#petrol century

[dilemmaontwolegs]

Licence to Thrill || CL16

Pairing: Charles Leclerc x fem!reader Summary: You give Charles the ride of his life when he’s running late to an important event. Warnings: 18+ only, illegal driving, sexual innuendos, fluff WC: 2.7k

F1 Masterlist || Based on this request

“No, no, no, shit.” Charles’ curses woke you up and you rubbed your bleary eyes as he tossed the blankets back, cold air rushing over your skin. You immediately missed the warmth of his body where he had been spooning you all night and grabbed your phone to see the time.

“Fuck!” Charles growled as his little toe caught the corner of the bedpost, again, and you leapt up to get dressed too. “We are so late, mon amour.”

He had been looking forward to the charity football game all week and the prospect of missing the kick off made him clumsy in his rush. While you pulled on a pair of jeans and a shirt he struggled to get one leg into his team’s black football shorts, falling twice as he lost his balance. 

“I’m sorry,” you murmured as you curled an arm around his waist to steady him. “I shouldn’t have kept you up so late.”

He grabbed a shirt before sparing a moment to press his lips to your forehead. “Don’t be, I enjoyed myself very much.”

“Oh, I know, and I’m pretty sure my neighbours know it too,” you teased as you took your shirt from his hands and tossed him the correct shirt with his name and driver number on the back. “Come on, get that sexy ass moving.”

He laughed as you squeezed his butt when he bent down to tie his shoes. “Hands off the goods, honey, I’m not a piece of meat.”

“Keep telling yourself that, handsome,” you shot back as he made for the stairs and you locked the house behind you.

“Shit,” Charles groaned as he hit his head on the steering wheel. “I am stupid.”

“What’s wrong?” you asked, leaning over to see the dashboard. “You forgot to put petrol in again, didn’t you?”

“I was in a rush to get here last night,” he admitted sheepishly. “I’ll call Arthur to come get us.”

“I can take us.” You opened your handbag and found your keys as well as the remote for the garage door.

“Wait, you drive?”

“Of course I do,” you laughed as you climbed out of the Pista.

He quickly hopped out his side to follow. “I didn’t even know you had a licence. Why am I only just learning this now?”

“You never asked,” you said with a shrug, “and you always offer to pick me up.”

“Because I thought you didn’t drive.”

You giggled as you hit the remote and the door lifted up. “What did you think was in the garage?”

“Storage? Chérie,” he sighed as he followed you down the driveway that passed by the front door that he had a key for and he pointed to it. “I’ve never come in your backdoor, how should I know?” You cocked an eyebrow up with a smirk and he rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

“Well, just so you know, the garage is where I park my car.” You waved a hand to the opened door and Charles whistled as he saw the gleaming black hood catch the morning sun. He automatically started walking to the drivers side and you tutted at him. “Don’t even think about it, love. That’s my baby.”

“But-“

“No buts, if you want to make it to the match on time you ride shotgun.” You grabbed his shoulders and turned him in the direction of the other door and he grumbled as he started to walk around. “If it’s any consolation, you can pick the music.”

The door creaked open and slammed shut behind him before he groaned and you laughed as you climbed in to see him holding his phone, the Spotify app useless with the old radio. “Forgot to mention, she only takes cassette tapes.”

“You know you can update the stereo,” he pointed out as he opened the glove compartment and rifled through the stacks of old cassettes. “Fleetwood Mac. Michael Jackson. There’s nothing from this century.”

“Hey, don’t hate on them. They are classics and this is a classic car.” You turned the key and grinned as he dropped the tape at the sudden roar that was deafening in the small garage. “You might want to buckle up, baby.”

“Why are there racing harnesses in here?” he asked as he pulled the five point harness over his shoulders and bucked it in.

“You probably shouldn’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to,” you admitted as you shoved a random mixtape into the radio and turned the volume dial up.

The kick drum intro to Ram Jam’s  Black Betty thumped from the speakers as you pushed down the clutch and put the ‘70 Dodge Charger into gear. The full force of the V8 engine drove your body back into the seat as the car hurtled forward and burst into the sunlight. Charles latched onto the handle above his door and while the other hand pressed against the dash and his knees tucked up like he was preparing for impact.

“I’m trying not to be insulted here,” you huffed as you pushed his knee down between shifting gears. “I may not have a super licence like some people, but I have never crashed.”

A terrified scream erupted as you burst out of the driveway and pulled the handbrake, kicking the back wheels out as you drifted into the quiet suburban street and took off with a trail of burnt rubber. Your neighbours wouldn’t be too happy but you didn’t care as long as you got Charles to where he needed to be on time.

You spared a glance over to your boyfriend and saw the whites of his eyes as they stared at the road ahead and his knuckles turned white from the tight gripe he held. “Chérie, road, road, cars, look, traffic, look at the road. The road!”

He turned to you wide eyed as you approached the busy intersection at full speed before hitting the brake. You held his eye contact as you shifted down the gears before coming to a gentle stop at the lines in front of the traffic light and he exhaled in relief.

“You’re fucking crazy,” he said but the words were warm and his smile was one amazement as the adrenaline hit him. His hands tugged the harness until it was snug and he settled into the seat as you waited for the light to turn green. “I’m ready this time.”

“Good, because we won’t make it if I stop for every red light.”

“Wait, what?” The light changed and you put your foot to the floor as Charles chuckled nervously. “You’re joking right?”

“If it helps, sure,” you shrugged, weaving in and out of the cars and ignoring the angry honks of their horns. “Do you think I could take your car for a spin?”

“Absolutely…not.” 

You narrowed your eyes as he got your hopes up and almost missed the turn that would shave a few seconds off the travel time. Any normal person would have struggled to stay upright in their seat but Charles’ line of work made it easy for him to tense his abdominals and neck so he barely moved as the mass shifted and the back wheels drifted behind the turn.

“What if I let you drive this?” you bartered as the road straightened out and you reached speeds high enough to instantly lose your licence and the car. 

“Oh, mon amour,” he murmured as he chewed his bottom lip and he debated the offer before looking at his watch. “If you get me there before kick off you have a deal.”

He should have known you wouldn’t miss out on the opportunity very few people got and the smile you gave him gave him pause as he wondered what he had just got himself into.

“It’s going to be tight,” you muttered as you saw the time, just catching the hint of a smile on his face. “But doable.”

Charles watched with fascination. He saw your eyes scanning the road far ahead, making plans and contingency plans for the hazards that you might face. All the while you blindly shifted up the gears with your feet working in tandem, releasing the accelerator as you double clutched for a smoother transition. 

“I can’t believe this is really happening,” he chuckled in disbelief as you took a corner with enough speed that he knew there had to be some g-force working against you, but you didn’t even notice as you gripped the wheel tight and exited the apex without slowing down.

“I’m pretty sure if you were dreaming we would be doing something else, not driving.”

“I’m not sure now, I’m finding this extremely hot. You could pull over and make that dream come true?”

“And miss out on driving your baby? No way.” You shook your head with a laugh before biting your lip. “It is tempting, but I have to think of the children. They would be very disappointed if you didn’t show up for the match.”

“And Pierre, I don’t think he would forgive me.”

“I said children didn’t I. Oh, shit.” You ripped the handbrake and did a 180 as you missed the street you needed. “Stop distracting me.”

The stadium was just up ahead and you could see the parking lot on the other side of the overpass but there was only one road to get there. Unless you wanted to drive the long way around but then you would be late.

“Amour, that’s a one way street,” Charles pointed out as you headed to the underground pass. “You’re going the wrong way. There’s traffic cameras here too.”

“You’re right,” you huffed before twisting the wheel a little to the left then all the way to the right. The suspension would not like the pressure you were putting it under but she spun around and you shoved the car in reverse and draped your arm across Charles’ chair as you looked over your shoulder. “Wouldn’t want to get a fine.”

The engine roared inside the tunnel as you pushed the limits of the gear and you swerved through the lanes. You were grateful that it wasn’t rush hour traffic so there were only a few drivers angry with your recklessness before you burst out of the tunnel, through the intersection and into the parking lot. 

The stadium was quiet since the event was only televised but there were still lots of media crews at the entrance and they all turned your way as the back of your car careened towards them. You reached the last row of empty parking spaces and pulled the handbrake, whipping the front around and coming to a stop beside the gate entrance.

“Twelve seconds to spare,” you laughed as you drummed your fingers on the steering wheel. “That will be twenty euros and a five star rating, s’il vous plaît.”

“Just enough time to change my shorts,” he joked as he pushed his door open.

“Good thing they are black this year,” you retorted with a laugh as you tossed him his boots he would have forgotten. “Go, I’ll meet you inside.”

He blew a kiss as he took off at a jog and waved to the stunned reporters who were still recording.

“Is that Y/N?” A female presenter asked her male colleague.

“Leclerc’s girlfriend?” He laughed and shook his head. “No way. This has to be some stunt.”

You drove more sedately to a spot a few spaces away where you spotted Pierre’s car and parked beside it before killing the engine and letting the silence settle. Adjusting your mirror, you saw everyone still watching, waiting to see who it was being the wheel.

“I told you,” the woman gasped as she elbowed the man. “It was her! Do you have a moment?”

“Sorry, games about to kick off,” you apologised as you rushed past and into the stadium just in time to see Charles faceplant. “Ohh,” you gasped along with the others watching before cupping your hands around your mouth. “Yellow card ref!”

“He tripped over himself,” Kika whispered as she joined you.

“Oh I know, I just thought he could use a little 15 minute rest.” You grinned as you gave her a kiss on the cheek. “He’s had a rough morning.”

“What happened?”

“He stubbed his toe.” Your phone started vibrating and you pulled it out of your pocket to see your twitter notifications blowing up. “Huh, that was quick. The devil works hard but F1 fans work harder.”

You showed her the thread which started with a short clip of your car thrashing it down the street, Charles holding on for dear life. You chuckled as you saved it to show him later, knowing he would get a kick out of it too.

“Yeah, I don’t think that was the stubbed toe, hun…” she hummed.

“Meh,” you shrugged, pocketing the device so you could concentrate on the game.

Charles and Pierre’s team won the match and you climbed over the baluster to jump down to the grass as the pair jogged over. Charles swept you up with a proud grin as he spun around.

“Well played, handsome,” you praised as you brushed his sweaty hair back into place before helping yourself to a quick kiss.

“Wouldn’t have made it without you, chérie.”

Pierre clapped him on the shoulder and nodded his head to the reporters waiting for a post match interview and he reluctantly placed your feet back on the ground.

“Well, this should be interesting,” you muttered to Kika as you waved to the camera that remained pointed at you until Charles said something.

“Just how bad was your driving?” she asked curiously.

“Bad? Oh it wasn’t bad,” you chuckled. “My driving is actually very good, if I do say so myself. It was just a little faster than he was expecting.”

She curled an eyebrow up. “He goes 200 mph for a living.”

“Yeah, funny right.”

Charles was still catching his breath when the microphone was held in front of him and could see videos of his entrance playing on the big screens around the stadium. Pierre’s eyebrows disappeared under his hair in surprise as he saw the black Charger spinning to a stop and his friend climbing out.

“No fucking way,” Pierre laughed as he looked back at you laughing with his girlfriend. “That’s awesome.”

“I know right,” Charles said with a proud smile. “You should have seen it, she was going full on sideways through these corners, it was insane.”

“So, Charles, I'm sure this comes as no surprise,” the reported began, “but we have some questions about your girlfriend, after the entrance she made.”

“You have some questions?” He threw his head back and laughed. “I have some questions! I had no idea she could drive like that.”

“Her father is a rally driver. Did you really never suspect anything?”

“My mother is a hairdresser, doesn’t mean I am good at cutting hair. Why do you think I wore a bandana during lockdown? I butchered it that’s why.” He brushed his hair back that had thankfully grown back after his terrible attempt and laughed to himself. “So no, I didn’t assume she could drive because her father can.”

The interview finally turned to the football match and then a little bit about the upcoming race before Charles was able to escape. He held up a finger and mouthed one minute as he made a detour to the few fans that had been invited. He talked with some of them, shaking hands and signing autographs.

You wolf whistled loudly as Charles took his shirt off and he grinned without even having to check who it came from before he gave it to a fan and waved goodbye. You knew you were staring as he jogged back and you knew you weren’t the only one, but he only had eyes for you as he gave you a wink and draped his arm over your shoulder.

“How cool is that shot,” he said as he looked up at the screens still playing a rotation of highlights from the game and your arrival. “There’s just one way to make it better.”

“Excuse me?” you dared him to criticise your driving but his charming smile only grew wider.

“Do it in a Ferrari.”

[cobragardens]

Every Anglican church has a basin of holy water. It's not, like, in demand as a criminal product. It's not guarded. It's not even really supervised.

It's usually not even kept near the apse. In one Anglican cathedral (Manchester Cathedral) I visited regularly, the basin was kept next to the entrance, and the lapsed Catholic I was with dipped his fingers in and crossed himself with it out of sheer habit because apparently Catholic churches all have holy-water basins next to the entrance so people can do that.

And btw churches aren't even locked during the day. Like, there will always be somebody around in the church who will check in on you at some point, but I don't think you'd have to visit more than half a dozen before you were left alone with a basin of holy water for long enough to scoop some into a water bottle, especially in 1967. A lot of them are big historic monuments and have literal tourists wandering around them unattended.

Even if you decide to go to all the completely needless effort of breaking into a church and stealing it at night, it is a church, and it is 1967. It does not have a security system. There are no cameras. This is not Ethan Hunt breaking into CIA Headquarters. The locksmith could open the door and just...fill up a jar of holy water and leave. I cannot overstate how wildly unnecessary a heist for this substance is.

But! This is also the era of the spy thriller, and it's the year the bullet-hole stickers that were a promotion for the James Bond movie at a petrol station appear on Crowley's car window--

--and he is wearing his Spy Turtleneck.

This means Crowley has spent the last century thinking about how to get his hands on some holy water, and the solution he has generated is not "Offer a random kid £10 to bring me a bottle of water from the holy water basin in the church and tell him I'll give him another £10 if it's dry and wrapped in two towels," no. The Wile E. Coyote answer he has come up with requires a locksmith, a guy called "Spike" to be "the muscles," and Sally "going down on the ropes."

[not-terezi-pyrope]

I think that living in a culture where we expect almost all narratives to exist primarily in a textual form has left us woefully complacent to the intangibility of oral stories, where they still exist.

For instance, when I was a small child, my grandmother would during her visits regale me with episodic installments following fictional characters that, as far as I can tell, were entirely of her own spontaneous devising. The two of these I can remember most clearly are "The Forgettis" and "Rebel and Jim".

The Forgettis was a comedy following the misadventures of an absurdly over-extended family of Italian nationals, The Forgettis, who were cursed with a sort of hereditary amnesia that would cause them to periodically forget all prior context of their lives and invent new ones. After all several dozen of them visited the UK on holiday, they promptly forgot that they were on holiday at all, and settled into an abandoned petrol station on "Gasworks Lane" after their tourist coach stopped there to refuel and they never got back on.

The patriarch of the family, Giuseppe Forgetti, was often at the center of things, but most episodes would involve several family members getting lost and subsequently adapting to fulfill some bizarre new occupation based on whatever they found in their surroundings. A particularly memorable episode involved most of the family leaving the Gasworks, only to return and find it had overgrown into an indoor jungle, and the sole remaining member of the family had adapted into a sort of safari hunter persona, managing the population of unlikely exotic animals that had taken up residence.

Rebel and Jim was a fantasy crime procedural about police constable "Jim" and his talking dog, "Rebel", who would make use of a number of supernatural items and allies to catch ne'er-do-wells. Their signature tool was their flying cloak - a cloak that allowed Jim to fly when worn, so long as Rebel sat on top of his head to also be under the cloak. They were also friends with the "Rock Monster", a sort of granite earth elemental who lived underground, but who was frequently confused with the identically named "Rock Monster", who as best as I remember was a sort of "rock and roll elemental".

These stories were pretty formative to my childhood, looking back, but the sad things is that the above recollections - the most I can recall concretely after thinking for ten minutes or so - are likely all that is recoverable of what I know were some pretty sprawling sagas with many episodic story arcs. I can no longer ask my grandmother, as she passed away from dementia two years ago. I can barely remember any details of Rebel and Jim at all, and I'm fairly sure there were other stories I can't even remember the names of. What I have written above may be the only record of them that will survive into posterity, which seems so sad for something that had a pretty big impact on me and are some of my fondest memories of my grandmother from my childhood.

The really frustrating thing is that I am sure that at one point she made attempts to write parts of these stories down - I remember seeing word documents! - but I have no idea where those would have survived, if at all. As far as I know we don't have any of her old computer hardware from what would have been 15-20 years ago. And that's still so recent! Imagine the equivalent when a story has been lost for several decades or centuries, no matter how impactful in its time.

So much so easily lost. When oral storytelling was the only storytelling form, people knew what was up and would make efforts to memorize and preserve stories. But instead if something isn't written down it so often just slips away.

[useless-catalanfacts]

A football referee expels a coach for speaking in Catalan

Sadly this doesn't make it to most news because it's not uncommon, but I will translate this to give an idea to foreigners of the situations we have to deal with.

Yet again, another Catalan speaker has been kicked out of somewhere just because they spoke in Catalan in a Catalan-speaking country. This time, it happened in a local football camp in Petra (town in Mallorca, Balearic Islands).

While reading this story, remember that Catalan is the native language of Mallorca, and is legally recognised as a co-official language.

During a local-level football match, the football coach of the team UE Petra protested to the referee that a decision wasn't right. The referee told him "we are in Spain, Mallorca is part of Spain, not Spain part of Mallorca, and you must speak to me in Spanish". The coach continued speaking Catalan, since it's the language of the place where this is happening, and the referee proceeded to expel him. This is what the referee wrote in the match's minutes:

In the half-time, the coach [...] after perceiving my communication in Spanish and being reprimanded for addressing me with the words "this is shameful", starts speaking to me in Catalan. When I ask him to talk to me in Spanish, he continues perpetuating his dialect, where I understood some lacks of respect. Since I could not make him stop, I decide to expel him.

At the end of the minutes card, the referee wrote the reason for expelling him as "for disobeying my orders".

The other witnesses in the football match explain that the referee was very rude to the coach and never asked him politely to change to Spanish, only rudely saying "in Spanish!". Later, the referee also wrote that the coach was "perpetuating his dialect", as we have seen. Using the word "dialect" for a language that has suffered persecution, illegalization and discrimination is an extremely loaded term based on bigotry, only used by the hardcore Catalanophobes who defend that Catalan (and other discriminated languages like Basque and Galician) aren't languages because they're not important or respect-worthy enough to be a language, only a "dialect" (understood as a derogatory word).

The football club UE Petra has complained that this referee is partial and "has taken decisions, as can be seen by the wording used in the minutes, influenced on a coach using his mother tongue in the place where it has been official for centuries".

Now, a few days after the game and the UE Petra publishing a statement explaining it on their social media (you can read it here), the referee has pressed charges, claiming that she has been "threatened" when it was posted on social media. 🤦

Can you imagine if this happened to a Spanish person for speaking Spanish in Madrid? Or French in Paris, or English in London? Can you imagine if doctors threw them out for speaking Spanish in Madrid, French in Paris or English in London? Or hotels, banks, petrol stations did? If policemen identified them because speaking it was seen as lack of respect? Then why do we have to accept that it's normal when it happens to us?

You can find the statement published by this coach's football team UE Petra here (in Catalan). Some sources from newspapers who reported on it: Esport3, Ara Balears, Vilaweb.

[fatehbaz]

On April 21, Ali Hussein Julood, a 21-year-old living in the Iraqi town of Rumaila, on the outskirts of one of the world’s largest oil fields, died from leukaemia. He was told by doctors that pollution from gas flared in the nearby field, which is operated by British Petroleum (BP), had likely caused his cancer. “Gas flaring” is a low-cost procedure used by oil companies to burn off the natural gas expelled during drilling. [...] [I]t also contributes to global warming [...]. Some of the pollutants released during this process, such as benzene, are known to cause cancers and respiratory diseases. Ali, who had been battling cancer for six years when he died, was only the latest victim of the environmental degradation caused by international oil companies like BP in Iraq.

In towns and villages near the country’s vast oil fields, thousands of other men, women and children are still living under smoke-filled skies and suffering avoidable health problems because company executives insist on putting profit before lives. [...]

[A] confidential report from the Iraqi health ministry recently obtained by the BBC blamed pollution from gas flaring, among other factors, for a 20 percent rise in cancer in Basra, southern Iraq between 2015 and 2018. A second leaked document, again seen by the BBC, from the local government in Basra showed that cancer cases in the region are three times higher than figures published in the official nationwide cancer registry.

Like many other problems and crises that are devastating the lives of ordinary Iraqis today, the chain of events that led to the poisoning of southern Iraq’s skies by international oil companies also started during colonial times.

---

In the early 20th century, as its navy transitioned from coal to petrol, Britain found itself in increasing need of oil to run its empire and fuel its numerous war efforts. [...] In 1912, Britain formed the Turkish Petroleum Company (TPC) with the purpose of acquiring concessions from the Ottoman Empire to explore for oil in Mesopotamia. Following World War I, it brought modern-day Iraq under its own mandate [...]. By 1930, the TPC was renamed the Iraqi Petroleum Company (IPC) and was put under the control of a consortium made up of BP, Total, Shell and several other American companies. Together, they pushed for a series of “concession agreements” with the newly formed Iraqi government which would give them exclusive control of Iraq’s oil resources on pre-defined terms for long periods. By 1938, the IPC and its various subsidiaries had already secured the right to extract and export virtually all the oil in Iraq for 75 years. These concessions were granted to the IPC and its subsidiaries while Iraq was ruled by British-installed monarchs and under de facto British control. Thus the state had almost no negotiating power against the British-led consortium [...] In 1955, the Iraqi government started to voice its desire to use the gas being flared in Rumaila and Zubair for electricity generation. In 1960, while negotiating a concession with the IPC, then-Iraqi Prime Minister Abd al-Karim Qasim formally asked the company to let Iraq exploit the gas that it was not using. The same demand came up again and again [...], but IPC and its subsidiaries repeatedly turned the Iraqi government down. [...]

Following the 2003 invasion, the Iraqi oil industry was once again privatised as a result of pressure from the US and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). As was the case in the early 20th century, any negotiations on oil extraction rights took place when Iraq was still under foreign occupation [...]. When the process of auctioning off oil fields in southern Iraq began in 2008, the Iraqi government offered foreign oil companies long contracts of up to 25 years, reminiscent of the early concessions agreements with the IPC. These included stabilisation clauses, which insulated foreign companies from legal changes that might emerge over the course of their contracts. This meant that the companies were, and continue to be, unaffected by any environmental regulations passed by the Iraqi government to reduce pollution [...].

---

Looking back at the development of the oil industry in southern Iraq makes apparent that the kind of pollution that killed Ali has been in the making for some 70 years. His death – like the deaths of many others who succumbed to pollution-related cancers in his country – was not an unavoidable tragedy, but the natural consequence of a long history of colonial violence and extractive capitalism.

Predatory colonial practices that began over a century ago caused southern Iraq’s vast oil reserves to be left under the sole control of foreign companies today – companies that over and over again put profit before the lives of the Iraqi inhabitants of the lands they exploit.

Ali’s death is yet more proof that colonial violence is far from over and that it has many different faces.

---

Text by: Taif Alkhudary. “Southern Iraq’s toxic skies are a colonial legacy.” Al Jazeera (English). 12 June 2023. [Some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

[iamthatwhich]

If you menstruate and are on a path of zero-waste, avoiding plastics, avoiding toxic chemicals, minimizing your footprint, or all of the above, then you’ve likely been faced with a frustrating conundrum: Menstruating is a natural part of your life, but there doesn’t seem to be too many ‘clean’, safe options to deal with it.

First off, let me say that I have been off and away from mainstream menstrual care for over 14 years, including birth control (wrecked my hormones), and storebought sanitary products (full of harmful chemicals like bleach, perfume and hormone-disrupting PFAs!). I have used silicone cups, discs, and cloth pads, and have a lengthy and thorough review of how they are used and what brands I prefer up on my Patreon.

However, for today I want to focus on one tried and true item: The pad.

Pads have been around for centuries- longer if you include their earlier predecessor, The Rag. However, in this time we’ve come pretty far to create a more secure, clean and manageable item— though the creation of the chemically-treated, plastic lined disposable pad has been a regrettable pit stop.

Cloth pads are great because they come in a wide range of colors and patterns (making them more appropriate for more kinds of menstruating people, including men and children) and can be reused for years if cared for properly. Over the past decade, they’ve gone from being available solely from independent sellers on sites like Etsy to  being sold alongside menstrual cups in the ‘alternative’ period care section of many stores. You can also specifically buy  pads made from organic or natural materials and avoid petrol-based textiles.

However, a downside here is that purchasing pads can still be expensive even if you aren’t buying direct from an indie seller. Now, it’s not that they aren’t worth every penny; having made 3 sets myself I fully understand the time, skill and materials that go into making them. But the fact of the matter is that under late-stage capitalism, paying the higher up-front cost for a set of reusable pads can be daunting, even if you know it’s cheaper in the long run (and it is). If you have access to fabric, a sewing machine, and sewing skills, you can half the price, and I’m going to show you  how. The cost of fabric can even be lowered by recycling old towels and clothing and I’ll talk about what you need in the tutorial! As a set of good cloth pads can last from 4-6 years or more, this is a great, frugal and eco-friendly option!

Additionally, I’m going to tell you how to wash and care for your pads since working with reusable pads is way different than just wrapping them up and throwing them in the trash.

For the step by step directions, photos and care tutorial, click here to read for free on my Patreon. All of my content is Patron-supported and Patrons also receive private and early-release posts! If you appreciate my work, feel free to visit my membership page and choose the tier that works for you.

Free tutorial here.

Tips + Thank yous Insta

[moorishflower]

Fawney Rig Estate Sale

Fawney Rig Estate Sale, the flyer says, and Hob doesn't know who placed it, or why they chose the Inn as its final housing, but when Dream sees it, the grainy jpeg of some massive gothic monstrosity of a manse bracketed by the words FURNITURE - BOOKS - COLLECTIBLES, his expression becomes distant, and his hand spasms on the bartop. He's gotten fairly good at reading Dream's moods over the past few months, and this one, he thinks, is a doozy. This one is almost like fear.

There's two things that Dream fears, at least that he's seen fit to tell Hob: one, in the darkling hours of the morning, the both of them twined together, Hob pulling the duvet over Dream's thin shoulders and gathering him close, Dream whispering, do not go far from me, Hob Gadling, and that's its own sort of fear, one that Hob understands. He feels it, too.

The other, more insidious, he's seen only rarely. When light catches on a curve of glass just so; when someone speaks in a very specific register and tone; when the night is too quiet, and too slow, and Dream's fingers begin to scratch lines into the tabletops for want of something to occupy him. Dream has told him, in fits and starts, of a hundred years trapped within a glass sphere. He's never mentioned names, but now, in the way that he looks at this flyer, which Hob wants to rip from the wall and shred into a hundred pieces, he doesn't need to.

"How much of it was left?" he asks that night, and Dream tucks his head against Hob's chest, and says nothing. Hob touches his hair, his shoulders, the dear, thin line of his back, thumbing down the rungs of his spine in slow and gentle strokes. "Right. I've got a sledgehammer somewhere. Matty has a forge he made himself, I'm sure he's got something that can cut metal. Everything else we can have shipped out and we'll dump it into the sea."

I do not know if I can accompany you, Dream tells him, and Hob says, That's fine, love. Whatever you need to do. But there's not a chance in Hell that he's letting this opportunity slip by. It's become as much about his own peace of mind as Dream's -- he wants to see the thing that trapped his lover for a more than a century. Wants to see the glass and the iron, the struts and bolts, rendered down into molten slag. All these years and he's thought his great nemesis was his own selfishness, his own attempt to grasp the uncatchable, and yet Dream has said I would have come to you, if I were able, and Hob now realizes the truth: a few tons of scrap iron and lightning-struck sand were the only things that stood between him and Dream, for a hundred and thirty-three years. And he had never known.

It hurts. It hurts in a way that beggars the soul, and out of the centuries of his past he drags up a brigand's easy violence as he dumps petrol into the car. As he drives to Fawney Rig.

It's every bit as tasteless and huge as the picture implied it to be, and the man who opens the door to Hob is older, bent-backed, something soft and yielding about the shape of his shoulders. He takes in the sight of Hob on his doorstep, dirt-grimed burlap sack over one shoulder, the sledgehammer leaning like a loyal dog against the wall.

"Can I help you?"

"Hope so." He drops the bag. It makes a satisfying clanking noise. "Are you Paul McGuire? Put up a load of flyers for an estate sale?"

"I...yes. That's me. The sale isn't for another two weeks. I'm afraid you're rather early." There's something conciliatory about the way he talks. Some sharp and cavernous thing in him senses it, the way that owls can sense the shape of mice in tall grass. He longs for the feel of a good dagger in his hand. It's been a long time since he killed anyone, but he wants, and he recognizes that this is not good, he wants this gutless old man to put up a fight.

This man has never been bloodied nor bled another creature in his life. He'd make a fine target for a bandit, but for Hob's purposes, he's unsatisfying. He kicks the bag, instead.

"I'm not the mercenary I used to be," he says. "Better for you. There's about. Hm. A bit more than a kilo of gold bullion in that bag. It's old, but any jeweler will tell you it's pure. It's yours if you leave. Now."

"I don't. I don't understand."

"No," Hob says, unkindly. "You don't. Which is why I'm giving you this chance to leave. He said you were the one who let him out. Eventually. After a hundred and thirty-three years."

The man's face goes pale as clotted cream. He looks at the sledgehammer with new fear. He remembers this feeling, the intimacy of a knife held to the throat of one who deserves it. It's not one he anticipated dredging up, not once highway robbery went out of style, but it comes back to him as easy as riding a bicycle. Perhaps he should be worried about that.

He'll worry later. Paul McGuire is nodding slowly, looking ill, looking lost. "Is he here?" he asks, and Hob snorts.

"If he was," he says, "I wouldn't tell you."

And that, as they say, is that. Hob is left standing in the entry hall of Fawney Rig, the fading splendor of it, all its gothic twists and its vaguely occult symbolism wended through with high-quality electric lights and a security system to make the Queen weep. Paul hasn't left him a key. By the end of the night, he doesn't intend to need one anymore.

It makes as much sense to start from the ground up as anything else, and finding the stairs to the basement is easy. The hammer is a comfortable heft over his shoulder, and it's as he starts down into that long and sightless tunnel that he feels the shape take just behind him.

"Hello, love," he says, and Dream reaches out. Hob takes his hand, as easy as breathing. "You doing all right?"

"It looks different. From this direction."

"I imagine it would. You aren't alone this time, though." He squeezes the hand in his. It's like trying to squeeze a stone, cold and implacable. "And we're leaving here together."

"Hm." But the hand relaxes, in minute increments. He can feel Dream behind him, can feel the outline of his shoulders, can see the vague eyeshine cast upon the wall, but he doesn't look back. Hob's read that story before. He'll look back when the job is finished. When they leave Hell together.

"Let's finish what you started," he says, as they reach the bottom of the stairs. The ruin of the glass sphere sits in awful majesty in the center of a narrow moat; even from here, he can see the lines of yellow paint, the runes that bound Dream into an airless, feelingless void. The iron struts are lined with spikes; Hob wishes, abruptly, hotly, that he had only given Paul McGuire to the count of ten to leave. He hasn't any horse to ride him down, but he wouldn't have needed one anyways. An old man, and he with rage giving him winged feet.

"Right," he says, and let's go of Dream's hand, only long enough to heft the hammer properly. "Let's get started, darling. I'd like to be home in time to make you dinner."

He doesn't look back (he'll look back, he thinks, when he has reduced this poxy sphere to dust, when he has ground the iron into filings, when there is nothing left of this cursed mausoleum but concrete dust and burnt pages), but he feels the shape of Dream behind him. Can hear his smile.

It sounds like breaking glass. There's no music sweeter, Hob thinks, and lets the hammer fly.

[sometipsygnostalgic]

The myth of the "Third World"

There is this false notion of "lesser economically developed countries", or "third world countries", wherein people from the "more economically developed countries" believe if the other places Did It Right, then they would become as prosperous and have as high living standards as the "first world".

This is false, because the "first world"'s entire way of living depends entirely on the "third world" taking a different trajectory.

There is literally no possible way for China to live like the UK without, for example, dominating other countries and using them as their main means of production instead, which is what the UK and the USA and France and Germany have done. We have exported our industries and imported all the benefits they bring.

This is why environmentalism is a fucking joke. The UK is so proud of being a greener country but we are simply exporting all our enviromental damage to China and India by having all our factories made there, and having all our vegetation made elsewhere in Europe. We make charts and say we are doing better! Our emissions are down! Look, we've banned petrol cars from London! Then we point to China and go, look how bad their environmental standards are! Look how bad that air pollution is!

Who is responsible for the air pollution in China? It isn't the Chinese. What if one day, China went "fuck this, your factories are ruining our lives and we aren't going to run them anymore"? Would China just get sanctioned into oblivion? Would they lose all the completely necessary economic development that the UK claims China is so behind on?

That's it though, if you're not top of the food chain like the UK was a century or so ago, you need to take a different route to get there because you haven't got the same means of enslavement and resources. And that either involves the domination of nearby countries, and exporting resources there to improve local quality of life, or it involves sacrificing your own environment in order to become an economically powerful country.

I think a lot of people in the UK still don't understand the great power that China and India have developed taking this path, they don't understand that if those countries stopped cooperating, the UK would die within a couple of months. We are not a strong, independent country with a good quality of life. We are like an old abusive relative who is taking advantage of our background of colonialism to exploit countries that are working way harder and better to grow.

[probablyasocialecologist]

If you have the time, could I possibly get some nonfiction reading recommendations from you? Subject regardless :)

Sure!

Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures by Merlin Sheldrake

Red Plenty by Francis Spufford

The Glass Half-Empty: Debunking the Myth of Progress in the Twenty-First Century by Rodrigo Aguilera

The Future is Degrowth by Matthias Schmelzer, Aaron Vansintjan and Andrea Vetter

Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature by William Cronon

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow

A People's Green New Deal by Max Ajl

After Geoengineering: Climate Tragedy, Repair, and Restoration by Holly Jean Buck

Together: The Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation by Richard Sennett

Sparking a Worldwide Energy Revolution: Social Struggles in the Transition to a Post-Petrol World by Kolya Abramsky

A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster by Rebecca Solnit

Sexing the Body: Gender Politics and the Construction of Sexuality by Anne Fausto-Sterling

Drugs without the hot air: Making sense of legal and illegal drugs by David J. Nutt

[mask131]

Can you someday do a post about a very important question that always deeply fascinated me: How technologically advanced is Oz?

Wicked as a stage show puzzles me because it implies Oz has electricity, a broadcast radio system, and trains.

How much tech is present in Oz in the books?

Oh boy that's one COMPLICATED question... Now, before I start saying anything, I will point out that I am not an Oz expert by any means. I have not read all of the Oz books. However I do know an Oz expert that tackled the subject! He is here on Tumblr somewhere, but I know his Oz analysis and lore-exploration by his blogs. He started doing them more than a dozen year ago on vovat.livejournal.com ; and then he continued his Oz posts to vovatia.wordpress.com ; I know they have very, VERY helpful when it comes to my own knowledge of Oz, and he tackled several times the topic of technology in Oz and Baum's work, with quite fascinating analyses! So go check out these blogs, you might find some interesting info!

That being said, what can I tell you?

Since I haven't read all the Oz books I will stick to Baum's novels only - but before doing that I want to point out something... It is something I said in my previous Oz post (So you want to know about Oz 5), but the Wicked stage musical is part of a pretty big wave of 2000s-onward Oz adaptations that decided Oz was a steampunk world. I know you entertained yourself a pretty similar project of a Gilded Age Oz, if I recall correctly? And when you look at Oz adaptations, you have this wave of SyFy's Tin Man, and the Amazon series "Lost in Oz", and the graphic novel/animated movie "The Steam Engines of Oz", and more recently the show "Emerald City". Even "Dorothy and the Witches of Oz" had a steampunk-vibe to their Oz. It is kind of the modern direction to go.

Now back to traditional Baum's Oz... Does it have electricity? I don't think so. The Oz created by Baum is... it is something between a fantasy version of the late 19th century American countryside, and your archetypal fantasy land. The Land of Oz is mostly a huge countryside to be honest. Its lots of forests with woodsmen and wild animals ; it is lot of fields and orchards because most of Oz's economy relies apparently on farming ; the only other big industry seems to be metal-working (Winkies, the guy who made the Tin Man) and stone/gem-working (due to the huge presence of precious stones, though no mine or miner is ever descrbed in the Oz books) ; it is a lot of small villages scattered around the one big city that is Emerald City (or around big castles like the Tin Man/Wicked Witch castle) ; this all gives it a very medieval/feudal feel in structure... Though Baum really tried to give Oz originally a "fairytale feel" and thus you have the same historical madness typical fairytales have. For example, just like your typical Renaissance fairytales (a la Charles Perrault), you have mirrors and candies and porcelaine in Oz ; and yet, just like your also typical 19th century fairytales (a la brothers Grimm) you also have guns in Oz! Mind you the guns are rare and rarely used, they seem mostly to belong to the military cast (they are always wielded by soldiers or royalty bodyguards), and they are usually useless against the monsters and magical threats... But they do exist! But Oz seems to lack things like electricity of petrol or even steam machinery. At least in the beginning!

(In fact I had a chat with @artmakerproductions recently about fireworks in Oz. He wondered if the Oz The Great and Powerful idea of using fireworks as something non-existent in Oz could work with Baum's canon, and indeed, while the presence of guns implies gunpowder is a thing in Oz, there are to my memory no mention of fireworks anywhere in Oz... Maybe they appear at one of Ozma's birthday parties, but I couldn't find which one. Fireworks are evoked in his non-Oz/Oz-crossovered work "The Magical Monarch of Mo" but only as a comparison to how lightning appears in this country...)

Is there radio in Oz? Actually there is! In the opening of book 7, to get out of how he had written his way out of Oz in book 6, Baum explained his return to the series by "Oh yeah, Ozians got hold of the radio and now they send me radio messages about what is going on in Oz". So Oz DOES have some sort of radio equivalent. How, since there's no electricity or batteries in Oz? That's beyond me, but here's why it is difficult to say for certain what Oz's technology level is: Baum, as I said, started not giving a fuck anymore about continuity. As I explained the first two-three books are kind of solid in terms of continuity because they were designed as their own closed novels, but book 4 onward Baum just gave up any concrete effort at "solid" worldbuilding and went the "Fuck it, I'll add whatever I want" road. As such, don't expect any serious effort at making a cohesive technological system - Baum isn't Tolkien. He's the anti-Tolkien. That being said, another very interesting point when it comes to Baum's work is that, as you go through his fourteen Oz books, you realize how modern technology slowly creeps onto Oz. Baum was writing Oz book between 1900 and 1920 - and the technological evolution of these two decades quite influenced Baum. The addition of the radio element was one case of Oz "evolving"; in later Oz books there are also magical equivalents of television popping up. But if you want to see a concrete comparison, you can compare the first Oz book, "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz", with the last Oz book Baum wrote, "Glinda of Oz". The first shows an Oz so technology-lacking people are easily fooled by stage tricks ; while the last book is heavy on technology, with for example evocations of submarines, but it is a technology presented as a form of magic. Which leads me to my last point...

Does Oz have trains? Not by the time Baum wrote them ; though modern day adaptations and authors did add a handful of them to the Oz world (and you can also find things such as ray guns or time-travelling machines in modern Oz books so you know, it evolves with its time). But Baum did wrote about a carriage that did the entire tour of Oz for touristic purpose: that's one of the subplots of "The Emerald City of Oz", and how Dorothy shows her aunt and uncle all about the fantasy land. It is not a train, but you have already here the idea/potential for a train-like system here (even though it is rather a carriage/wagon drawn by a wooden horse that can never tire and doesn't eat). And here's my point: the reason technology is so weird in Oz, and why it is also lacking in many way, is due to Oz being filled with magic.

Most Ozian equivalent to our world's technology is, in Baum, powered by magic. There is no camera or surveillance system, but there are the Magic Picture or Glinda's big magical "spy on everyone" book. There are no lie detectors, but there is Glinda's pearl. The magic eye of the Wicked Witch of the West was explicitely compared to a telescope. Etc etc. Magic replaces most advanced technology around the Land. Advanced technology and mechanism do exist, and Baum was very fond of the idea of the... "magical mechanic" if I can say so. What he does is basically take an actual real-world technology, but take it to fantasy extremes - which notably is why the Oz books are considered early sci-fi. There's how the Tin Man came to be: Baum took the workings of actual real-life prosthetics for missing limbs, but pushed it to the extremes by making a "vintage android". There is how the Woggle-Bug came to be: a great scholar used a machine to project an enlarged image of a small bug on the wall. Quite ordinary right? But turns out the machine literaly enlarged the bug to a greater size - which is a very common sci-fi tropes (all those rays that shrink or enlarge things or objects). And while it is not an Oz example per say, Baum gave us the most blatant example of "magical technology" with the realm of Ev, where lived Smith and Tinker, the inventors of many fantastical automatons, first of which being Tik-Tok, a sentient automat that is considered one of the first robots of modern literature!

So... On one side, Baum tried to show a land that would not advance technologically because magic was there and much more powerful. It is the line by the Good Witch of the North, about how Oz still has magic because it is not "civilized", and one of the traits of "civilization" is advanced technology. Take how guns are treated in Oz: they exist but they are not made a big deal out of, and in fact prove quite useless among the many magical items and beings. And yet, on the other side, Baum's Oz is the literal proof of the law "Any advanced technology is magic" ; or rather a whacky incarnation of this principle, because indeed, the most advanced form of technology in Ozian lands work by fantasy and extravagant sci-fi rules (Tin Man, Tik-Tok), while most of the great spells and magic items of Oz are fantasy equivalents to our real-world technology (the Magic Picture, or even the Gump which works as a fantasy equivalent of flying machines).

[isay]

Chances are that when you think of Australia you tend to think of the beaches, Sydney Opera House, or the red centre and Uluru. Most people by and large tend not to consider that we also have gigantic forests and mountain ranges.

So anyhow, taking advantage of the Chris died for my sins public holiday yesterday, we decided to head out for a drive because Kim has had a hankering to see leaves changing colour with the advent of autumn. We'd planned to head to a place called Jamieson up by Lake Eildon, stopping on the way for lunch at Mansfield, which in winter is the gateway to the snowfields and the skiing at Mount Buller.

Now to get to Jamieson was nice and easy, about a two and a half hour drive on decent enough roads. Not exactly major roads by any means but perfectly capable and comfortable to drive on. But then in Jamieson, with about 120 kms of gas left in the tank we decided to take a 'scenic route' for the return journey.

After forcing Google Maps into choosing a route south along minor roads off we set, oblivious to what lay in wait for us. Essentially a good two and a half hours on unsealed roads, up and down mountains with the traction control freaking out constantly. Both Kim and I are terrible passengers as we both like to have control of the car, but yesterday I got to ride shotgun, which often meant staring off over a sheer drop into a bottomless gorge.

And did I mention the 4x4s that are built to do this that think nothing of roaring along those roads at 60-80km an hour, billowing up clouds of dirt you can't see through? Yeah we came across a few of them too.

Halfway through we also realised that we were likely to run out of gas before making it back to civilisation. Thankfully after about an hour or so and with 60ks of gas left in the tank we made it to a township (pop.30) called Woods Point which showed it had a 'historical gas station'. No actual gas station though.

Thankfully though it has a pub, the Commercial Hotel, which is now my favourite pub in the world. Because it also sells petrol. Just enough to get us back to the 21st century. Off we set again, leaving Brigadoon behind us, grateful that our visit coincided with it's once in a century appearance.

Another hour and a half of time travel through the land that time forgot and we finally hit sealed roads again, much to our palpable relief. Then weaving through some of the most gorgeous driving there is to be had in this world, winding roads surrounded by forest still, and hardly a soul sharing them with us. We finally made it safely home after three and three quarter hours of adventure.

So the moral of this story? There's a reason why Google Maps is sometimes reticent to send you down the road less travelled, and you might want to listen to it. Or you might not, because you'll see things others hardly ever get to, have a grand adventure and you might get to find the best pub in the world.

[canadiannationalfox]

Murder Drones Prequel fanfic - Gone Girl part 2

Morning light was starting to appear on the horizon. Tessa, still in her disguise, sitting at the helm of the stolen company van. She had on the radio to keep her awake, blasting rock songs from centuries ago to keep herself awake.

J had fallen asleep in the passenger seat while N was in the back using the sleeping bag he had brought along for Tessa to use.

Tessa pulled up to a gas station and hopped out, putting on a monster mouth face mask before heading in to pay for petrol.

J started to stir, awakening to see Tessa enter the gas station. She was surprised that it wasn't a dream, and that they were on the run. N was in the back, giggling in his sleep, dreaming about being licked by puppies.

J rolled her eyes and slightly smiled, yes she was stuck with the "corporate losses" but, if it made Tessa happy, that's all that mattered.

Tessa returned and started pumping the petrol into the van's tank. She had intentionally taken the gas-powered car as it couldn't be tracked as easily. She hopped in once she was done filling it up, accidentally waking N as she closed the car door.

"Morning Tessa," N yawned happily, "Where are we this morning?"

J scolded warningly as she threw an empty coffee cup from the front seat at N, "Hey bozo! Her name is Maxxine!"

The young disguised Elliott girl admitted proudly, "We're 357 kilometres from home." She then softly scolded to J, "Please don't throw coffee cups at my robot,"

Tessa started the car up again and drove for a while longer until they reached the outskirts of a city. She pulled the car in-between some RV campers outside of a large box store and urged gently, "I am going to get some rest. You two, I need you to guard the van while I rest, alright?" She pulled off her wig before hopping into the back of the van beside N. Tessa instructed, "I want you to wake me up at 6:00pm, we will then go to a local club for youth. We will meet someone there who can get us to a landing pod."

J froze in shock at what Tessa was implying. "We are leaving this planet?"

The girl who was currently going by Maxxine sat up and nodded, admitting sadly, "It's the only place Mother and Father can't catch us, Jay-bird..."

N looked down sadly, he didn't want to leave. His voice hitched slightly as he rambled, "Wh-what about Cyn, and V, what about them?"

Tessa's eyes welled up too, she didn't feel right about it either, she explained, "It was a risk bringing you two with me as it is... But... it's less likely that we will get caught this way... It's for the best, N."

J sighed before lightly bopping N over the head, "You heard Maxxine, she knows what's best, and we need to respect her wishes."

N felt really worried but hushed up, sitting next to Tessa to be there while she slept, while J watched out the windshield, keeping an eye out for any trouble. Meanwhile back at the Elliott Manor, chaos was ensuing as Mr and Mrs Elliott couldn't find their daughter. James scorned as he got off the phone with one of his employees, "When we find her she's not going to be allowed to leave the manor grounds for a year!"

Louisa sat on a fainting couch, distraught over her only daughter having run away. She glanced up as she saw Cyn hobble into the room. "Oh god, not the little creepy robot." "Giggle," Cyn monotonely greeted, "I think I know where your daughter is."

James took his fancy cane and held the handle right up to Cyn's throat. He ordered aggressively, "Tell me where she is and I will spare your life, toaster."

Cyn let out a monotone laugh as she beeped, "She h-headed out last night, she ran away to try to escape. I th-think possibly sh-she was headed for space."

James lowered his cane and got back on the phone at his desk as he dialed out to the dispatch for the JC Jensen company guard, "I want you all on the look out for my daughter, she headed for the coast and she is trying to run away. If you see her, bring her back, and destroy any drones she has with her."

To Be Continued

[wanderlust-in-my-soul]

Nine People I Want to Get to Know Better

I was tagged by @thisonelikesaliens @byemambo and @twig-tea 🥰 Thank you so much! 🤍

Last song: J'ai Cru Entendre - Louis Garrel, Gregoire Leprince-ringuet

This song is on repeat right now. I stumbled upon a gif set from this movie and I remembered it had a really good soundtrack and now I am obsessing over it. And I love french! Such a beautiful language, but it was hell for me to learn it in school. I was never really good in learning languages and french was just difficult. But I love listening to it.

Favourite Colour: Petrol

Currently Watching: 😂😂😂😂 Sometimes I think too much, but I got on terms with my self and I just watch things I really want to watch. There was a time I was watching everything that aired, if I liked it or not. That is over! But this is my list:

4 Minutes

Bad Guy

Century of Love

Gyeongseong Creature

Hidamari ga Kikoeru

His Man Season 3

My Love Mix-Up!

Takara no Vidro

The Boyfriend

The Spirealm

The Trainee

World of Honor

Some of them I just watch when I am in the mood for it. And why are most of the series airing wednesdays and thursdays? I have a life and have to go to work and earn money to pay for this hobby!

Last movie: Pitch Perfect 2 - I was on a small summer vacation with friends and as we were listening to the soundtrack we decided not to play our Pen & Paper games, but watch the Pitch Perfect Franchise instead in the evenings. Well, we ditched the last one, because it is not good, but it was fun watching the first two with friends.

Currently Reading: The Bones Beneath My Skin - TJ Klune (I am happy it didn't ask what my last read was, because it was such a bad book, I can't believe I finished it...)

Sweet, Spicy, or Savoury?: Savoury... with a little bit of spice and after that something sweet

Relationship: A very happy, long-term relationship with myself 🤍

Current Obsession: The Boyfriend? This show on Netflix, which is really just so good! And I watch it with my best friend which is something special. And of course the soundtrack from "Les Chansons D'Amour".

Last googled: How to shuffle all of my songs on Spotify... I learned that it is not possible so I used a third party website...

Currently working on: An photobook for a good friend who is getting married next month.

That was fun! I am tagging @troubled-mind @aprilblossomgirl @firstkanaphans @nieves-de-sugui @wen-kexing-apologist @djeterg19 @bengiyo @pose4photoml @respectthepetty (Just as always: no pressure, just ignore me, if you don't want to play or if you already did)

[jackhkeynes]

fis "done"

fis /fɪz/ [fɪz]

set, stuck, immovable, placed somewhere on a more-or-less permanent basis;

done, complete, finished, having nothing else of an activity or project to do;

spent, exhausted, empty, having been entirely used up;

despairing, hopeless, resigned to the inevitability of failure or defeat;

screwed, finished, in a hopeless situation

Etymology: past participle of figr "set down, place down, lay" used also as the past participle of figr a "finish, finish off, complete, stop" (where perhaps fis la would be more regular). In the sense of having run out of something, the word is seen from the sixteenth century; in the last senses it is seen from the seventeenth.

Nossy foyail es fis e scein lau pre yonoscon. /nɔˈsi fɔˈjel ɛz fɪz e xin lo pre ˌjo.noˈxɔn/ [nʊˈsi fʊˈʝel ɪz fɪz e çin lo pʀe ˌʝo.nʊˈxɔn] 1p-gn fuel be done and there.be-3p league before wherever We're out of petrol in the middle of nowhere.

[useless-catalanfacts]

No sé si has vist la controvèrsia que hi ha hagut amb la editorial Ivréa aquest cap de detmana per twitter on sembla que han estat bloquejant a gent només per preguntar si anaven a traduir mangues en català.

https://twitter.com/samfaina_visual/status/1672900791982538755?cxt=HHwWhoC2qYWaq7cuAAAA

https://twitter.com/ryuzakyy7/status/1673009848319967235?cxt=HHwWhoC8rfrl3LcuAAAA

https://twitter.com/elmangazin/status/1673015937698594819?cxt=HHwWhoC84bPI37cuAAAA

🤦 No ho havia vist, no.

The social media managers of the publisher house Ivrea are angry that some Catalan people have asked them (with full respect) if they will ever publish some mangas translated to Catalan too (for context, this publisher has a headquarters in Barcelona but only publishes in Spanish). The comment that started it all was this one (in Spanish, so the publisher can understand without complaining):

Translation: Hi @/Ivrea, my niece asked me if some day she'll be able to read #SpyXFamily in Catalan? She's starting to get into manga now thanks to Dr. Slump and Night Guardians and she would love to read it in her mother tongue.

The official Ivrea account blocked Samfaina_visual right after saying this, and tweeted saying these are bad faith comments and that it looks like this is a troll. Ivrea has blocked the other users who commented saying they would like it too or showed support in favour of Samfaina_visual.

There's a Catalan online magazine that talks about mangas called Mangazine, they were blocked by Ivrea too because they reported about this happening, even though they have many times reviewed Ivrea's mangas (which is a way of promoting them without getting paid btw, they're not even thankful for that). They sent a very respectful message to Ivrea asking why they and other Catalan people who post about mangas were blocked, and Ivrea answered a very angry text full of anti-Catalan stereotypes (for no reason, nobody had brought them up before) and pure hatred for the Catalan language, and ends by saying that they will sue for hate crimes against Spanish. For having asked if they will publish in Catalan.

(It's the 3rd link. It's quite long so I'm not translating the full thing but if someone wants to know and doesn't speak Spanish, let me know and I will translate it)

See what we have to deal with? The mere fact that we still exist is treated as a hate against them, just because we survived these centuries of persecution and illegalization, resisted and didn't give in and abandon our language and culture to substitute them for the Spanish ones that they keep telling us are so superior. Nothing against Spanish, we would just like to be able to live in our language, like they have the right to live in theirs. But apparently that's a hate crime. This is the treatment that marginalized languages get in Spain.

I hadn't seen this case before anonymous sent me this ask, but it did not suprise me at all, taking into account the amount of Catalanophobia there is. Very often there are cases like this, or where Catalan speakers are denied healthcare in public hospitals in Catalan-speaking territories because the staff are Catalanophobic: an example from last month, where a man was being served dirty food and denied water and mistreated by the hospital staff in Palma; or when a man called an ambulance and the person who answered the emergency number refused to call the ambulance until he repeated it all in Spanish and started giving him lessons on the phone saying why he must speak Spanish and that "you are not Catalan here" for some reason instead of calling the ambulance; or when a doctor refused to treat a patient for not speaking in Spanish, when this patient had a psychic disability and Catalan was the only language she spoke; or the many, many, many, many, many, many cases where doctors have refused to attend Catalan speakers because they spoke to them in Catalan. Or how people are kicked out of services like a hotel, a bank, a taxi, a petrol station (this one with an extra of anti-Catalan slurs), a press conference, or an airplane for speaking Catalan. Or the way that the Spanish police arrests or fines people just for speaking Catalan (again, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many times) and sues them because speaking Catalan to a policeman is considered disrespect of authority. Or the hoards of Catalanophobic insults that content creators who make stuff in Catalan get online, or the way that tragedies like airplane crashes and terrorist attacks are celebrated on Spanish social media because Catalan people died, or the way that Spanish nationalists (talking about individual citizens here, not just the police) have beaten people up for their ideology, even the Facebook group of Spanish people living in London called to "hunt independentists", among others. And this is without getting into what the Spanish media say or, even worse, the politicians, that reaches points like a mayor of PP (the Spanish conservative party) that publicly said "we must erradicate Catalan and its carriers" (I translate as "carrier" the term "agente portador" which is the wording used for someone who carries and spreads an illness).

All of these cases happened here in Catalan-speaking territories btw, it's not like we go somewhere else and expect to be attended in our language (unlike others ehem), it's in our own country that we're not allowed to use our language.

So, yeah.

[buryustogether]

love, peace, patience, home

summary: in which crowley learns to live after aziraphale is gone.

word count: 3k

tags/warnings: praying, religion, alcoholism, mentions of death, angst, hurt/comfort, crowley is depressed, found family to the MAX, hey siri play i want to break free by queen

author’s note: what if i sobbed uncontrollably

Crowley prayed for the first time since his Fall the evening Aziraphale left him. He did it in his car, because he could not stand to be in the bookshop any longer than he was forced to. Where the bookshelves creaked beneath the weight of love stories and tales of woe, he heard only the sighs and echoes of what once had been. He heard the laughter that inhabited a dance party. He heard the drunken clink of crystal glasses filled with wine that would be returned to its bottle with simply the snap of a finger. He heard the panted breaths through flared nostrils as lips seared together and hands splayed across his back.

He heard far too many things that twisted and stabbed at that dark, rotten heart of his, so he prayed in his car.

He clasped his palms flat together and laced his fingers, and the feeling of creating a sort of knotted steeple with his hands pulled a lurch of his stomach from deep within his belly. Slowly, as if he were waiting for a sword to come down and replace his singular head with two more, he craned his neck and touched his forehead to his thumbs. His ears twitched as he listened to the sounds of nighttime in Soho; a cat yowling in the distance, children running out past their curfew, trucks late on their delivery schedule hurtling past him. It all seemed so very deafening now.

Crowley hesitated for a long, long while, sitting there in his Bentley with his head bowed against his hands. His golden eyes, slitted and dancing with a kind of intimidation forbidden from a demon’s gaze, slipped shut after what could have easily been an hour. His lips parted, and he forced himself to take a breath.

“Don’t know if you’re listening,” he spoke to the emptiness of the car, and to the ears above - so far above. “Or if you’re even bothering to listen to me. I…” He stopped there as the gravity of the situation dawned on him like holy water sizzling into his skin and leaving him nothing but a dark memory.

He was praying to the God who had created him, loved him, hated him, dropped him from the skies into depths of hellfire and anguish that lasted so long. So long. Where he could do nothing but scream and cry and pray for forgiveness until the tar inking his feathers dried and pulled him like lead to the ashy earth. She did everything for a reason - wasn’t that what the humans said? She had let him fall. She had called Aziraphale back.

Why should he pray to Her when She no longer prayed for him?

Crowley unlaced his fingers, even wiped them on his trousers for good measure. He released a slew of swears, and the Bentley seemed to sigh around him in a low creaking of metal and glass. With a sniff of contempt, he knocked the gear into drive and left Soho, and the bookshop, and that singular, miniscule sense of hope he had felt upon kissing his angel, behind.

Crowley rented a flat in Battersea after driving listlessly for two months. He did not stop for petrol. He did not stop for water for his small rainforest of plants in the backseat. He only stopped for liquor and to watch lightning storms when they jumped across the horizon like strokes of an indecisive painter.

His flat was not large, nor did it have the room to fit a double king size bed for him to pass the next century or so in, in peace. In fact, it barely had enough space for him and his greenery. He did not mind this after he grew accustomed to it; with no empty corners or deskspace, he could not glance to his right and pretend to see the gleam twinkling like stars in a pair of sky blue eyes.

Even after renting his flat, Crowley did not open the door for another month; not when the woman across the hall stopped by to give him a pan of welcome-to-the-building lasagna (it was quite horrible); not when smoke from downstairs set off the alarms and the other tenants crowded on the curb to wait for the all-clear. Not when he heard the soft cries of a cat wandering the floor.

Instead he only sat in an upholstered armchair and stared at the brick of the furthest wall, fingers hanging uselessly off the arms and his head tilted at an angle that, normally, would have given someone a crick in their joints. He did this because he knew if he let his head fall, his tears would, as well.

It was no less than a month and a half, or so, when Crowley at last sighed and got to his feet. Pushed his shades over his nose. Unlocked his flat door and stepped outside.

Crowley found love in the two young men downstairs trying to figure out the puzzle of living on their own. They were barely twenty or so - kids, really. The taller of the pair was called Van and wore his hair in a tangled mop over his eyes marked with liner and star-shaped patches he used to conceal his acne. The shorter of them was Sebastian, and he buzzed his head every time the choppy little roots grew too long for his liking. It quite fit with the scarlet red motorbike he drove and the dog tags around his neck that actually once came in a Halloween costume kit.

The demon learned all this when he passed the pair handing out flyers for a community bake sale on the front steps of their flat building. It became evident rather quickly that Van’s mouth was faster than his brain and did not know when to shut up.

“It’s to fund the parade in June,” Van told Crowley after stuffing a bright yellow flier into his hands. “Usually there’s a ton of handouts, and music, and the like. To celebrate, you know?”

Yes, Crowley knew. He’d been watching the same kind of parades from afar for so long he could remember when the first one had been. Had it been before or after Stonewall? He didn’t remember; he’d been hit over the head in a nasty tumble with the authorities after he’d thrown that first bottle.

He had never been able to enjoy the festivities himself. He did not think he deserved to enjoy things such as the like. Silly little humans, he liked to think, celebrating the freedom to love when he did not have it. But he did not think that now.

Crowley stuffed the flier into his blazer pocket and got two blocks down before he turned on his heel, found the boys hawking the little yellow papers, and gave them some three hundred quid for their bake-sale-parade-whatever they wanted to call it. Then he told them Soho was a better place to hand out their announcements than some shoddy neighborhood beside the murkiest part of the Thames. There was a little bookstore on a corner, he told them. Give out the fliers there.

He wanted to think, in that moment, that Aziraphale would have been proud of him. But he hissed and snapped and scolded himself for even allowing the angel back into his head. He drank himself silly that night, and only paused his destructive vice to answer the door when there came a rather annoying knock.

He found Sebastian on his doorstep inviting him down to dinner.

It was at this dinner of frozen pizza and breadsticks from the restaurant around the block that Crowley learned Van’s mother had kicked him out of his home for wearing skirts to school, and that Sebastian was actually from America on what his family thought was a mission trip in Africa. They met at an astronomy lecture at the planetarium.

“Hmm-mm,” Crowley said over the bottle of wine he had brought from his flat (he had gone back upstairs to fetch it after hearing his hosts only had water and week-old lemonade). “Awful place to meet, in my opinion. Stars? Bit cliche, don’t you think?”

“You’re daft, old man,” Van said as he placed his pizza crusts on Sebastian’s plate. “Stars are romantic. You know there’s an old myth that stars are actually people’s souls, and when they collide and explode and whatever, that’s them meeting their other half.”

Crowley exclaimed, “Horseshit! You think some - some bundle of burning, gaseous balls are souls? That’s not what they are. They’re just - just that! Big, searing lights that could burn the flesh off your bones in a fraction of a millisecond.”

Then Sebastian turned to Van and said, “I heard they’re putting in a new exhibit on Alpha Centauri.”

Sebastian and Van hauled Crowley back up the stairs to his flat that night.

Dinner became a weekly occurrence.

Crowley found peace in the old man who lived on the ground floor of his building. Everyone called him Morris. He did not know if that was his real name, but he didn’t like poking around much to ask.

“There she is,” said Morris the third time in a week Crowley returned the black and white cat to her old man. “I just don’t know how the little girl keeps getting out. I should have named her Houdini.”

Crowley knew; Morris often forgot to click his front door shut when he hobbled back on his hand carved cane from his daily amble around the block. He also knew Houdini’s acts had been short of nothing before a certain angel had offered to lend a hand in exchange for a favor, but he kept both these things to himself. It was not like Morris would understand either, anyhow.

“Come in, son, and have a seat,” the old man said as he slowly wobbled back inside his flat. The cat scampered inside and disappeared into another room. “I’ve just opened the daily crossword; this week’s topic is historic events. You’d think I wouldn’t have hardly any trouble with that, now, would you?”

Despite the open invitation, Crowley felt as though he were stuck, planted to the entryway. He found himself fearing - when did he begin doing that? - he would let himself slip back into his instinctual business of temptation, of sin, and convince the old timer to do something rash. Stick his head in the oven, or something of the like. Aziraphale had never let him alone with customers on his watch; did this count as the same thing, he wondered?

Was he so horrible and rotten inside out that he should decline, should slither back to his dark little Eden upstairs and breathe in the silence?

But Morris had already poured Crowley a cuppa, and Crowley knew refusing such a thing was rude. This, Aziraphale had also taught him.

“Suppose it gets lonely down here, doesn’t it?” the demon asked as he watched the old man do his crossword puzzle from behind those shades of his. “Hardly suspect the church kids are paying good-deed visits to this part of town.” He scrunched up his nose. “No offense.”

Morris chuckled from deep within his throat and the whiskers on his chin quivered as he spoke. “One would think,” he replied. His shaking hand used long, careful strokes to plot out each letter along the blank boxes. “But I have Francesa.” He gestured to the cat, who now lay across the back of the plastic-draped sofa cleaning her pink paws. “And Elizabeth will always be here.”

At this, Crowley’s attention was drawn to a yellowed portrait of a woman hung delicately above the mantelpiece. Her hair burned golden like sunlight and her smile showed just a bit too much gum.

He could not stop himself from asking, especially with a subtle hiss of his pointed tongue to smell the air, to smell the long-since faded scent of an elderly woman across the flat, “Don’t you ever want to up and leave? I mean, you pair obviously lived here for a time. Doesn’t it all bring back… you know.”

Dance parties. Refilled wine bottles. A kiss quite literally stolen in the sunlight that filtered through the windows.

Morris said, “I suppose sometimes. But, where would an old man go, hmm? Besides…” He exhaled a shaky, unsteady sigh and slowly crossed off a hint from the horizontal rows. “It hurt for a time, yes, but not anymore. All I’m left with now are the best times.” The old man went silent for a long moment as he studied his puzzle. “I just can’t seem to get this one.”

Crowley read the hint upside down. “The London Blitz,” he said.

He should have remembered the smoke and the bombs, the trembling of his hands as he raised the rifle on that bloody stage.

But all he pictured was that angelic face as he handed over a leather bag of books, and that dazzling smile through the lights and the whispers in the crowd.

Crowley found patience in the woman who lived across the hall from him with her four-year-old daughter and no one else but the drawings on the walls and the children’s movies playing on the telly all hours of the day.

There came a great shattering one day sometime in the afternoon that could have drawn the attention of the entire building, and it was Crowley who answered the sound.

Jamie was the woman’s name, and she bore the lines beneath her eyes of too many sleepless nights and the markings around her mouth of so, so many smiles - the kind that lit one’s face up like the only bulb in a darkened room. Crowley had seen that kind of smile before. Her little girl’s name was Claire, and she was rather tearbound at every inconvenience. Normally he would have rolled his eyes back in his head, or miracled the child into being silent. But he had become immune to it, listening to the pitiful little wails after nightmares or a favorite stuffy had been lost.

Crowley found himself listening to the girl’s cries as he glued pieces of a broken vase together again while Jamie bandaged a cut over a tiny knee in the loo down the hall. His hands held steady even over the sounds of little hiccups and the hushes of a sleep-deprived mother trying her very best.

What was that horrible feeling in Crowley’s stomach, just beneath his ribs? Sympathy?

When he was sure they were still occupied cleaning the loo of band aid wrappings, he waved a subtle hand over the shattered vase and watched from behind his shades as the ceramic pieces came together again as they once had been. Satisfied, he left the now-intact vase on the kitchen table and stood just as the girls entered the living room from around the corner.

“You’re not going already?” said Jamie as she plopped her little girl on the couch and set up a favorite film to play. “Please, let me send you home with a bit of dinner as a thank you.”

“That won’t be necessary,” said Crowley, in part because he did not like her cooking in the slightest. But he did not say that. “You’ve got your hands full, anyhow.”

“Oh, please.” Jamie produced a red little popsicle from the freezer and handed it to Claire, along with a quick kiss on the head to fix everything that had gone wrong. “I could juggle more than an acrobat.” With widened eyes and slightly parted lips, she examined the vase sitting on her kitchen table. “Wow. I can’t even see the cracks. You’re a miracle worker.”

Crowley watched as Claire’s hands grew stained red from her treat, sticky and sure to make a right mess. “Can I ask you something?” he found himself asking, despite everything that screamed at him to keep his damn mouth shut. “You ever lose your temper with… you know.” He gestured vaguely to the little girl and the mess she was making in the middle of the couch. Had that been his sofa, he would have gotten himself struck with the searing, crackling energy of raging lightning by now.

Jamie exhaled a deep sigh and braced herself on the table, face turned to her daughter and the silly animated film playing on the telly - for the umpteeth time. It was a wonder the pictures hadn’t burned themselves into the screen by now. “To be frank with you,” she said, “I do. It’s hard, I’ll tell you that. But… part of it, honestly, is finding things I love about her to cool me down. And that’s not hard.”

Crowley thought of all the things there were to love. Soft blue eyes. A plush, coy kind of smile. The sweet smell that lingered in the car long after his passenger had gone.

By the end of the season, Crowley had fixed so many things in Jamie’s flat he knew Claire’s favorite film by heart.

Crowley found home in the cramped little flat building in Battersea right beside the Thames. It was not a bookshop organized in such a tedious way he wondered how anything was found inside. It was not his car, parked obediently out on the curb in his now-designated spot.

It was his respective seat at a top on Christmas Eve, across from an old man whose name only may have been Morris, with a black and white cat who wove between the legs beneath the decorated table. It was the single mother called Jamie who placed a steaming meal on colorful placemats as she smoothed her little girl’s hair in the chair beside him and barked orders to the two young lovers - one Van and Sebastian - as they attempted to prepare dressings and toppings in the kitchen.

Crowley felt at ease there, welcome there, in a way he knew as foreign and unfamiliar. There was a kind of love here he was not supposed to feel because technically he had no heart, but he did; deep down in his chest, in his veins, in his very being. He felt it there at the table. He felt it in the stairwell on his way down to go and fetch the paper when dinner was done to fetch the paper with today’s crossword. He felt it on the front steps, covered in snow, where he met a gaze across the street he had spent centuries falling into over and over again.

Crowley and Aziraphale stared at one another for a long moment, there amidst the falling snow and illuminated by the blinking holiday lights strung across the poles.

Crowley felt a small hand tug at his sleeve, and after a few beats of stillness, he collected the paper and allowed Claire to pull him back inside. The door shut softly behind him; no slam, no resounding thud that echoed for miles.

Aziraphale’s gaze wandered up floor after floor until they landed on a flat window pouring from the edges with golden light, filled to the brim with laughter. He watched his demon join them, and a smile graced his lips before he turned and disappeared into the darkness of the evening.