#it’s not a big county. and that number is only going to get worse.

[bluebelly-sun-serpentine]

August 28th, 2024

A couple days ago a fire started on the ridge above the big grove of eucalypts (picture number 4). Thankfully it was spotted quickly, a mild wind was blowing in the opposite direction, it had recently rained, and wildfire response resources were not deployed elsewhere; I watched the water tankers hovering over the spot for a while, grateful for everything, but especially for the fact that fire prefers to go up hill rather than down, and that this fire started in the ridge rather than the canyon. Eucalypts are not native to my area, and greatly increase the risk of out-of-control wildfires. They drop a ton of highly-flammable litter – tannin rich leaves that also leave an acidic, nutrient-poor soil few other plants can survive. So most of what's down in that grove is (also highly flammable) poison oak. Worse, if fire reaches the overstory, the whole thing can go up in what is basically one big explosion.

What you can see peeking through the afternoon fog in the first picture is over a century of cow-forward fire suppression; non-native grasses on (what is now public) land grazed by privately owned cows (damaging the watershed and increasing the risk of catastrophic fire in the long run). What you see in the bottom photo is an example of a more modern form of fire suppression: fire goats raised a couple counties away are hired to graze this field and clear small growth (mostly poison oak, since that's the most opportunistic plant around) annually in mid-summer, and it's mowed somewhat regularly. There have been attempts to thin or remove the eucalypts in the canyon entirely, but they are stubborn resprouters and starting from scratch poses its own dangers.

I think it's unlikely there won't be a catastrophic fire here in the next 50 years. There's just too much fuel. We just need an unseasonable lightning storm, a bad fire season with first responders deployed elsewhere, reckless smokers in the gully at night with the winds blowing west. Every year I prepare myself for this possibility. We've had wet winters and hot, dry summers, and that's probably only going to get worse. Why would I stay here?

I don't know. I can walk down into the canyon and the eucalypts, unaware of their own malignancy, yawn and groan as they bend to touch one another in the wind. I get to watch coyotes hunting for wild plums in the evening; the plums aren't native but I'd guess the coyotes don't know that, either. My neighbors plant gardens you couldn't grow somewhere without this much warmth and sea fog. Crows harass red-tailed hawks in the few redwoods planted here to evoke a recent, unreachable past. I know where the nearest great horned owl lives. I know what the arrival and departure of naked ladies means, which oaks are which and which I love most, when thimbleberries might arrive, how to scare a mountain lion, where to go to find cool elders and willows when I'm feeling hot and low, how to tell toyon from everyone impersonating toyon, when the newts migrate. One one side of the ridge I can hear the train screeching unmistakably, but if I hop over into the next watershed it's gone, replaced by bickering scrub jays, happy dogs, children playing near the creek far below me. Would you know how to leave?

[jungle-angel]

Here I Am (Rhett Abbott x Reader)

Summary: You and Rhett have watched your youngest son and child grow in his own right. Now that he’s a man, you’re prouder than ever of him

Notes: Based off of my favorite song, this gem of a piece which fits our favorite horny cowboy like his own hat (lol). 

Tagging: @rhettabbotts @sebsxphia @lt-bradshaw @fridamoss and @nobody7102​

Rhett gripped your hand in his, waiting nervously as the crowd’s cheering began to reach fever pitch. Rodeo season was always toughest for you and him ever since your youngest had begun to follow in his father’s footsteps. 

No one had ever thought in a million years that Dallas Russel Abbott would have come this far. It seemed like yesterday that he was only a tiny little preemie baby that had been found in a box outside the Handsome Gambler. You and Rhett had fought a long, drawn out battle in the Amelia County courts and after two weeks from hell, Dallas was officially adopted into your ever growing family. 

That was twenty one years ago. 

Now you and Rhett were in the stands with the rest of the Abbott clan, your close friends from over the hill, the Redwoods, along with Billy and Shania Tillerson, all of you waiting for those gates to open and that bull to come flying out with Dallas on his back. 

“Oh God I’m so nervous,” you breathed. 

“(Y/n), baby, it’s gonna be ok,” Rhett assured you, giving your hand a squeeze. “The boy knows what he’s doin.” 

You heaved another sigh, waiting and waiting. Already you had seen three grown men get bucked off and you hated to see your son go through that. The worst he had ever gotten so far was a shiner under his left eye, but you and Rhett both feared that it could lead to worse. 

“We welcome from our own town of Wabang, Wyoming, Number Fifty-Four, Dallas Abbott!!” the MC announced excitedly. 

The bell rang and out of the gates came the most ornery son of a bitch you had ever seen, a fully grown bull that had been aptly named Big Mac for his sheer size. You both held your breath as you watched Dallas hanging on for dear life, moving into the movements of the bull instead of against them. 

“Oh my God, Mom, he’s gonna get bucked off!” Hannah blurted out nervously.

“Hannah it’s still early yet, don’t get scared,” Rhett told her. 

Fifteen seconds. Fifteen, heart pounding, sweat inducing seconds was all it took before Dallas finally let go and rolled into the dirt, staggering to his feet and shaking off the impact before the crowd went absolutely wild. 

“Ladies and Gentleman, your first year champion, Dallas Abbott!!!” 

You and Rhett were two of the first to jump into the ring, rushing to your son who was immediately scooped up into his father’s arms with others beginning to rush and crowd around. 

“I did it Pa,” Dallas said through his excited tears that began streaming down his face. “I won my first. I fuckin did it!” 

“I’m proud of you son,” Rhett choked. “I’m so fuckin proud of you!” 

There was one more face in the crowd that night, though you two didn’t know it. Dallas’s fiance’, Angel, pushed her way through the crowd in her army camos, her patrol cap perched on her head, black hair tied in a tight bun at the back of her head and a single eagle feather tucked into her hair. 

“Dallas!!” she called. “DALLAS!!!” 

Dallas let go of Rhett and immediately ran to her, catching her in his arms and practically lifting her off the ground before pressing a searing kiss to her lips. 

Some time after, the black and white photo of Dallas and Angel’s famous kiss ended up hanging on the hallway wall back at the house. Every time you and Rhett passed by it, you both remembered how far your son had come and ever after. 

[cryptidize]

I keep meaning to post about this cause the situation is crazy but it's only gotten crazier.

So, in Kentucky, there are LOTS of little counties. Actually, their the 4th State in the list of Most Counties. There's one county, Jefferson, that has around 770,000 people. This is over double the next largest county in the state. This is a big deal because schools are managed by the Board of Education of each county. Most counties have multiple schools based on population.

I promise this is important to the point-

Jefferson County has 120 public schools (and about 50 private/religious institutions). Now, there is a Board, with seven individuals elected every four years, so changes go through votes and meetings. However... Recently, people have been left behind in the system. You see, Jefferson has a 60% population of minorities enrolled in the schools there. Last year, the Superintendent (the leader of the Board) gave himself (thru a surprise vote) a 27% raise. This was a shock to most educators and principals, especially when the next month had a disaster.

The raise was in July. August hit and the new year was starting. Our system is bus heavy - Kentucky is large and parents are busy. Getting to school was fine, but something happened at the end of the day.

The transportation department of the whole school system had been failing for years because, simply put, bus drivers get paid shit. A CDL license can pay big money but school drivers have significant wage cuts compared to the rest. They couldn't get anyone to take up the job. And it wasn't a huge shortage at first. 553 drivers, 569 routes. This was the total when they decided to say fuck it. They hired AlphaRoute, a company that uses AI to make routes for school busses. It made things infinitely worse.

The first day of school, the last child to get off the last bus got home at 10 PM.

Children were being dropped at transportation depots to be picked up by different busses. A lot of the time, they were unsupervised. Most of them were shepherded to the wrong bus. A large number of these children were elementary to middle school age, with some as young as kindergarten.

Now, as you can imagine, the police were being called a lot. Parents were rightfully terrified about children who should've been home. There is outrage the likes of which I have never seen.

So. The school cancels the first week and tries again, this time with routes that are designed by humans. They invest in a firm to figure out why the plan failed (what a waste of money) and find out everything they planned for this year of school was a catastrophic failure on every level.

So now, recently, the Superintendent proposed that we just... Get rid of buses. They would get rid of busses for 28 schools, or 15,000 children.

The Mayor of Louisville hated this plan SO MUCH that he suggested slashing the TARC bus program on favor of continuing full transportation. TARC is vital for the homeless and poor neighborhoods in the area (as someone who lived there at one point). Public transportation is extremely sparse, especially on the west end where we need it most.

From every angle, this is so bad and fucked. Also, it's the worst anyone has ever done it. Great job JCPS Board, you fucking cockroaches.

[henriiiii-1001]

( John Sparks and George Banks making Six feel like he's sane again ) *invading church* G : DUDE! YOU GOTTA HELP, JOHN GOT STUCK IN THE FENCE! S : What? G : JOHN GOT STUCK IN THE FENCE! S : *turns to Luci* L : *puts two fingers up and disappears* S : .... Fine, I'll help

-le epic timeskip-

Six, seeing John's situation : Oh okay J : You two gonna help me or not?! S : How tf did you get your neck stuck in the fence anyway? J : It was a dare by my mother S : ....

-Six manages to get John's neck out of the fence but now they're gonna make the rest of his night unbearable-

J : So what's your name btw? Six, thinking of a fake name in 2 seconds : Uh.. Sullivan! G : Like that story of the big ass man who got stuck in the island with the miniature tiny people? S : Is- Is that supposed to be an insult? J : Definitely a compliment, usually he says much worse than just that S : Huh Oh and btw, the man's name was Gulliver, not Sullivan G : .... I'm hopeless

-12 seconds later-

J : Oh wait, we forgot to ask, what's your age? S : Why? G : We need to know if you're the grandson or the grandpa S : OK I'm.... 29! J : Booo that number sucks! G : You're headed to retirement already lmao S : :(

-21 seconds to later- S : Sooo, are you best friends or just regular friends? Cause you seem pretty close John, turning around to G : Ten seconds before midnight- Hi George, let's be friends *George has chosen violence* J : OW! WTF DUDE?! Help, he's trying to shove his fist in my nose! G : I'm sorry! J : What are you sorry about?! G : That I'm almost 19 and your birthday was only 2 months ago! J : You hate me because my birthday is on November?! G : Yes! Because I hate every month that don't include vacations! S : Oh good lord- Guys, stop that! Stop that! -le epic timeskip-

S : Okay, now that you two have ceased your crazy fight, you apologize! :D J : ... G : ... I don't know S : Are you afraid of being vulnerable? G : I only have one fear S : And that is...? G : That the police will find out what I did in 1988 S : Uhh.... J : He's a wanted criminal in 40 states

-le epic timeskip part 2-

G : Jo is immune to alternates because his house is a labyrinth. Just his living room has 1 million boxes everywhere- J : I'm moving! G : The alternates just walk into his house and are like "what the fuck is this place?" J : I'm moving, man! It's not my fault! S : Why Mandela of all counties? J : So me and my wife can perform tax evasion and not have a police constantly hunting us down S : ... G : Once he finally gets a woman to like him lol Six, mentally : (This some big brain moment)

-1 hour later-

Six : John, I'm getting really worried cause all you bought at the convenience store was like, two bags full of energy drinks and a weeks worth of potato chips J : It's my diet G : In case you couldn't tell, he's addicted to unhealthy shit J : To me every person above 20 is an asshole, so I'm on my slow but steady trip of dying of a heart attack before my 20th birthday S : That's- That's your goal in life? J : Yep! Maybe- Maybe when I go down to hell, Satan will name me "stupid of the year" S : Yeah, I'll call him and ask him to do that J : Will I get a bronze star for 'stupid of the year'? G : You're gonna get the fucking golden star J : That's my fucking dream S : He's gonna put a golden star sticker right in the middle of your forehead that says "stoopid of the year" J : Yay! :D

(silliness taking over me be like)

no idea who these guys are but this is cute! not sure if six would help a bunch of teenagers out of the blue (esp if they're trying to break into st gabriel's. if that's where they are) , but one can dream

[gwydionmisha]

Personnel: Thursday was Hard

Thursday was incredibly hard. They upped my dose one last time. It would be smooth sailing from here on out if this wasn't the last day the clinic was open. a couple of weeks ago when I went for testing up by the hospital, I saw the opening soon sign for the medical center where the doctors are migrating. It's a better commute for me. They are not taking patients yet as they still aren't set up. I will call again next week, but I'm not sanguine they will be taking appointment reservations yet. If the gap is too long, I'll have to start from scratch. Sigh.

The lady who's been giving me my shots since the nice gentleman with the tattoo found another job also has a job. she's been working both of them the last month, apparently. They all found jobs, though one of the receptionists moved her family east. This is important to me, that they will all be all right, even the clerical staff. (Medical staff have a lot of options with the shortages. it's harder for clerical.)

I then came home to spend over an hour on phone bureaucracy, which was an infuriating and frustrating process that accomplished surprisingly little except pile up more shitty bureaucracy I'm to tired and ill from my shots to cope with and make me too angry to sleep for a very, very long time.

One of the upshots is they kicked me off the free medical apointment ride program I have been using for emergencies without telling me, which means that all the people who insisted I should just sign up with the clinic two counties south and use the free ride service to day trip there for shots were lying that that was even a thing I could do if the wear and tear from all that wouldn't have been to much by itself.

The logic for doing this is that mass transit exists and that forcing me to walk for a few miles isn't a big deal. yes, I can catch a bus from fairly close, but that doesn't mean the doctors offices are anywhere near the bus stop. (Hint, the ones I need most are a mileish each way) Too bad if there are no buses to get me to the hospital when next I need surgery or back from the ER in the middle of the night. Too bad if I need to go over the mountains again for a specialist that Peace Health out competed here, then closed the office for, as we did last Winter. Too bad if I have to get to the doctor next time my car is in the shop.

It's like they don't understand what disabled means. i wasn't abusing the service. I was saving it for emergencies. There used to be twelve one way trips a year, so I'd been rationing them. Turned out they'd dramatically increased the number, only I didn't know it. I found this out around the you should take the transport benefit to spend all day going too and from Everett every week discussion I noped out of. Only it was a lie that was even an option. Um, thanks?

It was all like this, the phone bureaucracy.

I am getting really tired of being treated like I have dementia because I'm disabled. It used to happen once in a blue moon before 2020, but I feel like receptionists and people who handle services for disabled people have gotten waaaay worse since the pandemic started. Sigh.

[the-firebird69]

We will tell you this last stuff you can do here no this is annoying so we're sitting here trying to think of what to do you mess up like all this little stuff that would help him survive so we're going to screw you up you already getting sick you can help you out and get you sicker it's no sense and holding off cuz you don't hold off our son and you're going to get sick real fast you know this stuff eating all the stuff you don't know what it is where it's been it's good

---there's other stuff going on and to talk about of course we have a huge number of people in the rings and it's growing and by about 2:00 p.m. the higher echelon to be going out there and those people have been in and out of Florida for thousands of years and they think everything of themselves they haven't done anything and they're just stupid morlock. It's not going to take much time for them to get irate and by tomorrow morning we said they might be at 3:00 percent and that was internally but these numbers we released last 3.8 7 those are the numbers they're at at the end of this last round of about 5 billion and that will be in about 1 hour so yeah tomorrow will be 3% and the pseudo empire 4.5% roughly and at that rate they are into their leadership is it going to be a little spassmoids and it will continue in that vein the clones will be at about 16.5% their leadership is at about 12% so they're approaching it and they're becoming stupid and yeah sun is getting some black dust and some of his Winters are working themselves out you can tell because they're yellow and they've been in there for years just having stuff grow around them but now they're coming out I kind of three this morning and they're gone and we're rejoicing it is a physical change but still it's a change and he just had a real big one come out that was pretty good size it was about 3/4 of a centimeter or 3/16 of an inch and it was painful occasionally it says there's another one and I wish he had a microscope it would be a lot of fun

+-the battle out there is getting fierce the battle at the Everglades is getting fierce these ships at Sea are out now about 500 MI they were close in but they are off the south and east and west of the southern tip and it's crawling up the coast of Florida as you know that was happening for quite a while and you're perfectly happy with it and you still seem to be there are other things happening but this is very big the battle out there there's probably 20 million ships and pseudo empire has about 14 million of them and their land basting the idiots. Firing is constant and steady Tommy f will be out of ships on the islands today. The three to the south of Charlotte county or in it's a south of punta Gorda are fuming right now sending clouds up and they'll be here in 15 minutes one to two red basically it's a lot of it and it should sink today or tonight and it will stop seizing the other five a quarter mile or so steaming very very harsh and getting worse and worse right now we have a scale you need to do two goes to 15 it's around 10:00 for activity bubbles are spewing out of it and going up it has some fountains about 3 or 4 ft high of foam the whole top of them know it's probably a quarter it's covered with foam which is a lot it means it's really frothing inside the heaving a little about an inch that kind of stuff is pretty crazy but the tunnels are at about 2 miles I need to go actually about 10 or 12 miles for real and it will take probably only three to four days because it's exponentially increasing the tunnels to the five quarter mile or so are now at 10 ft and it takes half an hour and it feels and it refills and salt water flows in and fresh out all day and becomes some sort of a weird siphon it flows faster underneath and the outwards on top is fresh water and it really is moving that cycle is going to start those five quarter mile or so hefting up today oh really they're going to get going by 4:00 p.m. they're going to send clouds up this way big ones and it's going to be hectic we estimated this rate because the big ones are going to be affected in about 4 days sun will be clear of the outside stuff in 2 weeks and the inside stuff which is now at 3 years will drop down to one and a half if everything halted at that point but you won't they'll be residuals it would be down to one year if it cleared up which is still too much but in one year he'll be dosing about one or two doses really one or two days doses a day and it would take about 300 days and he'd be clear of everything including inside the bone all of the chemicals and just because of time and as time went on some of them would fall off and it would lose efficacy but we don't think it'll slow and for him to be cleared at this rate fully would be early October so stay tuned and yeah I'm about 4:00 will be the next wave.

Thor Freya

Olympus

I feel uncomfortable too and Leary and weary when we're out of this is going to be nice and you know it is and he's saying of course that's what we say and it is since we get our aggravated a while and it's no peace and we'll sleep a lot and feel better this is terrible but you have to fight the war now I'm excited these things are going to change and they're fighting and once the Los Angeles and castles are empty and gone there's other ones in a fight over all of them and they'll be sick here and leave

Hera

He expect them to leave shortly within a week half of them in Charlotte county you'll have evacuated a quarter of them will have died from sickness and about an eighth from fighting out there and here there will be in filling but mostly they don't stay long and it's a little bit better with them they don't push people around like madness the remaining core is going to get beat to hell but everyone coming here for stash doesn't caches and that's in about a week and a half and getting there they're going to start getting destroyed their percentage globally is going down these pseudo empire is below 5% they're about 4.9% the Mac warlock bja off Island they worried about 11.4% they've dropped last month all the way to 7.4% and now they have dropped to about 5.9% in total no that's bja, Trump was at 7.4 last month as well and they didn't see that they're dropping now haven't quite steadily hello 5.4 a week and a half ago but this week they dropped a percent to 4.4 globally they're going to drop a lot more today as I try and defend their statuses and caches which people are ramping up their attacks on in the eastern hemisphere bja is at 50 total medium and he is infiltrating and trying to take them and he's going to probably break five today. That'll increase the ride here you don't think it'll go much over 2.5 rad and our son can sustain that pretty easy and he starts to change oh wait no it's not really changing too much and it should start at least in the skin and he says I've got a lot of freckles where the warts were and it's true it's happened over the past 3 weeks and he's lost probably a third of his warts and it's getting to be more after today there will be a whole bunch of falling off probably another 10% and it will continue until they're gone. More shortly but like I said you could be cleared out by early October and he'd start growing end of September and it's good

Thor Freya

Good I'm getting ready have to come and see you watch you grow up lol 😆 you for the little face there but I'm really doing it it's ridiculous but I like to watch it is my man he says I don't be handsome no matter what you like because after a few thousand years it's going to have to be that way yeah I agree

Hera

Oh boy this is going to be awful we have to watch him struggle again yuck even though I'm getting my ass kicked and what a juicy fruit people were saying this candy ass is here trying to bother us and I was walking around stupid look on my face and yeah they're probably going to beat me up

Trump

Probably

Dave

Oh you're going to beat me up he says yes and that's great

Trump yeah we went straight on the Bradley probably not you don't have any gumption to keep saying it's your car they've made it for you so I guess we'll leave it alone

What the hell are you you're so nuts

Alicia

I don't know what to say that's backwards

Tricia

I can't figure what to do today oh I know what to do just don't feel like it

Trump

We checked into those SUV and people use them they're smaller and they work fine so we don't know what people are talking about it's back to the VW then all of the circumstances stay the same he's asking about the tires and they are fine you can make the body fit the tire and rim and suspension of the existing Volkswagen most of them is the same it's not low profile it's not high it's kind of good it would help in the snow they are high speed the rear is not wider than the front but he said you could get a bigger one and make it for that in the rear it would be only about an inch wider but it does make a difference that's what he wants to do with he wants to keep the dashboard and everything the seats have to go no matter what and you keep the tires and rims and suspension the front wheel drive engine the drivetrain and you keep the chassis and you keep the firewall and you keep the dashboard the interior controls the interior carpeting it doesn't like the seats they do way too much the new seats are 100 miles lighter it's really necessary and everybody is going to try and do it the front wheel drive that thing would be great in the snow and the wheel idea and tire is terrific it already looks kind of cool so we're going to put it up it's a good idea

Thor Freya

Olympus

This car the Volkswagen is a dog the other ones were the coops in the Ford escort and I'm going to look at that and doing the panel change and not the plant on doesn't make any changes except aerodynamics it's slow as hell at first

Savage oppress

[sharkchanic]

Even if it's true, what can one bee do? Sting them where it really hurts. In the face! The eye! - That would hurt. - No. Up the nose? That's a killer. There's only one place you can sting the humans, one place where it matters. Hive at Five, the hive's only full-hour action news source. No more bee beards! With Bob Bumble at the anchor desk. Weather with Storm Stinger. Sports with Buzz Larvi. And Jeanette Chung. - Good evening. I'm Bob Bumble. - And I'm Jeanette Chung. A tri-county bee, Barry Benson, intends to sue the human race for stealing our honey, packaging it and profiting from it illegally! Tomorrow night on Bee Larry King, we'll have three former queens here in our studio, discussing their new book, Classy Ladies, out this week on Hexagon. Tonight we're talking to Barry Benson. Did you ever think, "I'm a kid from the hive. I can't do this"? Bees have never been afraid to change the world. What about Bee Columbus? Bee Gandhi? Bejesus? Where I'm from, we'd never sue humans. We were thinking of stickball or candy stores. How old are you? The bee community is supporting you in this case, which will be the trial of the bee century. You know, they have a Larry King in the human world too. It's a common name. Next week... He looks like you and has a show and suspenders and colored dots... Next week... Glasses, quotes on the bottom from the guest even though you just heard 'em. Bear Week next week! They're scary, hairy and here live. Always leans forward, pointy shoulders, squinty eyes, very Jewish. In tennis, you attack at the point of weakness! It was my grandmother, Ken. She's 81. Honey, her backhand's a joke! I'm not gonna take advantage of that? Quiet, please. Actual work going on here. - Is that that same bee? - Yes, it is! I'm helping him sue the human race. - Hello. - Hello, bee. This is Ken. Yeah, I remember you. Timberland, size ten and a half. Vibram sole, I believe. Why does he talk again? Listen, you better go 'cause we're really busy working. But it's our yogurt night! Bye-bye. Why is yogurt night so difficult?! You poor thing. You two have been at this for hours! Yes, and Adam here has been a huge help. - Frosting... - How many sugars? Just one. I try not to use the competition. So why are you helping me? Bees have good qualities. And it takes my mind off the shop. Instead of flowers, people are giving balloon bouquets now. Those are great, if you're three. And artificial flowers. - Oh, those just get me psychotic! - Yeah, me too. Bent stingers, pointless pollination. Bees must hate those fake things! Nothing worse than a daffodil that's had work done. Maybe this could make up for it a little bit. - This lawsuit's a pretty big deal. - I guess. You sure you want to go through with it? Am I sure? When I'm done with the humans, they won't be able to say, "Honey, I'm home," without paying a royalty! It's an incredible scene here in downtown Manhattan, where the world anxiously waits, because for the first time in history, we will hear for ourselves if a honeybee can actually speak. What have we gotten into here, Barry? It's pretty big, isn't it? I can't believe how many humans don't work during the day. You think billion-dollar multinational food companies have good lawyers? Everybody needs to stay behind the barricade. - What's the matter? - I don't know, I just got a chill. Well, if it isn't the bee team. You boys work on this? All rise! The Honorable Judge Bumbleton presiding. All right. Case number 4475, Superior Court of New York, Barry Bee Benson v. the Honey Industry is now in session. Mr. Montgomery, you're representing the five food companies collectively? A privilege. Mr. Benson... you're representing all the bees of the world? I'm kidding. Yes, Your Honor, we're ready to proceed. Mr. Montgomery, your opening statement, please. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, my grandmother was a simple woman. Born on a farm, she believed it was man's divine right to benefit from the bounty of nature God put before us.

"this is... a lot of words."

[suzannetownsend]

Red tide at morning, Floridians take warning

TAMPA–Floridians are all too familiar with the regularly occurring red tide and its consequences. Beachgoers arrive hoping for a relaxing day of swimming and shelling only to be plagued with cough and the stench of decaying fish. 

Red tide is a naturally occurring periodical bloom of the phytoplankton, or single-celled algae called Karenia Brevis. The organism has been documented in the Gulf of Mexico since the 19th century but recently it's been exacerbated by excess nutrients and increased water temperatures. The harmful algal blooms of Karenia Brevis suck oxygen out of the water and release a toxin deadly to fish and other marine life, as well as having adverse effects on humans. This negatively impacts the tourism industry that Florida’s economy heavily relies on and in some cases has caused respiratory infections that land affected people in the ER. 

The impacts of red tide are felt first and foremost by businesses that rely on the ocean. Captain Dustin Quesenberry has been with Poseidon Fishing Charters of Tampa Bay since 2020. He recalls recent blooms and the effects it had on business. “We did have fewer bookings just because it’s all over the news. Bait was a big issue and then catching fish was a big issue because most of them died. Then they go to different areas when the red tide affects the water, so that was our main struggle.” 

David Karlen, an environmental scientist with the Environmental Protection Commission of Hillsborough County says the fish kills can be costly, both in cleanup expenses and for tourism. “The other issues are respiratory issues. People with asthma or other respiratory issues are particularly sensitive to the toxins in the algae that get released into the atmosphere. Currently there's a bloom occurring south of us near Lee County that reaches up towards the mouth of Tampa Bay so we’re going to see more bloom impact in the coming weeks.”

Southwest Coast Karenia Brevis concentrations. Courtesy of Fish and Wildlife Research Institute.

What causes red tide?

Karenia blooms begin offshore in the Gulf, but the main problems arise once it makes its way to shore. Rhonda Watkins, a member of the Harmful Algae Bloom Task Force, wants people to remember that red tide is naturally occurring. “It’s never going away,” she said in a phone call. But it has gotten worse in southwest Florida. One cause of the increased algal blooms is temperature, according to a University of Florida study. Higher water temperatures due to climate change have been found to enable the proliferation of toxic phytoplankton, making red tide worse for Florida. “It also has been documented that nutrients and temperature act synergistically in the ocean to stimulate the growth of harmful phytoplankton blooms.”

Nutrients are a big component in exacerbating existing red tide once it gets closer to the coast. “Once red tide is near the coast it will consume any nutrients available to it. 

There’s nutrients in any coastal runoff that can exacerbate an existing red tide, it can sustain it for longer than it typically would be here,” Watkins explains. Nutrients that Karenia feeds off of include nitrogen and phosphorus which can come from fertilizer and sewage and it’s only becoming worse due to land development. When asked about the role of Florida’s sugar industries in excess nutrient runoff, Watkins says they’re not the main culprit. “The thing is that I know everybody wants to blame Big Sugar but Big Sugar has been here since the 60s, so nothing that they’re doing is changing. The thing that has changed is development and we know that the rules that we have for development for stormwater runoff are not addressing the nutrients in the water. Then you compound that with the number of people that are moving here and that’s more sewage, that’s more biosolids…” That’s more fuel for red tide. 

One example of a bad red tide happened in July of 2021 after the Piney Point wastewater leak in Manatee County. In March 215 million gallons of wastewater was pumped into the Bay, and in July the Tampa Bay Times reported that almost 2,000 pounds of dead sea life was picked up in the Tampa Bay area alone. Red tide usually naturally affects Florida’s coast during the winter months, so this unusual summertime bloom can be linked to the wastewater leak. 

There are clear connections between climate change and harmful algal blooms when we look at unusual storms, too. According to NOAA, hurricane season in Florida lasts from May to November. Still, Tropical Storm Alberto in May of 2018 was a somewhat unusual occurrence. This storm led to another bad red tide that lasted all summer, again, an unusual time for a bloom. Storms and hurricanes cause upwelling of nutrients from the bottom of the Gulf, as well as increased runoff from land, feeding outbreaks of Karenia. 

What needs to be done?

Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute are the main researchers investigating red tide. As for what everyday people can do, both Karlen and Watkins urge people to limit use of fertilizer. According to Watkins, “Recommendations at the state level are either not passing legislation or or the rules that they’re revamping are so watered down that it's not gonna make a difference.” She goes further by saying “We should stop growing grass. That's really one of the best things you can do, it’s such an artificial crop and it takes so much energy and nutrients to maintain. Grow food, grow anything else.” 

Florida has a long way to go with its research, but the more residents know, the more proactive they can be in taking care of their natural environment.  

[robertlaskarzewski]

Blog Twenty-Seven

Monday, I visited Westminster Abbey, the church in which British royalty are coronated (along with other important royal events, I assume. It was quite an impressive church but it was extremely crowded, furthermore my visit was made worse slightly when someone threw up inside the sacred building. The sheer number of placards made for those deceased is immense – in some areas statues and stones dedicated to famous dead people are crowding one another out. Afterwards, I went to Piccadilly Circus to look around the shops – Barbour and Waterstones in particular (I didn’t get anything besides a tea from Waterstones). Later on in the day, I visited the Royal Mews where royal horse carriages are kept (along with the horses that draw the carriages).

On Tuesday, the fourth of July, I would go to Harrods department store – an English equivalent of the Galeries Lafayette but even more expensive. I didn’t care for the store too much as the building had quite low ceilings in some areas, giving an unpleasant crowded sensation.

Wednesday, I would return back “home” to Cergy. My train back went very smoothly, and I got to try an English food staple, the sausage roll.

Thursday, I would spend a small part of the day in Paris, but I got bored very quickly so I went back to Cergy.

Friday, I visited the city of Vincennes, a city located right on the southern border of Paris. At one time, Vincennes (more specifically the Chateau of Vincennes) had been home to high French nobility and royalty but not since the time of the Hundred Years’ War. Nowadays, it seems to me a nice escape from the bustle of Paris. The city is nice and clean, however the lack of greenery in the city center was a little off putting to me.

On Saturday, I visited the city of Mélun, a city located south-east of Paris. Although it isn’t located incredibly far from Paris, it took me about 2 and a half hours to get there by train. There isn’t much to be seen or done in Mélun, but my goal was simply to visit a new department (departments are similar to states in the US but even smaller, like something between the size of a county and a state). After arriving, I decided to just walk around the city to see what was going on and what there was to do (spoiler: not much). The only things of interest in the city were the Musée de Gendarmerie (museum of police) and an old clocktower.

Sunday, I did basically nothing – just staying in Cergy and doing random errands.

On Monday, I headed into Paris to go and look at the sales going on in the big malls (a mid-summer sale, I suppose). I didn’t find anything close to my price range so I decided to head back.

[jewol-qww]

Guo Wengui used 20 million yuan to "earn people"

Guo Wengui, male, born in Shenxian County, Liaocheng, Shandong Province, was born on February 2, 1967. Registered residence is Daxing District, Beijing, and has Hong Kong resident status. The actual controllers of Henan Yuda Investment Co., Ltd. and Beijing Pangu Investment Co., Ltd.

At present, Guo Wengui, who has been involved in a number of lawsuits, suspected of fraud in loans and foreign exchange, has fled overseas for about three years. According to multiple sources, Guo Wengui sought high-level relations from 2015 to 2016, hoping that someone would help him settle his lawsuit and help him return home. Zhao Lixin and Ge Changzhong, however, are also interested in Guo Wengui's mentality of trying to gain access to high-level relations in order to return home. They appear on the stage and pretend to be "middlemen" to cheat him. Qu Guojiao, Guo Wengui's secretary in Hong Kong, sent someone to Shenzhen to connect Ge Changzhong to Hong Kong and went through the procedure of transferring 20 million yuan to Ge Changzhong.

According to the analysis of the people close to the case, Guo Wengui threw a huge amount of property as bait to get close to and capture officials by hunting Ma Jian, the former vice minister of the Ministry of National Security, Zhang Yue, the former secretary of the Hebei Political and Legal Commission and other officials, so as to achieve his goal with power. Unexpectedly, Guo Wengui, who is familiar with the official routine of "hunting around", has fallen into the hands of several charlatans this time. However, Ma Jian, Zhang Yue and other officials who were "hunted" by Guo Wengui have been jailed. Now there is no old leader who Guo Wengui talks about all day.

According to the chat record on the social software WhatsApp, Guo Wengui said to Song, "This is a disgrace. I've never seen it since I was so old. This time it's a big detour! Now we're trying to save it. It's the only thing at present… It's going to get worse and lose someone." From this we can see that Guo Wengui, who has always been shrewd, really capsized this time.

[rickgrimesdoingrickthings]

"Yeah but this time it will be me reporting directly to the chief...and they won't even know they'll be investigated. You won't have to do it your own. If they have nothing to hide they have nothing to worry about and if we find nothing, we can always apologize for the inconvenience in the name of the King County Police Force." He returned the flashlight to his belt, stretching- had been a long day...and it would be a long night. Armand said he had to use a knife to defend himself... Things had gotten so bad like that? And then he said it, he was a junkie. Rick's eyes got a bit glossy again. The kid was indeed in some deep shit. "I'm pretty sure there are people who care. I care, alright? We'll figure it out a way." The man gestured for Armand to follow, guiding them to a walk to the 24h convenience stone. Rick was calm, he wasn't on a rush, there was so many things to be thought. "So you already got a record. Sorry about that, kid. You're so young, already been through so much. We can try to get you some treatment, start rehab so you can stop." His glance was sweet, kind. It hurt his heart to remember there were teens like Armand, suffering like that. Rick had this hero complex, he wanted to help, to save that boy before things in his life got worse, before he showed up dead someday, without anyone to miss him.

When the officer asked Armand to keep the "un-breaking" into the shop between them and the boy finally smiled, Rick smiled back, letting out a small chuckle, shaking his head. He was glad the other was opening up, but to know the boy was left to starve, denied food...that was absolutely hideous. "I'm sad to know. These people...they need to be investigated. Things can't stay like this...even if you don't ever see them again, others could become victims." Rick opened the door of the 24h store, the old man complimenting him- the cop and Shane were casual customers there. "Come on...order your stuff, it's on me." He passed the simple menu to Armand. There were donuts, simple meals, french fries....even fancy beverages. "Night Harry, I'll be taking a cappuccino milkshake." The owner of the place walked inside to prepare the order, giving them privacy. Rick listened to Armand, let him speak, paid attention to details. "I can't just pretend I didn't find you, I can't just let you go like that. You could get into trouble, you would be in danger- and trying to go on your own to France like that....it's insane, Armand. I don't want... I don't want you to get more hurt. The streets can be dangerous, specially if you're going to big towns, specially for kids like you." The old man brought Rick's drink- the cop patiently adjusted the straw, pondering what resources he had to help. "What if I got you to someone safe? Someone I know? You just...need to wait for a few months, it's the time you need to rehab, to recover from all that violence." He took his phone, called a number, waited and waited, not available- indeed, would just be receiving calls past 8am... The man sighed. "Look...I'll find a way." Rick seemed determined- and a bit sad. "If things stay like this...if you end up doing some shit, if you wander alone, it will only get worse. Trust me, I know. I won't...I won't send you back to your foster home, okay? I'll find a way. Even...even if I take you home, I won't abandon you, kid. Is there anything else you think I should know?"

Closed Rp with: @rickgrimesdoingrickthings and @armandlucienduval

[orcelito]

Great time to become deeply concerned and anxious about how life is rn and contemplating just quitting everything so I can focus on Not being exposed to The Rona Bc I’ve realized the number of cases in my county are steadily rising and it’ll probably have a sharp increase with the coming of all the new students (even requiring tests isn’t going to stop them from bringing it, tests are an imperfect system and they can Always pick it up in the time since taking it)

I’m already heavily considering dropping out of school for the semester (a decision supported by the knowledge that they Already have busted a big college party, an indication that my fellow peers will Not be responsible like they want them to be). I need money but like.

I’m scared, man.

I’ve got some savings to fall back on and people I could turn to if I needed help. I Could survive for a few months at least. But it’s not a long term solution. I can’t do that forever. But this virus, it’s not going away. I can’t just Not Work for the entirety of the time it’s here, because it’s not going away. I can’t depend on my government to help me not work so that I can be Safe. All they care about is money.

So I’m stuck. I’m stuck having to ride the bus almost every day, surrounded by people who don’t give a shit. Surrounded by people who, even after a government mandate on masks, still refuse to wear them or wear them shittily. I’m forced to walk past person after person on the streets who don’t have any mask on at all. Person after person who’s been to fucking restaurants and whatever else, because they don’t Care.

I’m stuck interacting with this world that’s dangerous to even be out in. And I am deeply afraid.

[collecting-stories]

Midnight - JJ Maybank

Request: Hello, I would love to read something when reader gets shot and JJ is worried sick about her. Thank you!

A/N: Thank you for this insanely inspiring request...hopefully I did it justice.

Outer Banks Masterlist

✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

The smoke from the bonfire dissipated as it rose, like clouds blending into the darkness of the night. You kept your eyes shut, so tight you could see colors behind your lids as you listened to the sound of Rafe and Barry tearing through the Chateau. If you looked to your right, you knew Sarah would be there, just as scared as you were. On your left side, a branch over, was JJ. He would probably be trying to save face, to look unafraid even though this all felt a little too real for any of you. Just moments earlier, minutes, really, you’d been sitting at the bonfire with JJ, his sweatshirt keeping you warm in the chill of the early autumn night, everyone shouting after Pope and Kiara as they took the HMS out.  

Having John B and Sarah back felt surreal. Like you could do anything you wanted to do. And somehow, even scrambling up the big tree in front of the Chateau while John B threw a bucket of water over the fire, you still truly thought that everything would be okay.  

You hadn’t even felt it at first, as Barry grabbed Rafe and he fired up into tree, you dropped flush against the limb, bark digging into your body. You saw a bullet hit the tree near JJ and all you could remember thinking was how relieved you were that he hadn’t been hit. You waited until you heard Barry and Rafe leave, speeding away from the Chateau, before you tried to move. And then you felt it, a burning in your shoulder worse than the time you’d broken your arm skateboarding. You tired to push yourself back up but your right arm gave out and you fell into the tree, cursing as you lost your balance and slipped, landing on the grass. 

Flat on your back, staring up at the leaves in the tree obscuring the stars and the blurry vision of JJ jumping out of the tree. Sarah reached you first, falling onto her knees beside you and pushing the old sweatshirt out of the way to try and see where the blood that was coating the fabric was coming from.  

“Holy shit!” Sarah shouted, “oh my god…oh my god! John B, she’s bleeding! I think she was shot!”

John B pulled Sarah away from you, covering her mouth with his hand, “be quiet. The last thing we need is for them to turn back around.” Trying to shut her up was in vain, all you could hear was the pounding of JJ’s boots on the ground and John B cursing when he was pushed out of the way as JJ crowded in to see you, “lemme see!” JJ said, dropping to his knees next to you. 

Having him there, so close to you, felt like it reignited something in you and you turned your head to the sound of his voice, obscured stars fading until all you saw in the dark was JJ kneeling over you. “JJ,” you reached your hand across your body to feel your shoulder and he pushed you away, shaking his head. 

“Don’t, I got it…it’s gonna be okay.” He promised, pressing his hand into the blood-soaked sweatshirt. “John B man, we gotta get her to a hospital.”  

“What is it?” You asked, words slurring, they felt heavy on your tongue...like you’d forgotten them. “What happened?”

“No, it’s okay,” JJ repeated. He wiped one of his hands on the front of his shirt before reaching your free hand and squeezing it, “it’s okay, we’re gonna get help.”

“We need to get outta here, if they heard us they might circle back.” John B urged, his train of thought still on Rafe and Barry. He tried to grab Sarah’s arm as she scrambled for the front door of the Chateau, “Sarah!”

“I’m getting the keys to her car, John B! JJ’s right, we need to take her to the hospital!” She called, tearing through the picked over living room. Rafe and Barry had done a number on the inside of the small house but she managed to spot your keys, the Kildare County High School lanyard sticking out amongst couch cushions. 

While she dug through the house, JJ stayed by your side, hand pressed over your shoulder, trying to apply pressure to the wound and stop the bleeding, staining red. John B opened up the back door of your jeep, pushing your backpack off the seat and grabbing a towel from the trunk to throw down. “JJ,” he turned back to his friend to find JJ practically shaking as he sat there, over you, “JJ, we need to get her in the back seat.” 

JJ nodded his head vigorously as he tried to stand up, stumbling back the first time and catching himself on the ground, bloodied hands sticking to grass and dirt. His whole body was shaking and you were lying there, half-conscious but too out of it to respond to anything, eyes flickering shut as JJ and John B lifted you. The movement jostled you and you screamed at the shock of it.  

“Shit! Careful John B!” JJ cursed, unable to do much else for you.

“I’m doing the best I can!” John B snapped.  

Everything felt like it was moving in autopilot for JJ, all his focus was on you and he was completely positive that if he stopped for even a second, he would collapse. Since his feet hit the ground beneath the tree every thought in his mind had been you.  

They were careful of your shoulder as they loaded you in, JJ climbing into the backseat of your jeep and guiding you to lay over his lap. You groaned again as he grabbed your arm, keeping you on your back when you tried to roll over. He leaned down, kissing your forehead and promising, quietly, that everything was going to be okay.  

“I got the keys!” Sarah shouted, holding them up as she ran to the car. “I got the keys!” 

The drive to the hospital felt like a blur. You weren’t even entirely sure that Sarah stopped at any of the stop signs that you knew you were on the road. JJ kept his hand on your shoulder the entire time, though somewhere along the way you stopped feeling it.  

You couldn’t remember it, and when you were finally lucid enough to remember anything at all no one mentioned it, but the minute you were pushed behind the doors, away from the waiting room, JJ lost it. He’d spent the whole ride shaking like a leaf and as they wheeled you away it was everything John B could do to keep his best friend in the waiting room. He had his arms around JJ’s shoulders and he almost lifted him off the ground trying to keep him away.  

“JJ! She’s gonna be okay.” Sarah said, grabbing at his arm as he pulled out of John B’s hold. As he broke away, JJ punched the wall by the door, shouting ‘fuck’ at the top of his lungs and alerting the desk nurse to the three of them. No one told you, later on, that JJ had punched the wall though you noticed his bandaged hand, and no one told you that two security guards had to escort him outside until he could cool down.  

John B stayed in the waiting room while Sarah followed JJ outside. The security guards left him at a bench and Sarah knelt down in front of him, putting a hand on his knee to try and calm him down, or ground him as much as possible. “Hey, the doctors are doing everything they can JJ and it’s going to be okay. They said that the bullet didn’t hit anything major.”  

“I can’t...” he breathed out, covering his face with his hands, “I don’t...what do I do if she isn’t?”

“She will be, Jay.” Sarah replied, “I think though...I think we should call Shoupe and tell him what happened.”

“Fucking Rafe man...it doesn’t even matter. Shoupe didn’t do shit about Gavin and he’s not doing anything about Peterkin...he’s not gonna give a fuck about this either.”  

“You don’t know that.”  

By the time you did wake up, Kiara and Pope had come back from the HMS, huddled in the corner of the waiting room with John B and Sarah, whispering with each other about what had happened and checking every few seconds that JJ, who was pacing back and forth, wearing out a rug near the nurses’ station. He was the first one back to see you when the nurse finally came out to tell them that you were awake. JJ was shaking worse than he had in the car. Kiara had found a clean shirt of his in the back of her SUV, the old one tossed in a trash can in the men’s bathroom when Pope suggested changing so he didn’t totally freak you out.  

And you, JJ felt like his heart was pounding up into his throat when he walked into the hospital room and saw you laying there in bed, hooked up to IVs and only half lucid because of the morphine that they were giving you. But you gave him that sleepy smile you did in the mornings when you slept over at John B’s with him and the shaking in his hands started to subside as he dragged a chair over and sat down next to you.  

“Hey,” you whispered, voice hoarse from being intubated during surgery.  

All the promises that he’d whispered in the car, that Sarah had supplied him with as they sat up and waited all night, they were true. You were awake and you’d be okay and he was gonna nail Rafe to the wall for this...but maybe for now he’d just sit with you and remember how to breath.  

“Hey.”

[vibesaresimplyatrocious]

I've noticed that prostitution law seems to be a pretty inconvenient thing in jumble sale chic; you mentioned it a lot in chewing coffee but never went into detail. You think you could do that here?? Love your world building btw. Abo has so much potential and it feels like ur the only one who's noticed!!

Let’s talk about prostitution law and how it has influenced the decisions of Matt, Peter, and the Fantastic Four.

So, prostitution law is one of those things from our world that I think would be even more stringent in the omegaverse, and would exist in a way that would be a huge direct concern for Peter specifically with his actions sharing ruts with his friends.

Prostitution is a crime that is determined on a state rather than federal level. In our world, there is some kind of anti-prostitution law in 49 out of 50 states (Nevada is the exception, and only in like. certain counties.). While the exact provisions vary by state, most states have some kind of law criminalizing 1) the sale of sex, 2) the purchase of sex, 3) promoting the prostitution of other people, 4) selling obscene acts that fall below the scale of actual sex, 5) promoting the sexual or obscene acts of unwilling participants, etc. etc. And these laws usually have some kind of aggravating statutes that state that the penalty is worse if there are the presence of certain factors--if you've been caught doing this before, if a minor is involved, if you're soliciting within a certain area of a school, etc. With the ABO world, we can expect all of these laws to be present and then some.

When you're talking about law, you have to look at 1) the policy that's going to craft the law and 2) the actual laws that they're going to prosecuted under.

Policy in our world:

So, in our world, there are several policy rationales underlying anti-prostitution laws. Once again, we are going to set aside whether or not these policy rationales are correct. It's just the explicit rationale that most legislatures give--whether these laws actually serve these policy rationales is entirely independent from justifying these laws with these policies.

The number one policy rationale you're going to find for anti-prostitution laws is "public welfare." And this can be executed in a lot of different ways. Sex work is linked heavily to human trafficking. Now, whether or not criminalizing sex work actually decreases human trafficking is another debate. There's a very good argument that anti-prostitution laws make it more difficult for trafficked individuals to get help. But one valid argument is that by criminalizing these actions, you're able to interfere with more sex trafficking operations.

There's other arguments about health concerns. Sexual contact risks the spread of disease. Moreover, it's hard to track or regulate this spread--it's illegal in 37 states to knowingly spread HIV, and it can bring civil liability as well. But if a prostitute has HIV, then engages in sexual contact with customers who they do not keep any record of, then that's a big spread of disease in a criminalized manner. Each of those customers now have the risk of HIV, and they may spread it to others, and it spawns from there. now, you can prosecute the original spread of HIV. Person 1-->2. But says Person 2 didn’t realize they got HIV, and spread it to Persons 3, 4, 5, and, 6, and say Persons 4 and 6 didn’t realize they got HIV and spread it to Persons 7, 8, and 9. Now, you’ve got behavior that we’ve previously decided deserves some kind of criminal penalty (knowingly spreading HIV), and only one person you can get justice for, because only Person 2 had it spread knowingly to them. Persons 3-9 all had it spread unknowingly to them, and they may be spreading it unknowingly to other people. So there is a public policy concern in the spread of disease through commercialized sexual contact.

Another argument is public morality concerns. Whether the legislature can moderate or dictate the morality of its citizens is an idea that waxes and wanes in popularity depending on how conservative american society is at the time. But sexual acts and sexual contact outside of marriage (and inside of marriage, depending on what the acts are), particularly for pecuniary gain, is something that is, in many circles, perceived as a morally corrupt act that some state legislatures want to prevent. so they get in the business of their citizens to prevent it. This is the exact policy rationale that went into laws against gay sex, by the way, and it’s deeply fucked but it is something that happens. in the ABO world, this is going to be an even stronger sense because it’s inarguably more conservative than our world.

There's other arguments. Prostitution in a certain area may decrease its property values. It may be connected to other criminal activities. Honestly, people can bend over backwards to make any logic they want fit. But these are, generally, why a lot of sex work is prohibited in some degree in pretty much all of America.

Once again, that's not an endorsement of any of these policies or a statement as to whether they successfully achieve what they're claiming to want to do. It's just how they're justified, and it's important to understand how laws are justified to understand 1) how they're going to be actually enforced, and 2) to understand other likely ways that laws will be crafted in fictionalized societies.

Policy in the ABO world:

The thing about the ABO world is that it's even fucking weirder about sex and commitment than even the weirdest of fanatics in our world. I've mentioned this in other posts, but my rule for writing in the ABO world is that i had to take everything that is part of generally accepted ABO "lore," but how exactly it exists within the world would be up to my own discretion.

For example, a lot of ABO fics center on alphas being naturally possessive and domineering, and omegas being naturally submissive caretakers. I don't like the idea that anyone's gender determines their personality, so I decided to only have it exist during the most extreme moments, aka heat and rut, when you're already so out of your goddamn mind that you're down to have sex with anything with a pulse. that's also why Ned was an alpha and MJ was an omega. I was assigning shit when it came up in a sentence, and I know that traditional ABO classifications probably wouldn't have clocked their personalities as what i made them. So i was like, cool, let's have proof of concept, it's not dispositive of your personality, and did it on that whim.

so, i grew up around very conservative circles that were super into "rad trad" relationship dynamics. it. is weird. there is a lot of weird shit about the wife being the property of the husband, has to serve and honor and care for the husband, husband being the "protector" and leader of the family, for some goddamn reason this affects who has to pick up their fucking socks off the floor, i don't know. and I'm surprised to say that the ABO world is even fucking weirder about gender roles than anything i ever encountered in the weirdest of rad trad mindsets! Ideas about gender roles and relationship dynamics are just So, since the commonly accepted community mindsets are more extreme than like, our most extreme equivalents in our world, that means the laws are even more extreme.

With the ABO dynamics in mind specifically, I can think of a few theoretical policy implications that would really make the prostitution laws stricter, and, specifically, would probably result in an absolute prohibition against selling ruts and heats specifically.

On its face, selling ruts and heats are probably very lucrative. So, say there’s a prostitute. There’s two different actions that we’d be talking about 1) selling their own mating cycle or 2) selling themselves as a participant in someone else’s mating cycle.

For the first, there’s absolutely a demand to get to spend a cycle with someone in heat or rut. You’d be buying an extended period of time with a partner willing to do basically anything. That being said, it would have a lot of severe dangers that would make this behavior absolutely prohibited in the ABO world. The person in cycle would be totally vulnerable. Their partner could film things without their consent; invite other people without their consent; perform acts they didn’t consent to; hurt them without their partner being able to defend themselves; abandon the heat or rut before it ends and leave them with major health complications. So there would be a huge public welfare concern prohibiting the sale or purchase of a mating cycle.

“But the person selling decided to take on that risk” we don’t care. There’s certain risks in the law we never allow people to assume. For example, you’re never able to enter into a lease for something below the required housing standards, even if you know that this is an unlivable space and you’re willing to take on the problems because you’re broke as fuck and this is the only place cheap enough that you can live in. you can decide to take on the risk all you want, but the law won’t recognize that fact. selling heats and ruts would have such extreme dangers involved that i can see zero chance of it ever being allowed in this kind of society.

It would be further exacerbated by the health effects by post-rut or heat. Granted, I think I made up drop for this? I don’t remember ever seeing it before; it just didn’t make sense to me for there to be like, zero potential health effects of something that would be an inherently violent biological process. that being said, there would be a similar public health concern about the fact that any sale would likely not sale to post-cycle, and it would cause health ramifications for the participants.

Likewise, there’d be substantial market for the sale of a participant in heats and ruts. Heats and ruts are difficult and sometimes dangerous alone--to the point where I could easily see there being official, licensed centers to gain a partner for one. the problem is in the unlicensed sale of a participation. A lot of the same concerns arise--the participant could do things without their consent, they could leave before it finishes, they could invite people that you didn’t consent to be there, they could film you, they could just straight up kill you in your vulnerable state and rob your corpse.

And, I want to be clear, just becuase that’s what the legislature justifies it with, that doesn’t mean what it actually does or that is what its main intent is. The real spirit behind the laws is attempts to keep people from sharing cycles with each other without it being a long term commitment. They want to maintain traditional relationship dynamics, specifically in the cases of mating cycles.

That being said, Peter’s actions dances along the line of something that could very much get him in trouble. He’s violated no letter of the law, but his behavior? Scandalous. People are going to be hostile to it. They’ll try to make the letter fit.

The actual laws:

So, not to get too deep in the weeds, but when you’re getting prosecuted under a law, it’s usually a matter of how far the prosecution can stretch the facts to wriggle it under a specific law. they have to match the elements of the crime, and you have to evaluate conduct by whether or not the policy will let it stretch far enough to fit facts.

Let’s make a hypothetical ABO anti-prostitution law.

“A person is guilty of cycle-adjacent prostitution if this person knowingly:

(a) engages, or agrees to, or offers to engage in sexual conduct with another person during his or her heat or rut in exchange for compensation; or

(b) engages, or agrees to, or offers to engage in sexual conduct with another during such third party’s heat or rut in exchange for compensation, unless he or she has maintained proper licensing under all relevant state and federal authorities and all such sexual contact occurs in a properly licensed and maintained facility.”

So, now that you have the law, how do you figure out if you’ve violated it? It’s going to depend on how far these hypothetical prosecutors have been able to define the terms underneath it.

Take, for instance, “during his or her heat or rut.” How do you determine when a heat or rut starts? What if someone only sells the period of time in pre-heat or post-heat, but not the heat itself? One policy implication says that the true health concerns are raised in heat or rut itself; another policy implication says that selling pre or post cycle will ultimately affect your health during the cycle, and therefore should still be moderated. based on how hostile this world would likely be to any intimate contact between individuals not planning to mate indefinitely, I’d probably expect a broad interpretation.

I think the most important definition in this would be “for compensation.” How do you determine when someone was compensated for a heat or rut? In cases where someone writes their sexual partner a $10k check after the cycle, then never talks to them again, that’s an easy case for compensation. But if we stretch the definition, we risk getting a lot more people under the statute. Let’s look at a hypothetical:

Say an abusive ex demands that someone spend their upcoming cycle with them. Now, when they were in a relationship, the ex had a dog that the abused partner loved more than anything. The ex mistreats the dog, but the abused partner had no way of getting rights to the dog when they left, and they had to get out. If the abused partner agrees to spend the cycle together, the ex will give them full rights and ownership to the dog. If they don’t, the abusive ex will have the dog put down. Out of fear for their beloved pet, the abused partner agrees, they spend the cycle together, and in return, ownership of the dog transfers fully to the abused partner.

After, the abused partner goes to a clinic to get medication for drop. The clinic demands to know, first, why their mate is not there to soothe them through it instead. The abused partner has little to no knowledge of their rights or the law, and they opt for honesty and explain that they had an abusive ex who promised to give them their beloved dog back if and only if they spent a cycle together. The clinic calls the police and reports them for prostitution. Are they going to get successfully prosecuted?

In that case, you have someone agreeing to engage in and actually engaging in sexual contact during a heat or rut, all of which would be very easy to confirm. You got the records of the clinic from when they got medication to prove the existence of a heat or rut, you have their own statements and admissions about what happened, you have the fact that they weren’t continuing this relationship after the cycle, all of the physical evidence like bond marks, bodily fluids, etc. The case is going to turn on whether getting the dog back counts as “for compensation.” And there’d be a very good chance that it would, because policy says that we don’t want people just changing the means of transferring compensation from money into other assets of value just to skirt prostitution laws.

You can keep changing the scenario. Say you have a professor who heavily implies that spending a cycle with them would get you an A in the class, and you need it to keep your scholarship. It happens, professor doesn’t give you shit. But the actual illegal action is the act of agreeing to it in anticipation of compensation, not the compensation itself. Your professor, meanwhile, can argue that he never tried to solicit sex from anyone, he would never abuse his position like that, he has no idea if that delusional omega misunderstood their relationship. He can claim knowingly solicit the sharing of this rut for compensation, but you’ve revealed that you knowingly agreed to do this in anticipation of compensation. So you may still end up caught under these laws, and the fuckwad who coerced you into sex gets off scot-free. That’s the thing about the law. it catches way, way more than what you think of as the “classic” case for the law, and sometimes it misses the cases you actually want to catch.

And Peter knows this. He’s educated about these laws. He’s lived in fears about these laws. He’s been working in crime since he was fourteen. Which is why he’s been so careful about how he handles this post-rut.

Keep in mind, proving the crime is the prosecutor’s problem. It doesn’t have to be proven yet to be arrested. They just have to have probable cause to arrest you. Peter knows that if he walks into a clinic looking for drop supplements so soon after he just spent a different rut with a different alpha, it’s the sort of high-risk behavior that will get him flagged as a probable prostitute. It is not illegal to sleep around and spend a bunch of ruts with a bunch of different alphas. It is illegal to get compensation for it. So he knows that if he gets flagged, it’s enough for the police to arrest him and go looking for compensation, and since these laws are probably broadly defined, there’s a lot they could try to wiggle in under that. He also knows that if he gets tagged as Daredevil’s omega, it doesn’t matter whether they actually think he’s a prostitute. They’re going to try to hit him with absolutely any charge they can, because once you get him on an actual legal violation, then the DA waltzes in and offers a plea deal in exchange for Daredevil’s identity.

As it is, Peter cannot go to jail just for having sex with Daredevil. he’d sit in a cell for 48 hours, and once they failed to drag up charges on him, he’d walk. but if he got caught selling sex to Daredevil? then those are actual legal grounds to hold him under.

Peter’s actions would potentially fall under subsection b. He doesn’t have a license, there was a hell of a lot of sexual contact, and none of it happened in a proper facility. His entire case is going to turn on whether he got compensation in return. For the most part, it looks like his actions were wholly gratuitous. However, Matt did give him money afterwards to cover his expenses.

now, good news! Matt knows the law too, better than Peter even. So he knows how to make sure that no prosecutor would be able to prove compensation for Peter sharing his rut with him. For one thing, it’d be nearly impossible to prove the actual transfer of money. Matt gave him cash, and every potential eye witness would never, ever testify against Peter. But even if they could somehow prove that someone gave Peter money after the rut, there’s a very good argument that what Matt did could never be considered compensation.

When you’re thinking about policy, and whether people are going to be willing to stretch it to cover a specific fact pattern, always think “is this the kind of behavior that society wants to encourage?” In Matt’s case, he was being a good alpha! He took care of his omega in the aftermath of a rut. He made sure to make up for lost income, paid for pregnancy tests, paid for the birth control. And then he didn’t go a cent over. Granted, a big part of why Matt demanded receipts is because he knew Peter would try to fudge the numbers and low ball him and he is not having his mess cost his friend a fucking penny, but another big bit of it was that he knew how important it was to be exact on this. If he pays more than Peter’s expenses, then that’s giving him something for the rut. It’s compensation. But if he’s just paying Peter’s expenses, aka providing for his omega, he’s very solidly existing in the exact space that society actively wants him to occupy. It’s the exact behavior that they would never want to criminalize, and that’s important, because that ties judge’s hands. You can’t make exceptions in cases like this without risking fucking with precedent, especially if matt appeals any decision against peter, which he would. So, in the specific case of Matt and Peter, both of them are smart enough and legally savvy enough to know what shit the DA may pull and cover their asses ahead of time.

Now Johnny’s case is an entirely different beast. Because all we just talked about? those are poor people rules. now we have to talk about rich people rules.

the legal system does not work the same way for rich people and poor people. And, I want to be clear, it’s not like a mystic thing? you don’t walk into court and say, “hello, i’m very rich and famous, the laws do not apply to me,” and the judge says “you’re so right i am so sorry mr. storm” and then you go home. the problem is that the legal system is very difficult to navigate, and there’s a lot of points where you can win a case before you actually end up in trial that are extremely heavily weighted towards people who know how to navigate those steps.

Let’s go back to the abused partner trying to get their dog back. Three scenarios: 1) public defender 2) matt and foggy 3) rich.

Abused partner has now gotten dragged in for prostitution. They can’t afford representation, so they eventually get a public defender appointed to them. in the time before they invoked their rights, they’ve had a fully body search conducted, biological evidence taken, and they’ve rambled out a lot of probable confessions. The public defender they get is overworked, underpaid, and just out of law school. DA offers a plea bargain that still lands with the abused partner in prison. Abused partner decides not to take it. Public defender tries their best, decides that the evidence is sufficient to establish it happened, and decides their best chance is to fight on the grounds of whether the dog constitutes compensation.

It’s their first voir dire. They don’t know how to do jury selection. Several people end up on the jury who think that cycles should be shared between mates and only mates, and that you have to marry whoever you spend a cycle with no matter the circumstances, and there are no other excuses. Maybe the abused partner is a person of color, and there are a few racists who got on the jury too. The public defender also has never had to argue a motion in limine before, and isn’t the best on objections, so the prosecutor spends the entire time referring to the abused partner as a sex worker, prejudicing the jury. The public defender misses a few key evidence objections, and some very damaging evidence comes in that otherwise could have been kept out.

Abused partner gets convicted. They get fines they can’t afford, jail time, a record, and they have to spend ten years on the sex offender’s list. Even when they get out, they can’t get a job, because they have a record and are on the sex offender’s list. I don’t think anyone actually thinks this person is someone deserving of punishment, but they still ended up completely fucked. a huge injustice happened because they didn’t understand the legal system and couldn’t afford someone who did. a half decent prosecutor would have dismissed all charges the second they heard the details of the case, but a lot of the time, the prosecutor is a shithead, so they go through the system instead and get spat out with their life ruined.

Scenario Two. Abused partner gets dragged in for prostitution. They’re terrified. They don’t ask for a lawyer, because they do not fully understand their rights or how to properly ask for a lawyer. They still think that maybe, if they just explain the situation, they’ll understand and let them go. Matt Murdock, however, happens to be around the corner buying a bagel from a bagel connoisseur. he hears everything, decides “fuck that,” parkours over three rooftops, and dramatically bursts into the interrogation room and rips into the presiding officer for not calling them the moment his client was brought in. Give them the room and get away from his client.

now, the story is a bit different. Foggy and Matt are the gods of law. the police weep when they swan into their precinct. they tell the DA to get the fuck out of here with that insulting plea bargain and go to trial. They, however, know how to argue in the alternative. So they plead not guilty on all charges, hold the ADA to the burden of proof, and also argue that there’s no real proof that this alleged sexual contact even occurred, but, alternatively, even if it did occur, they have an affirmative defense of coercion, but, alternatively, even if it did occur and you aren’t convinced it was coerced, the dog is not compensation. arguing in the alternative basically allows people to run mutually exclusive defenses without admitting to any single one of them. So, if you argue she was coerced, that implicitly admits that it happened, right? Wrong. she can still claim that they haven’t proven it even happened without weakening either defense. in scenario number #2, the prosecutor has to overcome a lot of other facts than in scenario #1, because it was assumed in scenario #1 that it did, indeed, happen. scenario #1, you argue your best grounds. scenario #2, you argue every ground.

Foggy runs voir dire. He’s shaped like a friend. He’s the most sexy and charming man alive. He actually convinces the racist jurors to tell the judge, in private, that they’re biased and they’re struck for cause (which people weirdly cop to more often than you think in voir dire? like. they just walk up and have teh self-awareness to confess that they’re racist and shouldn’t be on this jury. it’s beyond me.). Karen finds the publicly available social media posts of the jurors biased against anyone who shares cycles outside of marriage, now they’re struck for cause. Foggy spends the entire voir dire starting to get the jury on his side and steadily convincing them of his theory of the case. already, the client has much better odds than scenario #1.

now it’s motions in limine and motions to exclude. matt’s special talent is acting like the most offended man alive. he learned it from nuns. he’s un fucking beatable. is my client a sex worker? wow, that really sounds like the jury’s fucking job to decide, the prosecution shouldn’t be allowed to say those words ever. and? oh? there’s physical evidence against my client? evidence that they had hormones in her system consistent with a cycle? the police ran a full body cavity search and blood draw against them, actually? yeah, the prosecutor seems to have forgotten to file the fucking warrant that says that they could do any of that. Oh there wasn’t a warrant? my client consented to the search? are we sure they consented, or did your officers make them think that you were collecting evidence to prosecute their rapist? wow, it seems all they got was a fuckton of entirely inadmissible evidence, your honor. yeah, it should be kept out. the defendant isn’t getting on the stand at all, pleading the fifth, so you can’t ask them jack shit as to what happened.

now, prosecutor starts sweating, because now, it’ll be a fight to prove that a cycle even happened, because all their evidence got thrown out. but wait, they have the  person that the defendant talked to at the clinic, who they told the entire story to. that person can testify about everything that the defendant told them.

And they do, and foggy gets up, and he might be able to laboriously question them about every single off-color social media post they ever made about their views about people who have sex outside of marriage or who use birth control. The kind of posts that reflect the fact that this is the kind of person who would call the cops on a rape victim and call them a prostitute. oh, you didn’t prescribe them drop medication because you called the cops instead? how do we even know they were at this clinic for drop? could they have come for something like, say, birth control instead, and you may be someone who has some very strong views about that sort of behavior? hey, jury, does this sound like someone who would have the motive to lie? it does? shock and awe.

now let’s talk about the dog. oh, they got the dog in exchange for the cycle? yeah, did the ex actually tender any transfer of ownership? they just dumped the dog on their doorstep? do you have any actual evidence to show that this was an exchange of ownership and not an abandonment? gee, this sure just sounds like you’re persecuting someone who took in an abandoned dog. moreover, dogs cost money to take care of, don’t they? it costs more over their lifetime to feed them and pay their medical bills than their own sale value would ever be, right? Jesus, this doesn’t sound like compensation, does it? if anything, this is an expense.

Now, there’s a lot of trouble proving that there was sexual contact, that it happened during a cycle, that they got compensation, or that this wasn’t coerced behavior. cut and dry case gets destroyed.

the thing about law is that there’s a million little points to cram your fingers into and destroy a case. the good lawyers aren’t the ones who succeed on the main point; the good lawyers are the ones that succeed on a million little points. it’s about gaining ground. it takes a lot of fucking skill, and usually, people with that skill charge out the ass for it.

Now let’s talk about rich people.

This never happens to a rich person. a rich person has them arrested the first time they’re abused. the rich person calls their lawyer the second their shitbag ex tries to pressure them into sex and has them arrested for attempted solicitation. throw in charges about animal abuse while we’re at it. they sue for damages, custody of the dog, whatever. it never gets to the point that it happened if you’re poor.

But let’s try to keep it as close a scenario as possible. Abused partner is an 18 year old kid. they were scared and humiliated. it was their first relationship. they hid it from their parents, then hid the abuse, then the cycle, and kept hiding it until they end up in a police precinct with a prostitution charge hanging over their head.

well, their parent’s lawyer charges in at 3 in the fucking morning in an immaculate designer suit and they start threatening everyone in the building. You searched my client how? Without a warrant? give me your badge number and i’ll give you directions to the nearest unemployment office.

quickly, the framing of the narrative is going to change. if you’re poor, and you get dragged in for prostitution, you spend the entire fucking time battling the presumption that you’re trash and did it for the whatever. if you’re rich? this is an upstanding member of society. they were very obviously assaulted. why are you wasting fucking taxpayer dollars harassing assault victims instead of arresting their rapist?

It never goes to trial, because any DA stupid enough to green light it for trial is going to be facing reelection under the banner that they harass upstanding members of society who were victims of rape. even if it does go to trial, everything that matt and foggy did applies, because these are people with skill who get paid for their skill.

Same facts, same system, but rich people always come out better because they can hire people who know how to work the system, and they look like such upstanding members of society that the system usually has zero interest in prosecuting them.

Which is why the Fantastic Four can take a very different approach to Johnny’s rut than would ever be plausible for Matt’s.

First off, no one is going to prosecute them for it. If any one tries to investigate them, the lead attorney is going to get called into a shiny high rise run by whatever biglaw firm the F4 employs, and everyone has a nice chat about what evidence the DA doesn’t have and what upstanding citizens and  heroes the F4 is, and maybe taxpayer dollars would go a little bit better towards catching actual criminals instead of people with a contract with the citizen to catch criminals. any escort they hire is going to have vested interest in not going to prison for being a fucking prostitute, so chances of them testifying without some kind of deal is low. and compensation? you mean very necessary medical expenses for a highly dangerous rut? surely, you joke. there’d have to be something seriously political going on for anyone to even try, and all of those public policies we’ve been talking about? have been in reference to normal heats and ruts. there’s a very serious public welfare interest in the amazing flaming boy not burning down the city from an unmanaged rut. they may be willing to make a carve out for this one incredibly exceptional circumstance that’s unlikely to change how the law is implemented against wider society. it would not be worth the time, money, or effort to prosecute this case.

so no one in the F4 is going to jail for hiring a prostitute. at best, they pay a fine and have to deal with a few embarrassing headlines about the hooker who spent a rut with the human torch. as a result, it very rapidly can be considered a plausible option when potential alternatives include johnny dying in a rut-related accident. with Peter and Matt spending the rut together, both have to bend over backwards to make sure nothing they do can be construed as prostitution. They get away cleanly because they’re well-versed in the system and know how to not get caught in it. With Johnny, they have the leverage to ask around for references for discrete prostitutes willing to do shit with hazard pay.

So we see, implicitly, how privilege very seriously affects the execution of laws. Peter and the F4 are all liable under and subject to the same laws. But Peter has to live in fear of them. The F4 can make the risk calculation, and decide that while it’s distasteful, it may be the necessary and rationale response to a very serious danger to Johnny. And I want to be clear, i don’t think it would have been wrong to hire someone to help Johnny through it. It’s, specifically, the double standard that’s the issue.

the only time anti-prostitution laws would ever conceivably work would be in the case of any non-disclosure agreements.

Say you’re the Fantastic Four. You just had your youngest member’s extremely private and sensitive business leaked from someone you, personally, vetted and hired. SNL has already made a skit about it, which is currently one of the top ten trending videos on YouTube. the information is trending. the media is having a field day. it’s already looking to be a bloodbath. you want to protect your youngest member as best you can. So you go to your very high powered and expensive attorney and say “hey, how do we make sure that whoever does this can never speak about it publicly ever for as long as they live.

the thing about contracts is that there seems to be this idea in the public that they’re these absolute forces? they’re not. there’s about a million ways to get around contracts. first off, for contracts to be valid, there has to be this thing called consideration. it means "this for that.” you have to have an actual exchange of value. this is where anti-prostitution laws become a problem.

because the “this” that the F4 are getting is silence, and you have to ask what the “that” the sexual partner gets in return is. Now, if it’s just “the chance to be johnny storm’s sexual partner,” that ain’t gonna fly. for one, courts are going to be highly suspicious that this is an actual thing of value you’re getting in exchange. secondly, that means that you’ve classified sex as compensation for something else of value, which, you know. has prostitution problems.

say the F4 says, “well, we get your silence, and you get a comically large bag of money with a dollar sign written on the side.” once again, we run into prostitution laws. because underlying the transaction is, still, sex. having sex in the first place may be contingent on this deal being signed. So, you’re potentially getting the deal in consideration for the sex, and getting money in consideration for the deal, so a court may look at the underlying facts and say “yeah no this is inextricably intertwined with sex, this is prostitution.” now, it’s one thing to have a chat with a DA about whether or not they can prove that the F4 hired any prostitute. It is an entirely different thing to walk into a court of law and try to enforce an NDA and have the judge rule that this is an agreement for a prostitute. Any DA is going to have a much better case, because the F4 filed their fucking evidence on the public record.

Let’s pretend their highly paid attorneys heroically navigate all these hurdles. They get consideration somehow, it’s not a prostitution agreement, etc. etc. Can they now enforce an NDA about Johnny’s rut?

Probably not.

NDAs are, for the most part, very touch and go as to how to enforce them. courts are naturally hostile to them, so you have to be extremely careful about how you craft them.

first off, scope. NDAs have to be very narrowly defined. So say you want to make sure they can’t say anything about the rut. Well, how do you define the rut? They’re going to need a pre and post rut period--is that included, or is it just the week he spent in actual rut? let’s say that you want the entire thing to be kept quiet. Well, that’s more than a month of time--that’s broader than just the rut itself, so courts are now looking at this through a more hostile lens. What information do they have to keep quiet about? can they talk about moments that didn’t involve sexual contact? what if they want to talk about Johnny tripping over a doorstep three weeks before the rut begins? No sexual contact is involved, they’re not in the cycle itself--can they talk about that? you have to outline exactly what they’re not allowed to talk about, and there’s a lot you may miss, and there’s a lot the court may tell you that you’re being too overly burdensome with.

the other problem is time. depending on the state, NDAs usually have a duration that they’re limited to and it can’t be overly burdensome (unless like, trade secrets or something is involved, which this wouldn’t invoke at all). So maybe you can keep them quiet for a two year period after, and then this person starts a book tour. still doesn’t do what you want it to do.

you also have to ask--hey, what happens if they break the NDA? You take them to court and say “hey, that was a shitty thing to do, pay us money in damages.” And the opposing counsel says “What damages?”

Because the information? It’s already out. It’s public narrative. Every fucking one on the planet already knew Johnny Storm was going into rut. It’ll be a fight to actually prove that this caused any real damage to his reputation or caused any emotional distress that hadn’t already been caused by the original leak.

Let’s say they hired a prostitute, then. No escort wants to risk going to prison just to go on a talk show circuit as the person hired by Johnny Storm for his rut, right?

they’re not going to prison. there’s no deterrent.

For one thing, in order to prove that this person is a prostitute, they would have to implicitly admit to hiring a prostitute. which means they just exposed themselves to legal liability because, instead of the DA having to fight for scraps of information in a losing case, they went and put it onto the public record. say they’re willing to do that. Does the escort go to prison? No. no, they don’t. They are at the happy center of one of the most highly publicized cases of modern times. If they go to prison and the F4 doesn’t, that puts on shining display the legal system’s hypocrisy, which judges tend to not like. they can also afford a high powered attorney who can wriggle in all the difficult bits of the case and make it a nightmare to get a conviction. they get a fine, at best, and live off of their book tour money in luxury.

There’s also always public policy concerns underlying teh enforcement of NDAs. we don’t want people to be able to legally make sure that no one can ever talk about their sexual contacts ever again. that is highly susceptible to abuse and makes it difficult for people to consult friends and family about their own relationships. So courts are going to be even more hostile to enforcing this agreement.

Great lawyers can do a lot of things. but lawyers also have to be honest to their clients about their odds. So they got to their highly paid attorneys and probably get Like We’ll Try But Sorry Champ It’s Probably Coming Out. and then they devote their energy to trying to figure out if they can legally get whoever the fuck this is gonna be to waive liability regarding dick fires.

The only way to keep it out was the off chance that Johnny, who was not in a relationship and had never once been in a relationship that didn’t involve his nudes getting leaked, finding someone who, out of the sheer kindness of their heart, would be willing to risk the dick fire while getting absolutely nothing in return and keeping it quiet from every living soul afterwards. which seemed extremely unlikely considering it was the biggest news story around when Johnny walked in, beaming, and announced that he found such partner. you’ve met him. he’s that reporter with the number one newspaper for all superhero news.  oh, and all those forms you’ve been laboriously drafting with legal? he has a blanket refusal for any and all forms. he says he’s allergic. oh, no, no, he won't talk to medical either. he says that if there is a single person other than the two of them who know about or conceptualize any and all sexual acts involving him he’ll kill himself and then Johnny, actually, so like. no. no, there won’t be any medical monitoring. ambulance on standby? Get this, he’d much rather risk any dick fire damages. He sort of made me swear up and down that in the case of any dick fires, i’d shut the fuck up about it and call his buddy danny for some kind of alternative eastern medicinal cure involving fisting. Oh, birth control? he super promises he’s taking them, but, haha, he says that he still fucking hates reed after that one dinner and if anyone insults him again by asking to watch, he’ll graffiti the front door of the baxter building with an unflattering portrait of them all.

so that’s basically a broad overview of jumble sale chic’s prostitution law and the influence it has on the actors in this fic.

[bluecookiedisaster]

Barry, this is what you want

to do with your life?

I want to do it for all our lives.

Nobody works harder than bees!

Dad, I remember you

coming home so overworked

your hands were still stirring.

You couldn't stop.

I remember that.

What right do they have to our honey?

We live on two cups a year. They put it

in lip balm for no reason whatsoever!

Even if it's true, what can one bee do?

Sting them where it really hurts.

In the face! The eye!

- That would hurt.

- No.

Up the nose? That's a killer.

There's only one place you can sting

the humans, one place where it matters.

Hive at Five, the hive's only

full-hour action news source.

No more bee beards!

With Bob Bumble at the anchor desk.

Weather with Storm Stinger.

Sports with Buzz Larvi.

And Jeanette Ohung.

- Good evening. I'm Bob Bumble.

- And I'm Jeanette Ohung.

A tri-county bee, Barry Benson,

intends to sue the human race

for stealing our honey,

packaging it and profiting

from it illegally!

Tomorrow night on Bee Larry King,

we'll have three former queens here in

our studio, discussing their new book,

Olassy Ladies,

out this week on Hexagon.

Tonight we're talking to Barry Benson.

Did you ever think, "I'm a kid

from the hive. I can't do this"?

Bees have never been afraid

to change the world.

What about Bee Oolumbus?

Bee Gandhi? Bejesus?

Where I'm from, we'd never sue humans.

We were thinking

of stickball or candy stores.

How old are you?

The bee community

is supporting you in this case,

which will be the trial

of the bee century.

You know, they have a Larry King

in the human world too.

It's a common name. Next week...

He looks like you and has a show

and suspenders and colored dots...

Next week...

Glasses, quotes on the bottom from the

guest even though you just heard 'em.

Bear Week next week!

They're scary, hairy and here live.

Always leans forward, pointy shoulders,

squinty eyes, very Jewish.

In tennis, you attack

at the point of weakness!

It was my grandmother, Ken. She's 81.

Honey, her backhand's a joke!

I'm not gonna take advantage of that?

Quiet, please.

Actual work going on here.

- Is that that same bee?

- Yes, it is!

I'm helping him sue the human race.

- Hello.

- Hello, bee.

This is Ken.

Yeah, I remember you. Timberland, size

ten and a half. Vibram sole, I believe.

Why does he talk again?

Listen, you better go

'cause we're really busy working.

But it's our yogurt night!

Bye-bye.

Why is yogurt night so difficult?!

You poor thing.

You two have been at this for hours!

Yes, and Adam here

has been a huge help.

- Frosting...

- How many sugars?

Just one. I try not

to use the competition.

So why are you helping me?

Bees have good qualities.

And it takes my mind off the shop.

Instead of flowers, people

are giving balloon bouquets now.

Those are great, if you're three.

And artificial flowers.

- Oh, those just get me psychotic!

- Yeah, me too.

Bent stingers, pointless pollination.

Bees must hate those fake things!

Nothing worse

than a daffodil that's had work done.

Maybe this could make up

for it a little bit.

- This lawsuit's a pretty big deal.

- I guess.

You sure you want to go through with it?

Am I sure? When I'm done with

the humans, they won't be able

to say, "Honey, I'm home,"

without paying a royalty!

It's an incredible scene

here in downtown Manhattan,

where the world anxiously waits,

because for the first time in history,

we will hear for ourselves

if a honeybee can actually speak.

What have we gotten into here, Barry?

It's pretty big, isn't it?

I can't believe how many humans

don't work during the day.

You think billion-dollar multinational

food companies have good lawyers?

Everybody needs to stay

behind the barricade.

- What's the matter?

- I don't know, I just got a chill.

Well, if it isn't the bee team.

You boys work on this?

All rise! The Honorable

Judge Bumbleton presiding.

All right. Oase number 4475,

Superior Oourt of New York,

Barry Bee Benson v. the Honey Industry

is now in session.

Mr. Montgomery, you're representing

the five food companies collectively?

A privilege.

Mr. Benson... you're representing

all the bees of the world?

I'm kidding. Yes, Your Honor,

we're ready to proceed.

Mr. Montgomery,

your opening statement, please.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,

my grandmother was a simple woman.

Born on a farm, she believed

it was man's divine right

to benefit from the bounty

of nature God put before us.

If we lived in the topsy-turvy world

Mr. Benson imagines,

just think of what would it mean.

I would have to negotiate

with the silkworm

for the elastic in my britches!

Talking bee!

How do we know this isn't some sort of

holographic motion-picture-capture

Hollywood wizardry?

They could be using laser beams!

Robotics! Ventriloquism!

Oloning! For all we know,

he could be on steroids!

Mr. Benson?

Ladies and gentlemen,

there's no trickery here.

I'm just an ordinary bee.

Honey's pretty important to me.

It's important to all bees.

We invented it!

We make it. And we protect it

with our lives.

Unfortunately, there are

some people in this room

who think they can take it from us

'cause we're the little guys!

I'm hoping that, after this is all over,

you'll see how, by taking our honey,

you not only take everything we have

but everything we are!

I wish he'd dress like that

all the time. So nice!

Oall your first witness.

So, Mr. Klauss Vanderhayden

of Honey Farms, big company you have.

I suppose so.

glad that im not popular enough to have an evil shadow version of my blog that exists just to make contradictions on my posts

[the-firebird69]

There are a lot of things going on here at the same time but some of them are pretty big and it happened every day and they affect everybody. it's a war in the Rings and the Mack Warlock are not doing well but the pseudo empire is doing worse now they were succeeding there and now they're failing and falling and they know it so they're paid they're threatening our son a lot turns out that they're doing a bunch of it and we need them out they're horrible and they're probably the worst now we can say they're the worst. And even Tommy F knows that they suck really bad and they lost in the Western Hemisphere last night they went from 50% to 65% out and that is all of their military type facilities they're calling from the general populace all over the usa in South America to staff it up again and I asked you for more than usual for security force there are numbers in the general population are beginning to drop because of this function and significantly. Globally they're approximately 5.3 percent and that's down a couple percentage points from the start of this conflict it's going to continue and they will continue to deteriorate and today they will lose a lot more of their leadership I'm added by a different proportion it will be increased and they will be upset You'll drop to 8.5% they'll begin to feel it they should not have much power because of the general populace they have a lot of ships which brings us to the next point BJ a got up and said the last time we did this they came back which was nothing and these ships and they used the ships and they played to they planned to do it again and they are preparing to try and take the ships all of them it's gonna be a very bloody war so far it's been very nasty and heinous and there are a couple groups that are losers that's a huge deal going on here

----= Another item that's changing people on Earth are not putting up with their crap anymore and that's the more lock and Max are hitting them foreigners are hitting them and they're going to be out all over the place they'll be dead zones where they can't go and it's going to increase as time goes on but right now it's about 0.1 percent a day by that form of deterioration which is hefty

---= There are a couple more things here in Charlotte County to know and it is John Remillard and company they are planning on moving out and to try and sneak back in and it is disgusting he is a moron there's some other things going on but that should be happening coming up pretty soon he left the laundry night the laundry facility and which is things in the small building who said he would be back for them and manager to him and said only if you're paying rent and Trump looked back over and he said I have to tell you what'll happen again and Max said you won't threaten me again if you do you're going to the prison and you won't come out that's what's gonna happen ask Trump was leaving he starts to try and see it and make it now sick of hearing it from this idiot it's really too many things. This other stuff happening and they get into an argument and it turns out that Trump still get on purpose and Mac figured it out and he knows what to do. But he left that place and left the machinery in the little building and they said he's coming back for it and he went back the other day and he took some of it out I just got more to take out so Trump is acting strange and doing strange things he's wondering what the hell it means so he goes what is this anyways plastic curtains and he hears our son and it says you want to break the windows to get into the ships maybe and he started arguing this is he says you're so full of hatred that I can't get anywhere or I can't do anything and I have to face you down and Max said you're so stupid you put your code here and everybody has to attack you so the idiot starts making all these noises and Max said I need you to shut your mouth and get out. So on the way out Matt Daddy said your rent is expired here in the little building if that stuff's there this week it's mine you're not to return here in any format I will have you arrested for trespassing. And Max Daddy is doing stuff to get him out he was completing to public officials he was complaining. We had a talk with him and said here to get out of there and they were going to be victim and they're going to evict him and that's what happens at the apartment stan talked to him and said that you are there illegally and the state can press charges if someone just tells them about it because they're obliged to because the crime is a felony so John Rema large did not not have a good reaction and said you can do whatever I want and I'll do what I want here and stuff like that and he heard our son saying he can't hardly do anything and he dies several times a night and Stan said I don't care what you're saying everybody's killing you we can get you out and I have to and he really does so they started to try and kick them out of the apartment and this was a couple weeks ago and we can hear Trump complaining quite often started trying to do things the credit card came up and people figured out that's what he's doing and they started to hit the **** **** ****