I’ve figured out who the elusive illustrator of Signed, Venus is and their place of residence. But what I didn’t mention is that today, we actually went over to their house to ask them about The Writer. It didn’t all go exactly according to plan… but that’s a topic for the next post!

Follow my blog to keep up-to-date with me and Kameron as we set out to find The Writer! :) You can also follow Kam on Instagram.

[manuscripts-dontburn]

The Book of Dust: The Secret Commonwealth

Author: Philip Pullman

First published: 2019

Pages: 687

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 11 days

Review HERE.

Kam s ním?

Author: Jan Neruda

First published: 1917

Pages: 29

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 1 day

Znáte přeci ten starý vtip, ne? Jan Neruda miloval Karolinu Světlou. A když zemřela, tak napsal "Kam s ním". :D V každém případě tento ikonický text i po více než sto letech vyloudí na tváři čtenáře upřímný úsměv, pobaví a zároveň dýchne romantickou atmosférou staré Prahy.

The Tattooist of Auschwitz

Author: Heather Morris

First published: 2018

Pages: 320

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

How long did it take: 7 days

As much as I appreciate learning about Lali (not Lale!) Sokolov and his story, this book from literary point of view is deeply average. The sparse and straightforward style of narration can be effective (case in point: Exit West by Mohsin Hamid), but for some reason here is only does the book a disservice by making the people in the book cut-outs without much differences in personality, and subsequently the reader (at least this particular reader) fails to engage with them on a more personal level. Add to it the historical inaccuracies and what you are left with is something very unremarkable.

Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War

Author: Robert K. Massie

First published: 1992

Pages: 1007

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 40 days

I am not going to pretend that I read each page of this book, some (about 1/4) I skimmed. This is a great achievement of a research for the writer, but so very dense and detailed that the retention level is not high. I definitely feel like I learned a lot, but I also feel a lot has escaped me. Very interesting, very well written, my brain is toast.

Kristin Lavransdatter: The Wreath

Author: Sigrid Undset

First published: 1920

Pages: 278

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 3 days

This is, actually, a very simply laid-out story. A beautiful young girl comes of age, falls in love and defies her family wishes to get the man she wants. And the book is very straight-forward with it as well, not adding anything unneccessary, no deep philosophy, no side-tracks to boast its volume. But the core of the book are relationships between flawed characters, be that Kristin, naive and stubborn, or Simon, kind but also condescending, Aashild, helpful but not above scheming, and of course Erlend, impulsive, selfish and overall a bastard. The life in medieval Norway was tough, honest, difficult, lacing Christianity with superstition and all this Sigrid Undset captured beautifully. What truly elevated this volume to 5 stars for me, however, was the ending scene between Kristin´s parents.

No One Is Too Small To Make a Difference

Author: Greta Thunberg

First published: 2019

Pages: 68

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 1 day

First of all, I think many people angry with Greta just don´t get what she is and what she does. They criticize her for being harsh and undiplomatic, and they criticize her for speaking up without offering a sollution of her own. And it would be funny if it was not so horrible. What I got to understand from this book is that Greta asks the world to LISTEN to the people who DO have sollutions, or at least strive to find them. She is the voice that is supposed to attract attention to a problem and she is pleading, begging and demanding (as well we all should!) that we actually start treating that problem with the seriousness it deserves. That said this little book is hardly a comprehensive statement and I believe Greta and her mission deserve a better representation. By this I mean: instead of merely printing her speeches, why not edit them in a ways so that many points are not repeated in all of them? I GET the point of this publication, but at the same time the potential was not reached

The Familiars

Author: Stacy Halls

First published: 2019

Pages: 360

Rating:  ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 3 days

Yeah..... this was fine. I liked it. Not much to discuss. If you wanna read it, go ahead, there is nothing wrong with it.

Glass Town

Author: Isabel Greenberg

First published: 2020

Pages: 224

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 1 day

I just... really love Charlotte Brontë, you know. And this book is really both imagined, but for greater part factual, journey into her own private torment. I have, also, always found her the most tragic of all the Brontë siblings, especially because of she outlived all of her siblings, and then her own pregnancy killed her. As for the publication itself, I have to say I am not a great admirer of Isabel Greenberg´s art style, especially her close-ups freak me out (though the more complex pictures were nice). However she has managed to tell the story of the Brontës in a very creative and original way, by using beautiful language and packing a punch right through my soul.

The Tales of Beedle the Bard

Author: J.K. Rowling

First published: 2008

Pages: - (audio book)

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 2 hours

This was, for most part, really enjoyable and makes a nice addition to the Harry Potter books.

Madame Bovary

Author: Gustave Flaubert

First published: 1856

Pages: 311

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 9 days

1. Beautiful writing. 2. I hated everyone.

A Gentleman in Moscow

Author: Amor Towles

First published: 2016

Pages: 472

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 5 days

I liked the gentle flow of events, I liked the atmosphere and the people I met in this book. I thought the premise was interesting and clever, and all in all the author did deliver a lot of what was promised. The only thing I missed, and I cannot tell you the specific reason if I tried, was a strong emotional connection, something that would stun me, perhaps some long lasting story elements which would ties everything together. Life of the gentleman in this book moved from episode to episode, from character to character, but there was not that one underlining goal which would have made it all so much powerful.

[itsbenedict]

Kingdoms and Koopas: Ep. 6

K&K is a Fate Accelerated campaign set in the Mario universe, which I’m running for three players:

Bee @thebeeskneesocks​, playing Kandace Koopa

Jovian @jovian12​, playing Cozmo Naut

Malky @sleepdepravity​, playing Dr. Chevy Chain

Last time | Archive | Next time

Previously on Kingdoms and Koopas, the party survived a harrowing underground experience, arrested a bigshot crime lord probably, acquired a magical item, and were in the vicinity of Kandace while she did horrifying things.

This time... we’re leaving the Koopa Kingdom for a fun vacation! Woooo!

So, Kandace wants them there Music Keys, still- and her favorite test subject I mean minion I mean friend, Cozmo, is all too happy to go on a fun adventure to help her get them. Unfortunately, Dr. Chevy Chain would be all too happy to never interact with these chucklefucks again, so she needs an alternate reason to follow Kandace and Cozmo. That reason is... her boss at the hospital has ordered her to make a house call in the Magic Kingdom, which happens to be where the other two are headed!

Unfortunately, the road to the Magic Kingdom has problems on it. One of the problems is bandits. Y’know, Bandits. They’re like Shy Guys, but their masks are more like faces and they steal your crap? Bandits. They’re here to be a random encounter.

Cozmo and Chevy begin fighting them off, but Kandace has an idea to end the fight quicker than that. Y’know her curse that she has? Her magical talking shadow, Carbonado, who makes her life difficult? Well, she’s prepared to bargain this time around- in hopes that maybe he can actually help.

Carbonado’s terms- in exchange for using the darkness to get very big and scary and scare the bandits off- are that Kandace must behave. This is a bit of a tall order, and she bargains him down to... using manners while in the Magic Kingdom. Which are still, likely, terms she’s going to violate, but hey.

Further down the road, they encounter... someone... they’ve... met before? It’s... a Shy Guy wearing a trenchcoat and a big bushy mustache, who would like to sell them some merchandise. It’s Deals Guy! 

Immediate attempts to rip off Shady Guy’s mustache again (isn’t he supposed to be in jail?) are met with failure, as this happens to be... the Real Deals Guy. He actually has decent stuff to sell! Or... would. He’s kind of out of inventory right now, and is actually looking to buy. We try out the new Rich system I threw together (an extra stat you roll, Rich, which depending on the outcome tells you whether you can afford the thing, and whether you need to decrease your Rich to do so). Rolls ain’t great, but Kandace does buy a Super Leaf, once it becomes clear that the random crap off the floor he’s selling does include some useful items.

As they proceed, and as they’re getting closer to the magic kingdom, they meet a wandering wizard- and he has Prophecies for them! One about hearts, one about dreams, and one about paths. He can give them two true prophecies, and another false one- and they have to pick which ones will be true and which will be false. Which... shouldn’t be how prophecies work, but they agree, pick that “paths” should be false, and Merlon gets all SHA-ZIBBY, SHA-ZOOBY on ‘em. The prophecies are as follows:

'Thou shalt never be betrayed by those thou trusteth with all thy heart and all thy mind.'

‘The bow is a truer guide to the arrow's path than the arrow.' 

'A dream is a nightmare waiting to happen.'

The second, on the subject of paths, is conveniently the false one- which they can get the true version of just by inverting it. Still... cryptic as hell, though.

Finally, though, they arrive in the Magic Kingdom.

Chapter 3: From the Stars

Unfortunately- besides Chevy, who has an address she’s meant to head to- they have no idea where to go. The Music Key’s magical signature is just “up”- somewhere in the sky- and they need to find a way to get there. (And, Chevy needs to find a way to figure out how to reach the address in question, since the Mario world doesn’t have GPS.)

So they check an information booth, manned by a Star Kid named Astrid. She gets out a telescope and checks out the spot in the sky they mention- which, as it appears, is a strange ribbon of rainbow light... hm. I wonder...

As for getting up there- well, there’s ways. All kinds of ways! Except, there was recently a large destructive bomb-related accident down at the local Cannon District (where they keep all the Cannons That Shoot You Into Space), and there’s only two cannons left standing. Bullet Bud and Robert Omb attempt to convince the party (minus Chevy, who’s gone off to do her job elsewhere in the city after obtaining a map) that their cannon is the safe one and that the other guy’s cannon is a rickety mess that’ll explode in their faces.

(The paths prophecy, by the way, applied to this situation, though in keeping with Merlon’s “Useless Prophecies” aspect, nobody realized that the “arrow” is the Bullet Bill, and the “bow” is the explosive that fires the bullet- or the Bob-omb.)

No, they solve this dilemma by arbitrarily picking the right cannon- which Cozmo tests first. Unfortunately, they fail to notice a problem in time to stop it (but succeed in noticing it happening at all.) Robert Omb snuck around the side of Bud’s cannon and blew up as it fired, knocking Cozmo off-course. He goes flying up into the sky, and... well, he’ll probably be fine. Let’s assume he’s fine.

Kandace, noticing the sabotage, attempts to... mete out justice? Which is to say... draw a teleportation circle, and attempt to shove Robert Omb into it, to get rid of the cheating bastard. She barely fails the Forceful contest, but Bullet Bud helps her out with sending his rival off to... well, Ted the Storm God’s cloud, is the only place Kandace knows how to make her random-teleport spell come out, right now. Gonna be one confused Bob-omb, suddenly in the middle of Kam Ekademy.

Meanwhile... Chevy has a job to do. She’s arrived at the address, to make the house call she was specifically needed for. See, there was some kind of magical accident that cost everyone in a given radius of the patient to be unable to control their hands, which made things difficult for normal doctors. But Chevy doesn’t even have any hands, and so was considered perfect for the job.

Arriving at Rainbow Cruise Tours, she encounters a crew of concerned Bob-ombs who explain the situation. Their captain, apparently, stumbled in one day with a big piece of magical crystal sticking out of his chest, and fell into a coma on the bed. The crew didn’t have hands, but they also didn’t have surgical training- and most of the surgeons in the Magic Kingdom are Wizzerds, known for pretty much just having hands.

The job itself turns out to be pretty easy, and Chevy successfully removes the foreign object and resuscitates the patient- an odd, stout, yellow man with a heavy accent, a curly purple wig, and an inability to shut up. The Great Flavio invites Chevy on a sky cruise as a reward for her efforts, which she- having nothing better to do, now- agrees to. Like a fool.

Partway through the lovely flight on the sky boat in question, there is a THUMP as something impacts the side of the ship. And then manages to grab hold of the dangling anchor, rather than slide off the ship and fall to its death. This something, as it happens, is Cozmo Naut, who for reasons unknown was recently fired out of a cannon into the sky. Weird. Chevy confirms he isn’t going to fall, and then entirely declines to try and help pull him up.

Kandace, after probably doing a crime by magically banishing someone by force to another Kingdom, climbs into Bud’s cannon and fires herself up there, getting enough altitude that she can reach the Rainbow Cruise and rescue Cozmo using her broom (which would’ve been too difficult to ride all the way up there by herself.)

The cruise, though, appears to be making a stop somewhere else before heading up to... the rainbow ribbon in the sky that you’ve probably already figured out what it is. That they’ve actually figured out what it is, actually, so I’ll just tell you: it’s Rainbow Road, the famous kart-racing track.

But the pit stop is at... oh, just the Royal Castle of the Magic Kingdom. For guests to meet the princess, and stuff. No big.

As they arrive- and Cozmo and Kandace line up to meet the princess, while Chevy hangs back because when can Chevy ever be bothered- they encounter a... familiar face? Sort of? Except for how X-Nauts wear face-concealing goggles and stuff? It’s an X-Naut Cozmo used to know from back during the whole moon thing- Oneiro Naut. They catch up a little bit- apparently, Oneiro is doing some guard duty for the princess’s meet-and-greet, and in their spare time is researching dreams.

Researching dreams...? Dreams, dreams... there definitely wasn’t a prophecy about that...

Anyway, Cozmo and Kandace eventually reach the front of the line, and are face-to-face with Princess Opal herself!

(art by Bee)

Now, here’s a little bit of Kandace backstory that I don’t think I’ve mentioned in these recaps yet: when Kandace was younger, she was experimenting with teleportation spells, and... accidentally teleported herself into this very castle. It was a little surprising, but Opal took it in stride, and told the young magikoopa that she knew she’d be an amazingly powerful witch some day, before helping her get back home.

It was a pretty formative moment for young Kandace- and now, here she is, once again meeting her hero.

Who... absolutely doesn’t recognize her. Which is... fairly crushing, for a moment. But... hang on. This Opal is weirdly... sedate? Very calm, regal, princess-like. Which isn’t at all how she remembers her.

Suddenly, there’s a spark of realization, and Opal tells Kandace- and her friend- to head through a door just behind the throne area. Confused, they agree... and are dropped through a trapdoor and fall and fall and fall through some kind of magical sparkly hole. They land in... what looks like some kind of extremely messy magical workshop. And in that workshop is... the real Princess Opal. 

She explains that the Opal doing the meet-and-greet up in the throne room is a decoy, there to handle all the princess-type duties she finds super-boring. What she doesn’t find boring is Kandace, who she does in fact remember. And she... has Kandace look at some weird magic instruments, and pokes her with a glowy detector rod thingy, and has her hold an orb which she then tosses into a machine which explodes, and generally sort of geeks out about Kandace’s nonspecific magic specialness. She’s very excited.

It’s kind of difficult for Kandace to follow a lot of Opal’s projects, which are very advanced and very hard to determine the actual purpose of. It seems there’s a lot of stuff here that’s unfinished, or that was never really meant to do anything besides look cool in the first place. Opal’s running all over the place, unable to stick to a topic for very long- because whose attention span wouldn’t be taxed by the many wonders of magic, right?

Anyway, Cozmo and Kandace tell her about their quest- to find a magical music-related orb of incredible power. Opal tells them that she’s pretty sure the big tournament is going to have something like that as a prize.

Tournament?

Yeah, the kart-racing tournament. On Rainbow Road. That one. Do they want to enter? YES they want to enter.

So Opal- who’s big into kart racing, along with apparently everything else- offers them pick of her old experimental karts, to borrow for the race! (She herself has been, uh, banned from participating, because she kept breaking vehicle regulations and causing magical accidents during races. Apparently the issue was bad enough that they actually banned their own princess, so... well, it’s probably totally safe.)

Cozmo picks out something with flame decals and lots of firepower- just a big ol’ beefy boy of a car, with a high top speed at the expense of handling. (He tests it out by crashing it directly into the wall of Opal’s workshop- pretty good at crashing!) Kandace, rather than pick out an old kart, works with Opal to soup up her broom, giving it a magical bike mode that increases its top speed at the expense of flight capabilities. 

Meanwhile, Chevy is approached by a Buzzy Beetle who represents the Rainbow Road course management. Apparently, there are so many outlandish injuries that happen on Rainbow Road that most of their doctors have quit in horror, so they’re really looking for last-minute replacements. And so it is that Chevy takes on a part-time job, and is escorted to Rainbow Road by a Lakitu crew.

The two racers, meanwhile, are escorted to the track personally, on karts towed behind Opal’s magical royal chariot. It’s a very stylish entrance, only slightly dampened by a Monty Mole mechanic at the track demanding that Opal leave immediately, in a panicked and horrified tone of voice. He can’t do this again! He can’t! (It’s fine, though- Opal’s just going to be spectating, honest!)

So we would leave off there, but... a couple strange things happen. One thing is that... Oneiro Naut is somehow amongst the crowds of spectators, despite having been at the castle a minute ago and not having been aboard the chariot when they left. So that’s weird.

And another thing is that... Kandace can still track the Music Key’s energy signature. And where it appears to be is... still up. Still straight up, in the sky just above Rainbow Road.

...It’s probably fine! See you next time!

Last time | Archive | Next time

[atamascolily]

A Natural History of Tatooine, part 23/?

Luke and Callista discuss marriage and children in a scene that is a direct response to a particularly infuriating section of Darksaber. Also, daily life at the Jedi Academy.

(People who have read my other fics will know that making the characters happy right before everything goes to hell is one of my favorite literary tropes.)

(Previous installments)

"Did you ever want to have children?" Luke asked Callista one day. They stood on the balcony of Luke's quarters on the upper level of the main temple, watching the sunset and waiting for the bell to ring for evening meditation.

"I mean, yes. Someday. It just never seemed like the right time. And then the Clone Wars came and everything was in disarray, it <i>definitely</i> wasn't the right time. And then, just as things startled to settle down--"

"The Empire," Luke finished.

"Yes. And after that--having children was the last thing on my mind." She played with a tendril of passionvine intent on tangling its way across the railing.

"So now...?" Luke prompted after a long pause.

"I don't know," Callista said at last. "I don't know--if they'd be mine or Cray's."

"Genetically speaking, probably Cray's. But who knows? Your hair is coming back in the old color, and your voice is different from her--and so are your eyes. Given how your spirit shines through her body, I suppose there's only one way to find out."

"Try it and see what happens?" she said, with a gleam in her eye. She turned away to look out at the view. "Well, I have to admit that scares me."

"Why?"

A very long pause. "I'm afraid any children I have would inherit my Force blindness?"

"So what?" Luke repeated. "It doesn't matter to me."

"Shouldn't the first Jedi Master of the new order have Jedi children?"

"I don't think I have to personally spawn the new order myself," he said carefully. "In fact, Yoda and Ben would probably hate it if I did. They didn't think that Jedi should marry and have children. My father Anakin defied the Order to marry my mother in secret. He probably would have been happier with Djinn Altis's group," he added as an afterthought.  

"Perhaps," she agreed, though she still wouldn't meet his gaze. "But I just--"

"Anyway, Leia's children are Force-sensitive, and Han is not, so who's to say they would be Force blind? And Cray was Force-sensitive, so if you are genetically Cray, then there's no reason to assume--"

"I guess you're right," she said, turning to face him at last. "Put that way, it sounds so cold. So clinical. So... Imperial. As if we were building a dynasty."

"I mean, I'm not averse to the idea, but I'm also not wedded to it--" Luke started, as he leaned over to embrace her. He stopped abruptly as an idea occurred to him. "Should we get married?" he asked after a moment.

"I don't know," she said. "I want to--Luke, truly, I do, I just--too much has happened. Too fast. I'm still getting used to it all. Let's take it slow."

"All right," he agreed, though he couldn't deny his disappointment. Still, there was no point in rushing her. "I can do slow. After all, a Jedi is very.... very... patient."

They both dissolved into giggles and the tension passed.

***

The days quickly settled into a routine. Luke and Callista rose at dawn, slipping on their robes and sandals in silence, threading their way through ancient stone corridors and the early morning haze to the meditation hall with the rest of the community. They sat cross-legged next to each other on dark cushions for an hour, stepping aside from the endless river of their thoughts to listen to the sound of their breathing and the squawking clamor of the pikka birds as they announced the return of the sun.

After breakfast, the community gathered in the central courtyard for morning announcements before splitting off for training. Since his return to Yavin, Luke had spent most of his time with Kirana Ti, coaching her as she strengthened her considerable Force powers, and answering her questions as best he could. A frequent debate was how best to adapt the Academy model to Dathomiri society when it was time for her to return to her home planet, and how to nip potential problems in the bud.

Callista's mornings were far more varied. In the beginning, she rotated between Luke, Kam, Tionne, and Mara, working one on one with them as they tried everything they could think of to restore her connection to the Force. Luke was nervous the first time Callista and Mara worked together, but it seemed to go well; Callista reported that Mara was polite enough, if a bit standoffish. He realized later that he was disappointed that two of the most important people in his life were never going to be friends.

Callista only tried to work with Corran once; it didn't go well. Of all the students who had trained at the Academy thus far, only Dorsk 81 and Nichos had ever had the temperament to mesh well with Corran. He was far more powerful than Tionne, but much worse at teaching--Corran admitted as much--but until they had more instructors, they were stuck with him.

After a few weeks, at Tionne's suggestion and with Luke's blessing, Callista began to offer her own classes for the students and teachers alike. She drawing on her considerable memories of Jedi history and lore, much of which she had personally experienced. She couldn't personally assist the students in carrying out the exercises she described, but under her guidance, Luke saw the quality of instruction at the academy blossom and expand beyond his wildest dreams. It didn't bring back her connection with the Force, but it made her feel appreciated and valued, and Luke was grateful for it.

After lunch, the community would meet again for the work assignments and chores necessary to keep everything running, from cleaning the bathhouse and guest rooms to tending the grounds to assisting the Head Cook and the kitchen droids with meal preparations. Callista threw herself eagerly into every assignment she was given. Since Force powers were rarely helpful in these sorts of work, she was more or less on even footing with the rest of the community and was rarely reminded of her loss.

Luke spent the work periods in his office, answering his messages and checking the accounts, though Mara was responsible for most of the day-to-day operations of the resort portion of the business. Corran, down the hall, managed vetting the guests and overall security, but Luke made a point to look over his shoulder now and again to know who and what to expect wandering the grounds and soaking in the baths. With several kidnapping attempts against Leia's children, it was best to be cautious.

After the work period ended, it was time for recreation. Luke spent most of those late afternoons wandering on foot with Callista or taking his airspeeder out for a spin over the treetops. She was particularly fascinated by the complex architecture of the temple complex, and they spent many hours exploring above and below ground, marveling at the sophisticated art of a vanished civilization.

Having spent her childhood on a raft-community on one of the vast oceans of Chad, Callista never failed to marvel at the vast forest stretching out in every direction, just as Luke had done since his first visit to Yavin when it served as headquarters for the Rebellion. Her unfailing zest for life, her laughter, her sense of humor and the absurd and the ridiculous had survived her resurrection more or less intact, and meshed neatly with his own.

"If you don't have a sense of humor, you're dead," she told him one afternoon as they made their way back to the temple, exhausted and covered in mud, but happy.

"<i>You</i> had a sense of humor when you were dead," he teased.

"Not <i>quite</i> dead," she corrected, laughing even as she said it.

Some days, they sparred in the dojo under Traitakh's watchful eye and the blank-eyed stares of the ysalamiri on their nutrient frames. Luke was nervous about sparring with her with open lightsabers, but he shouldn't have been. Callista had been training in sword-forms since she was twelve; she could easily best him if he was careless, especially when he couldn't draw on the Force for help. She knew many things he didn't, and under her careful tutelage, Luke found himself improving by leaps and bounds.  

"Your style is so... rough," Callista said, after the first session. "If I didn't know better, I'd say it was 'unpolished'. Like a jewel pulled directly from the earth."

"That's because I didn't really have a teacher," Luke explained. "Yoda and I never studied combat. I just... did what I had to do."

"You fought Darth Vader and <i>lived</i>. How many people can claim that?"

"I'm still not sure how I survived, to be honest. It helped that he probably wasn't trying to kill me, even at the very end."

"I suppose so. But that doesn't make your form any less impressive under the circumstances," Callista said, stopping to stroke the rough pebbled back of a ysalamir. "Tionne doesn't like these big lizards, but I think they're cute. I've been helping Traitakh take care of them during work period sometimes, since no one else wants to do it."

Aside from Luke, Traitakh was the only member of the community whom Callista was close to. It pained Luke that her only friend was the one non-Force sensitive person at the academy, but he held his tongue. All of the students or instructors were polite to her, but none of them--even Tionne--had tried to get close. He didn't know how to bridge the gap.

After the exercise period, it was time to bathe. Callista loved the hot springs and the bathhouse, and they went every day in the late afternoon when the sun was level in the sky next to the fiery orb of the Yavin gas giant, but the shadows in the bathhouse were cool. They split up to enter the bathhouse, each washing on the side of their respective gender, only to meet up a short while later in the private teacher's pool, which they usually had to themselves. Then it was time for dinner, after which those who had foregone the afternoon work period assisted with the guests' dinner and with the meal clean-up, and then it was back to the meditation hall for another hour of silence and stillness before bed.

In theory, Callista had inherited Cray and Nichos's quarters, but in practice, she spent her nights with Luke. It was good not to be alone again, good to have someone to share his days with, a friend and ally he could count on. And no matter how restless his sleep, it was good not to be alone at night.

[orbemnews]

Travel Quarantines: Enduring the Mundane, One Day at a Time May Samali knew she’d reached her limit when she saw a tentacle emerging from her hotel dinner in Sydney, Australia. “I called downstairs and said, ‘I’m a vegan now, thank you!’” she said. “It was just so much fish. I’d gotten to the point where even thinking about it made me gag.” Ms. Samali swore off the seemingly unlimited seafood while in the middle of a required quarantine in the Hotel Sofitel in Sydney this December and early January. An executive coach, she was repatriating back to Australia after her U.S. work visa expired. In addition to an excess of fish, Ms. Samali was confined to her room all day, forbidden from stepping outside, for two weeks. Air travelers around the world are finding themselves in similar situations, enduring mandatory government quarantines in hotels as they travel to countries that are very serious about containing the coronavirus. Their quarantine is not the cushy experience of shorter-term quarantines or “resort bubbles” found in some destinations like Kauai and the British Virgin Islands, where you are able to roam relatively freely on a resort’s expansive grounds while waiting for a negative coronavirus test. This is the more extreme, yet typical experience of quarantine life. These mandatory quarantines involve confinement to your room, 24 hours a day, for up to two weeks (assuming you test negative, that is). And with some exceptions, you are footing the bill — quarantine in New South Wales, Australia, for example, costs about $2,300, or 3,000 Australian dollars for a two-week quarantine for one adult, and up to 5,000 Australian dollars for a family of four to quarantine for two weeks (in January, Britain announced a mandatory 10-day quarantine from high-risk areas with a similar cost of about $2,500 for one adult). Travelers now journeying to countries with mandatory hotel quarantines, which also include New Zealand, mainland China and Tunisia, generally must have compelling reasons to do so — visiting ailing family members, “essential” business travel or permanent relocation. Most accept the inconvenience and inevitable claustrophobia of the quarantine as the price of traveling. But while there can be comfort in establishing some kind of routine resembling normal life, travelers find themselves craving human connection, fresh air and, well, different food (the staff at the Sofitel happily accommodated Ms. Samali’s request; she is still off fish). Travel quarantine might seem manageable, even familiar, for those who have been living in places with shelter-in-place orders and working from home. Pete Lee, a San Francisco-based filmmaker, wasn’t concerned about the quarantine when he flew to Taiwan for work and to visit family. “I was a little bit cocky when I first heard about the requirement,” said Mr. Lee, during his eighth day at the Roaders Hotel in Taipei, Taiwan. “I was inside my San Francisco apartment for 22 out of 24 hours a day! But it’s a surprisingly intense experience. Those two hours make a big difference.” Destination: unknown Much of quarantine life is determined by your hotel. And depending on where you are traveling, you may get to choose your quarantine hotel, or you may be assigned upon arrival. Mr. Lee, in Taiwan, was able to choose and book his quarantine hotel from a list compiled by the Taiwanese government, complete with information about location, cost, room size and the presence (or lack thereof) of windows. He also footed the bill. Similarly, Ouiem Chettaoui, a public policy specialist who splits her time between Washington, D.C., and Tunisia, was able to choose a hotel for her weeklong quarantine when returning to Tunis with her husband in September; she based her selection, the Medina Belisaire & Thalasso on price and proximity to the Mediterranean Sea (“We couldn’t see it, but we could hear it … at least, we told ourselves we could!” she said). Brett Barna, an investment manager who relocated to Shanghai with his fiancée in November, could select a district in the city, but not the hotel itself. In an attempt to improve their odds, Mr. Barna chose the upscale Huangpu district where, he hoped, the hotels would be higher quality. “There were four possible hotels in the district, three of which were nice enough. And then there was the budget option, the Home Inn,” he said. Mr. Barna and his fiancée, to their dismay, ended up paying for quarantine in that option, which had peeling wallpaper and bleach stains on the floor thanks to aggressive cleaning protocols. In Australia and New Zealand, there’s no choice in the matter — upon landing, your entire flight is bused to a quarantine hotel with capacity. In most instances, travelers do not know where they are going until the bus pulls up at the hotel itself. Joy Jones, a coach and educator who is based in San Francisco, traveled to New Zealand with her husband, a New Zealand citizen, and two young daughters in January. She learned before their departure that they would have no say where in the country they would be quarantined. “That was probably the hardest part,” she said. “I could put together a bag of activities for my older daughter, and plan on doing laundry in the sink. But not having an answer to where we’d be — after more than 21 hours of flying, with masks — would we have to get another flight? A three-hour bus ride?” They didn’t. Ms. Jones and her family were taken to Stamford Plaza in Auckland, just 25 minutes from the airport. Pim Techamuanvivit and her New Zealander husband, however, were not so lucky. After arriving in Auckland from San Francisco, they were promptly directed to board another flight to Christchurch, and to the Novotel Christchurch Airport hotel. “At that point, we just really, really wanted to get to the hotel!” said Ms. Techamuanvivit, the chef-owner of Nari and Kin Khao restaurants in San Francisco and the executive chef of Nahm in Bangkok. Relief at arriving — finally — might be the initial reaction, but it doesn’t take long for reality to set in. The hotel room is all that you’ll see for a not insignificant period of time. As Adrian Wallace, a technology project manager who was quarantined at the Sydney Hilton in August after visiting his ailing father in Britain, put it: “That moment when the door slams … it’s reminiscent of the opening scene of ‘The Shawshank Redemption’!” Mr. Wallace said, referring to the 1994 prison movie with Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman. Passing the time The challenge is managing the tedium. Working remotely helped pass the time for a number of the travelers, including Tait Sye, a senior director at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, who traveled to Taipei, Taiwan, from Washington, D.C. in November. Mr. Sye attempted to maintain East Coast hours for the majority of his quarantine at the Hanns House Hotel, working from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. Mr. Wallace ran a half marathon around his Sydney hotel room (he was unable to adjust the in-room air-conditioner and got very sweaty). Mr. Barna and his fiancée in Shanghai had date nights on Zoom, since official policy required them to quarantine in separate rooms. A major highlight of their days came when a hotel employee, clad in full, hazmat-style P.P.E., knocked on the door and pointed an infrared thermometer at their heads. They were not allowed outside. In New Zealand, travelers who test negative for the virus are allowed on the hotel grounds for supervised constitutionals after checking in with guards at multiple checkpoints (masks and distancing are still required, and the rules can quickly change if there is any threat of an outbreak in the country). The ability to get fresh air and walk was crucial for Ms. Jones, and a key part of the routine she created for her family. Other aspects included morning yoga, remote school, nap times, playtime and art projects (her husband worked remotely from the bathroom). “We decorated a paper horse that we hung in our window — every day, a different part of it — that was a favorite activity. We’d have dance parties. And we’d watch a movie every night. We did what we could to bring some fun into it,” Ms. Jones said. Three meals a day Meals become very important in quarantine life, to mark the passing of the time and as regular occurrences to break up the monotony of the day. Food quality, though, varies widely, as Mr. Sye learned in Taipei, where meals were ordered from nearby restaurants. He recounted the highs of a Michelin-starred meal from Kam’s Roast Goose and the thoughtfulness of a Thanksgiving dinner decorated with a paper turkey to the low of an absolutely terrible pizza (at least it was accompanied by a beer). For Ms. Techamuanvivit who documented her quarantine in Christchurch on Twitter, ordering food and grocery delivery was a life-saver. “I’m a chef. I suppose I am, shall we say, a snob!” she said. “As a restaurateur, I don’t have much love for UberEats. But ordering Indian takeaway proved to be important.” (Others who had delivery options available similarly cited them as game-changing). Ms. Techamuanvivit spiced up hotel meals with leftover Indian pickles and found that Greek tzatziki sauce ordered from the grocery store worked well as a salad dressing. She and her husband also treated themselves to nice bottles of wine from the hotel restaurant’s wine list (In Australia and New Zealand, quarantined guests were limited to a delivery of six beers or one bottle of wine per person per day, perhaps to ward off belligerence. In Shanghai, alcohol was not allowed). Seeking connection on social media There are Facebook groups dedicated to hotel quarantine, by region and even by specific hotel, where members share tips for boiling eggs using in-room kettles and “cooking” with an iron. They were also a source of community; Mr. Wallace, who learned of the Sydney Hilton’s Facebook group while on the bus from the airport, participated in a daily Zoom call with members of the group (the meals of the day were a constant topic of conversation). Mr. Lee moderated filmmaking conversations on Clubhouse, an invitation-only social media app, and spent time on Tinder while in quarantine; he connected with a woman who was nearing the end of her confinement in another hotel across town. Ms. Jones documented her family’s quarantine experience on her private Instagram account, showing forts made of blankets, paper airplane competitions and “bowling” with water bottles and a crumpled ball made of paper. She was touched that friends and family, both in New Zealand and in the United States, sent her family meals, treats and toys for her daughters in response to her posts. “It was a really cool way to feel love, and connection, from such an isolated space,” she said. Follow New York Times Travel on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. And sign up for our weekly Travel Dispatch newsletter to receive expert tips on traveling smarter and inspiration for your next vacation. Source link Orbem News #Day #Enduring #Mundane #quarantines #Time #Travel

[suspendedfl00r]

Hello,

My soul yearns for a good write to try to make sense of my world right now. I haven’t found the most success writing pen to paper; due to the fact I’m always tired and fall asleep or just feel guilty like I should be doing other thinks like work. This narrative follows my overall process with creation which is fine cause sometimes you gotta just focus on school. I am curious if I should just delete all my social media apps again. Also curious as to why I feel I need adderall to function. I essentially dream of days where I can just wake up at a normal time get out of bed and just do life. Getting energy for breakfast and working out, and being more delicate with the way I nourish myself. I guess that goes in more ways than one as even considering the media and conversations I intake + the things I exchange energy and time with being different. I wish to spend my free time reading books, eating cleaner maybe plant-based, working out doing yoga, painting drawing embroidering tinkering with electronics, tinkering with models making clothes, drawing imaginary architecture, making models of it. Writing poetry, playing the guitar, making YouTube videos, + beautiful media.

I guess when I think of all the things I wish I could do I get so distracted from the present. I’ve been trying to detach from this idea I have of myself just being better and accepting myself as I am in order to be more real about moving into those spaces I wish to fill. What I mean by that is: rather than looking at my art, the architecture I’ve done, or think about what I have done and how it is not enough compared to where I wish to be; I’m trying to shift my energy towards being happy I have these skills and I’ve done what I have as experiments as a process. Rather than distilling fear into these areas of my life wondering if I’m good enough or what I’ve done is good enough, I wish to be at that place where I am just doing, experimenting not being held back by my fears or yearnings to be comfortable in my bed. But jumping out of bed to try something new, or planning my meals and bed time carefully so I do have time to squeeze in all these dreams and aspirations making use of all my time, energy, and money rather than just sitting in my room waiting for the opportunity to present itself.

Anyway that is the first layer of my mind the second layer consists of my responsibilities and having confidence in my movement. Staying focused and not getting distracted.// so I gues this has three dimensions work, school, personal life: lately I’ve been loosing slee from the demanding rhythm of life: working the two jobs has been a great blessing and learning process. However it has been really rough lately just to get out of bed and go to the work that pays the bills: which annoys me cause In the back of my mind I overthink about how I am perceived in the work place. Also T.A.‘ing has been super stressful. I guess I’m putting too much effort in the wrong places: with the professor I am bothered with how unorganized and over assigning work, the kids are just assholes that takes shit to the dean after I spent two days pulling all nighters to give them feedback. The whole class has been a shit show, and I feel both the students and the professor lack to take responsibility and I am just in the middle trying to help, but not doing so well as I’ve not taken this class. Also underplayed and forgetting to clock my hours.

Concerning my own classes I just pretty much fell behind the last couple of weeks from just lacking focus, which needs to be addressed as a real issue because no matter what I have to shoot for the A+ and practice statics so hard that I pass the class with flying colors I am definitely doing better than previous semesters but I want to have all of this class understood and down pat. So I will not struggle in solids next semester. Overall my biggest issue is that worksite from both jobs has been prioritized over my course which is due to the fact of paying bills, paying for school, and buying adderal(also been hard to find)

So as far as my personal life it is just a ball of stress and money especially when thinking about the car how I need to fix it. Wanting to have a good relationship with my family. Having kam around really helps but also adds to the stress as I’m usually a concerned about feeding us, overly sharing of my drugs and time. He is a Superman the way he works and I wish the best for him but I also realize I must see my self in the same light, and sometimes I see him as not having g his shit together and literally needing my help and this is wrong because that view reflects on the way I look at myself. His presence I really value but I often catch myself using him as a blanket to run away from my responsibilities. So as I feel myself with him, I see what I’m doing how it makes me crazy and I want him to just take care of all my problems for me the way I try to do for him. So essentially I find myself creating cycles of overdepency or toxic interdependency where my movement is based on his. Which is bad because we do move entirely different. He is so important to me because I feel he is my only friend really who gets me and hears me out and doesn’t judge me like my family does, while also loving me and actually caring instead of just using me like many of my friends do to just fill up their time as they run from their loneliness. He reminds me of reasons to be happy, while also reminding me that the stresses of the real world are real but you just do it.

so all in all I am doing okay and I still have time to do everything I want In this life and even this semester. My creative pursuits do not need to be happening now, however I am preppingg for them by focusing on my priorities of the now.

Which seem so jumbly because the lack of sleep. But really it’s simple!

Top priority: take care of yourself first! Eat nourishing food sleep at good times, exercise when you can and Allow yourself time to breathe. Stop worrying about how you are perceived and out overthinking to rest. Simply be gentle and loving to yourself by showing up for life. Nurture ur growth first. Before you consider Anyone or anything else!!

Priority #2 pass statics!!!

Study what you did not understand!! Chapter 21-22 then refresh on all the things you found tricky. Do all the exams and remember to not depend of reference material.

priority 03 pay bills/work

First acknowledge you need to be a good worker so stop delaying and pushing g things off. Just get them done, show up on time.

-stop breaking your back for people who will not notice/care

-to be avoid worker simply do the job you don’t have to go above and beyond but do the job well. ThAts it.

-do not let your jobs affecut your emotions: you are not defined by them in anyway and you are just there to do the work and make money. Dont over give, demand respect and don’t be a push over: be confident and focuses that your time and energy must be conserved to focus I. School: stop feeling guilty about work. Feel grateful that you are lucky to have two jobs during this plague! So echa me ganas.

As far as TA’ing

Get grades in but have a plan!!

Grade all project one and 2 then enter the rest of the grades

Also stop overworking yourself here for pretty much nothing. It’s not worth it girl. The professor and students jobs are not ur responsibility!

-do not let it get in the way of statics

Final remark: so yes I might feel super flakey about work life rn: but those spaces are temporary and do not let it distract you from the mission to graduate As the architect engineer master crafter!!! To learn! You are not the only flake everyone is struggling and you have a lot on your plate which you have communicated. So do not wear the guilt of the working world. You are a student and you get to participate in the work I g world and as long as you communicate and so your job you are ok!!

-as far as today go in to work

Focus on staying concentrated!!

Do good work

Tomorrow is a day off you can catch up then!! Also be happy share positivity with yourself and others!

You are doing fine! There is a lot going on but it will calm down! You got this!