#to stop coal leaving a site

[ludojudoposts]

Premiere - Pit Strike (1977) dir. Roger Bamford, writer. Alan Sillitoe

Starring: Brewster Mason, Bernard Hill, Jennifer Linden, Paul Shane, Paula Tilbrook, Johnny Allan

[sureuncertainty]

so as a former employee of RMS Titanic Inc, I have some thoughts I need to get out about this whole current situation, or I will literally explode.

for context, I worked for RMST Inc. for a year and a half as a tour guide and artifact specialist. The company owns the salvage rights to the wreck site, and partners with Oceangate and other companies to retrieve artifacts. the artifacts are used for educational purposes only, in the museum that I worked at, although they weren’t above selling little bits of coal from the Titanic in stupid little tchotchkes like snowglobes and hourglasses.

i dedicated so much of my life and passion to that company and that museum and was treated like absolute dirt lol. and I didn’t even get the worst of it, I had friends and coworkers whose safety and wellbeing was consistently disregarded for the sake of profit, fighting desperately for corporate to stop pretending to care about the legacy of Titanic when all they really cared about was making money

so despite my initial shock at reading about what was going on with the missing submersible, I can’t say I’m surprised. This is what fucking happens when you cut corners and put profit over everything else. If only there was some big historical event that we could look to that would show us just exactly how dangerous that can be...  oh wait.

Jack Thayer, who was 17 when he survived Titanic, said that “the world woke up on April 15, 1912″, which pretty much sums up how SURE people were in 1912 that they would never make those same mistakes again. They realized had gotten complacent and swore things would be different. They enacted safety laws, pointed fingers at survivors, created conspiracy theories to try to explain what happened, all out of fear of it happening again. And yet, history always repeats itself

and now people are fucking OBSESSED with the Titanic, they find it fascinating,  they won’t fucking leave it alone, and the company I worked for, and Oceangate, and others, capitalize on that because they’re greedy and want to make money off of it. all they care about is how to profit off of it. they PRETEND to care about Titanic but they don’t. They never did.

I also actually have a personal connection to one of the five members of the team in the submersible. I met P.H. Nargeolet at the event our museum did commemorating the 110th anniversary of the sinking, I spoke to him and heard firsthand some of his accounts of dives to the wreck site, I even took a picture with him. He cared, he cared so much about Titanic and its legacy, and so do I and so did so many of my friends I worked with. The company we worked for took advantage of our caring, it took advantage of how passionate we were about it in order to line its executives’ fucking pocket

I’m horrified, I’m devastated, I’m vindicated.

on the one hand, I hope this ruins them. i want to watch the company die. there’s a satisfaction in that. but the shitty thing is how much suffering has to happen for things to change. i just wish good people didn’t have to die to make change happen. I wish people cared first, before tragedy strikes. I wish our world wasn’t so fucked up and shit like this didn’t happen. But it did. And it does. And money won’t save any of those people any more than it saved John Jacob Astor or Benjamin Guggenheim, or any of the other rich greedy assholes who died on Titanic. I’m not celebrating their deaths. But I won’t ever forget who suffers the most. The coal trimmers and the stewards and the minimum wage guest service associates at the museum I worked at.

I’m glad I don’t work there anymore. But some of my best friends still do. And I don’t want them to suffer more because of this. All I can hope is that it enacts meaningful change that actually lasts. But I know that’s just wishful thinking.

[myemuisemo]

The fiery bowels of hell are the setting for chapters VIII and IX of The Valley of Fear, in the two most recent Letters from Watson -- or, it's Pennsylvania.

Referring to "this most desolate corner of the United States of America" as of 1875 made me think first of Pittsburgh, but that's not possible, as Pittsburgh's steel industry didn't start until that year. This place in the grimy folds of the Allegheny mountains has been going for a while.

My heart says that the Vermissa Valley is an expy of the Wyoming Valley in the northeastern part of the state, where there is a string of towns from Carbondale at the northern end, through Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, down to Nanticoke. The iron furnaces of Scranton, Grant, and Company had the largest production in the United States in 1865, according to the Anthracite Museum. This is anthracite coal-mining territory, as well: the hardest, blackest, and purest grade of coal.

(Had I known I'd be reading this novel in 2024, I'd have made a point of visiting the Anthracite Museum when I went to Scranton in 2019. I was mostly there for the Steamtown National Historic Site, the massive railroad museum.)

The little single-line railroad could be any of a number of lines, since the Scranton area was the birthplace of railroading and very heavily served. It's possible that the train is a narrow-gauge line, better designed for handling mountains.

Given the meanness and muddiness of the settlement where the twinkling-yet-threatening John McMurdo stops, it's probably not Scranton: that had already passed 35,000 in population by 1875. Wilkes-Barre was a bit above 10,000, which still seems large. Of course, the point of the Wyoming Valley is that there is an almost continuous string of little towns, and we don't know why McMurdo wants any one town more than another.

The presence of a Market Square in chapter IX doesn't indicate much, as that was a common design wherever Connecticut settlers had perched -- which includes Wilkes-Barre, the site of the post-Revolutionary War scuffle between the states of Connecticut and Pennsylvania, known as the Penn-Yan Wars. ("Connecticut sea-to-sea" is also why Ohio has a Western Reserve where the towns look straight out of New England. The Nutmeggers calmed down before getting west of Ohio, though.)

By 1875, the Wyoming Valley was loaded with Germans, Irishmen, and Welshmen, all jostling for mining work that was, in the aftermath of the Panic of 1873, increasingly ill-paid. It was thus a scene of great industry but not great happiness.

I'm not sure what Doyle has in mind for the shacks with verandas lining the streets, so I'll just share an example of an 1876 "company town" house from New Haven, Connecticut. The big factories build tons and tons of these. At one point in the 1990s, I lived in one (not this one). This sort of house typically has three bedrooms on the second floor, a little bedroom off the dining room on the first floor, and enough space for two bedrooms in the attic. So you could squeeze a boarding house in here.

With the boarding house comes the landlord's beautiful daughter. Poor Ettie! She can't get McMurdo to leave her alone, nor can she shed her other suitor. Did she have friends among the daughters and wives of her neighbors, or is she another rose blooming alone in harsh soil?

The Eminent Order of the Freemen are presumably expies of the Freemasons: I guess if the members are going to be dreadful in an organized way, it's necessary to invent a pound-shop knock-off (though the Mormons certainly didn't get that courtesy in A Study in Scarlet).

We're still in the era when fraternal organizations were vital in giving a man entry into society in a new place. You might know no one -- but if you knew the secret handshake, you were instantly provided with friends and business partners. The Welsh Philanthropic Order of True Ivorites was present in the Wyoming Valley; and of course, Odd Fellows were everywhere. (Throw a stone in an old mining town in the U.S., and you'll hit an Odd Fellows Hall. it'll often be one of the oldest buildings still standing.)

The fact that the Freemen's lodge leader is called the Bodymaster -- I assume this is supposed to sound menacing, but it has the ridiculous feel of something the Clampers would have come up with. Yes, fraternal orders were so popular that there was a parody version formed in the 1850s: E Clampus Vitus. The Clampers faded, with the rest of the fraternal movement, after the 1870s -- only to rise again in the 1930s and establish their mission as preserving local history in the West. So many an historic monument in small-town Caliornia has E Clampus Vitus on its plaque as the sponsor.

Since the Bodymaster is excited about making counterfeit currency, I feel this secret society will not be as fun as the Clampers. Having a side line in murdering people, as the Scowrers, also is not quite a gentleman's work.

I'm presuming McMurdo is Douglas, so he's going to get the girl and not get killed -- but something else will surely go very, very wrong.

[she-elf4]

A Few Headcannons

People talking about their headcannons has me feeling inspired, so here's my 2 cents worth, lol! I'd say sorry for the length, but nobody here seems to mind much.

Klink: his birth mother was the Kaiser's younger sister, but they had a falling out shortly after her marriage. She then died in childbirth. Klink's father, thus denied a royal connection and now with a newborn, tricked a common girl into marrying him, not telling her that, in spite of being nobility, he's wasted the family fortune on gambling and bad investments and has a newborn for her to take care of. She, of course, is resentful, but tries her best not to take it out on Wilhelm. However, most of her warmth goes to her own son. However, she does her best to shield Wilhelm from the worst of his father's temper by sending him out to do chores when his father gets too rough. Wilhelm does the same for his younger brother, who is a bit of a troublemaker. When Wilhelm is around 10-12, his stepmother is forced to send him away, supposedly to find work and stop draining the family coffers, but in reality, to keep his father from killing him in a drunken rage. Wilhelm initially works at a coal mine outside Hammelburg, but the mine got shut down due to a dangerous contamination that makes the minors sick. He then gets a letter from his stepmother, telling him the truth of his lineage, and enough money to take a train to the capital. For a couple of years after his reunion with his mother's family, it looks like he'll lead a charmed life. Then the Great War starts. Wilhelm starts out in the Calvary, but an incident at Somme involving a horse, a hand granade, and a tank leaves him with a head injury and a quick transfer to the Luftwaffe. His first run-in with Hochstetter is part of what leads him to become the kommandant of Stalag 13.

Hochstetter: he originally hails from a middle class family that was hit hard by the Great Depression. He's one of those types that tends to blame every rich and/or royal person he can find for all the evils of the world. Instead of using this to fuel a desire to help his fellow man, he uses this to fuel his desire to punish anyone he sees as complicit (which is a rather long list). His actual beef is with Klink, not Hogan. Hogan is merely a convenient substitute. With how desperate Hitler is for royal approval, Hochstetter knows he can't get away with "interrogating" Klink very easily, and he's already done so once without official permission. His desperation to prove that Hogan is Papa Bear is, in part, a ploy to cover his ass before Klink spills the beans.

Burkhalter: an interesting quirk about the German royal family during this timeframe is that almost all the male members were named Something-Wilhelm or Wilhelm-Something. In Klink's case, it was Prince Wilhelm-Frederik, the Duke of Hammelburg, but he's more commonly known as Prince Frederik to differentiate him from his cousins, the Kaiser's sons. Burkhalter knows of Prince Frederik's valor during Somme, and he knows Klink served during the Great War. However, he does not consciously realize that they are the same person. All he knows is that Klink knows about the mine tunnels, Klink having informed him of the contamination at one end of the mine just as Burkhalter was getting ready to build the camp (having been put in charge of choosing the site). He took a big risk in letting Klink live, which seemingly pays off as Klink stays silent about the fact that the camp is still directly over part of the mine, just the safe part. Having Klink as the Kommandant lets Burkhalter keep an eye on him. Over time, he grows on Burkhalter rather like athlete's foot. While the initial threats to send him to the Russian Front were real, they've become rather empty as time went on. Burkhalter would rather die than admit it, but he's grown rather fond of Klink, apparent bumbling idiocy aside. He'll be rather shocked when he learns the full truth.

Hogan: his birth mother was a "woman of the night," and not very careful about keeping her son safe from her "clients." Eventually a new roommate and fellow "Woman of the night" noticed what was going on and took Robert away with her, posing as his mother. She brought him to an old boyfriend, who was a nice, strait-laced, military man with, by now, a wife and other children. Knowing the kind of life his former flame has fallen into, and knowing that Robert couldn't possibly be his, Mr. Hogan and his wife nonetheless take responsibility for Robert. It takes a while for Robert to adjust and start trusting his new family, but he eventually comes to flourish, though he has a love of mischief that gives his dad most of his grey hairs. He volunteered for the mission of setting up some kind of espionage at Stalag 13, not knowing for sure how much he'd be able to do, or if he'd be caught and executed right away. He actually is bisexual, and has 2 rather contradicting types: kinda sleazy but very smart women (like his savior), and high-class easily flustered men (like his dad). Klink somehow manages to be both at once.

That's all I have at the moment.

[allisonreader]

@inklings-challenge Here’s my challenge story for this year.

Grandfather's Story

(Not a true story.)

There’s a story that my grandfather always liked to tell about his days working in a coal mine. He would always tell it to his kids and then us grandkids. Most of us weren’t sure whether to believe it, but he swears that it’s true.

His story starts with a tragedy.

A tunnel had collapsed and miners had died. Others were injured and managed to get out of the mine.

My grandfather had been one of the men tasked with shoring up the tunnel so that the dead could be safely removed to be given to their families for proper burials.

He and the other men took a canary in with them. An important alarm system for them even though they weren’t actively mining.

They had been working for several hours and had managed to bring all but one of the dead up. This particular gentleman had been buried in the wall collapse more than any of the others had been. As soon as they had managed to recover him, my grandfather and the other miners swear on their lives that the canary spoke. Telling them that they needed to leave before the tunnel collapsed further, before the bird fell completely silent.

Not a single man my grandfather worked with hesitated. They grabbed the dead man and booked it out of the mine as quickly as they could. Just making it out before the tunnel did indeed collapse behind them.

The canary returned to its regular singing once out of the mine.

Not a single one of those miners; my grandfather included, heard that canary or any other, speak like that again. My grandfather was certain that if the canary hadn’t spoken that all of them working to retrieve that last man would have been buried and died.

When that canary died, he was buried with all the dignity of a human and was given his own highly attended funeral. All the miners who were there that day, came to honour the bird that not only saved their lives but allowed families to bury their loved ones as they wanted to.

I still find it hard to believe that the canary spoke, but it’s also hard to argue with the amount of witnesses. Plus my grandfather loves to tell the story and I won’t tell him what to believe when he was the one who was there.

🐦‍⬛🐦🐦‍⬛🪹🪺🐦‍⬛🐦🐦‍⬛

So fun fact. I wrote this fairly short story during the duration of a one of the sprints that I've held this year. It came from out of nearly nowhere where, as I certainly never had anything planned like this for Team Chesterton, either this year or previous. I also have only given it a basic once over before posting it. (Mostly out of fear of not deciding to not post it if I leave it too long.) I'm still not super confident about it. Part of that is because of how I wrote it feels very much like a post that you would come across in the wild on this site in some ways. By which I mean I feel like it's more written like a post telling a story than how I typically write stories. Anyways I think I should stop over explaining before this becomes more of a mess than this note might already be.

(Three days after originally posting; post note. I'm pretty sure the nerves about sharing this were more just typical new posting than actually about the style. Because the story does exactly what I intended it to do. Be a quick story told in a way like I'm telling friends/explaining this story that is passed down by family. So I mean it's definitely not that I don't like it, it's just generally not how I write fictional stories. Anyways this is to say that while I might not have been confident, doesn't mean that I don't feel accomplished in what I have written. Now I probably really have over explained at this point.)

[phosphoresccent]

phosphor goes mining for lore in voltz, the post, part 3

warnings for: my inescapable xephos bias, honeyphos agenda, past members who were in voltz, excessive reaching on my part

episodes 11 -15 under the cut

xeph and honeydew being scared of the sounds the endermen make vs lalna just finding them obnoxious - love it

honeydew makes first contact (derogatory) with ridge and gets poisoned for his troubles.

episode 12 is The Bomb, which i think we all remember, but put very shortly: sips and sjin blow up a world-ending forever-bomb, ridge tries to fix it with admin/god powers, can't, recruits lalna and xephos to fix it - xeph fixes it (though not after his first reaction to being teleported to a horrific bomb site being PLACING TORCHES i love xeph so much), we go back to normal after burring the sipsco base back into the mountain.

the treaty: i do like how honeydew is apparently the most neutral party here. he is. very much not, but its funny we are going with this. lalna signed his name with a little ! after it which is very cute.

honeydew,,, lore? - he signed the treaty: Honeydew of Khaz Modan, son of Gimli, son of Glion, son of Grion, Son of Dave. so if you ever need some members of his family - there you go! presumably dwarves use the nordic patrilineal "[fathersname]son" or "[fathersname]dottir" style of last names? so Honeydew Gimlison is a lore complaint full name

"no more messing around with powers out of your control" xeph. i think you should have headed your own warning.

"it must have been that cave in at sipsco that we don't talk about, because it was so traumatic that i can barely remember" we can take that a few fun ways - does xeph have poor memory for stressful situations (ie, dissociative amnesia) or did his temporary godhood leave a bit more of a mark than previously considered?

xeph completely unimpressed by the idea of a plasma canon is very funny

there is something about the way xeph treats his own mistakes vs the way he treats others - like when lalna or honeydew fuck up he'll snap at them and go run in to fix it, but ultimately doesn't give it another moments thought, compared to the way he lets his own mistakes build and expand because he can't stop worrying at them like loose teeth, but he never asks for help.

videos for the 'xeph is scared of the dark' pile: 2 (something about the contrast of a coal torch and an in progress particle accelerator is sending me)

honeydew being good with and liking animals is a fun character quirk considering he's a dwarf raised in the depths of a mountain - might have been one of the reasons he left in the first place (other than his love of space, which seems to also be canon to some extent)

"its good to familiarize yourself with being dropped in lava, so you know what to expect" <- another incidence of something lewis saying being funny, but in context of the character xephos being deeply concerning. he would do stuff like that though, wouldn't he?

radiation poisoning counter ticks up by 1 2 3 4 (first xeph i think!) 5

lalna 🤝 me : unable to read clocks

xeph tripping over his own words and getting gently bullied by honeydew, yeah i'll add that to the headcanon list.

i have somehow not mentioned comrade yet, but i love him.

xeph bullying honeydew for his fragile little house and then instantly going to hide it from other people so they can't damage it is very sweet

the reactor has broken again and the boys recreate the "this is not a place of honour" nuclear warning sign.

the 'do not cheat' treaty has lasted exactly 2 episodes, well done everyone.

this isn't lore but them all laughing helplessly at their own ineptitude is very cute

honeydew and lalna on an epic adventure to the nether, certainly nothing bad will come of this.

[nichenarratives]

Hurricane Heller 15

A Niche Narratives Fanficiton.

last | first | next

[tw for: period typical anti-semitism, anti-semitic terrorism, mentions of ww1]

15. Chag Sameach

Of all the months in the year, Mordecai despises December. Not only is it unbearably cold for a short haired feline, but it's also the time of year that complete strangers feel the need to wish one another holiday greetings for a celebration he does not acknowledge, bid for charity, or generally put their noses where they don't belong. While such behaviour does lead to an increased interrogator workload, the anticipated flush of funds is swiftly swallowed by increased electricity or coal and wood costs, leaving him exhausted and miserable, with very little to show for his efforts.

However, with the United States' continued involvement with ongoing disputes in Eurasia, such restrictions would worsen swiftly; food, electric and fuel shortages plague the poorer sectors of the city, while continued contractions in economic growth and massive inflation raise domestic prices for what remains available. Despite hating the cold, Mordecai stops purchasing coal for the fire and rations what he has left, his home practically an icebox that wilts his plants and tests his immune system on a daily basis. 

All high calorie or shelf-stable food, especially wheat, meat and fatty foods, are harshly rationed so excess can be sent to the frontline. Kosher meat in particular gets increasingly more difficult to source, leading to a restricted diet of soups or broths that do little to warm or fill his stomach. He loses weight and has to layer numerous blankets to sleep at night, though often nods off in the warmer launderette back room due to restless nights as frost gathered along the windowsill.

Despite being willing to do his duty for a country that openly despises his people, Mordecai is swiftly removed from the conscription pool due to severe myopathy, instead watching his neighbourhood become almost a ghost town overnight. As one of the few remaining men, a cluster of those deemed too sickly or disabled to serve, he's highly aware glares and quiet remarks questioning his patriotism follow him down the street, but that's the least of his concerns.

It's never been more dangerous to walk the streets openly sporting a kippah or tallit, as rumours from the frontline of an Semitic conspiracy to transform Europe into a Jewish haven begin to infiltrate the city. While known to the family, most in his area of the city aren't aware of his religious affiliation, but that doesn't prevent his concerns regarding his mother; she still takes his sisters to Sabbath services each Sunday even as reports of arson attacks during prayer, rising assault cases and even false arrests hit the papers.

He's still not spoken to them since his brief interaction with Esther, but that doesn't abate his concern; estranged he may be, but he's far from distant. He still slips their - recently thinned - allowance under the door, but adds an afternoon walk past his childhood home to his schedule, to ensure smoke rises from the chimney as mother makes the evening meal.

It's a reassurance they made it home safe, one he clings to until before his next walk.

By the seventh of December and the United States' official declaration of war on Austria-Hungary, Mordecai is forced to shut down the two least profitable enterprise's, the races and the launderette, and moves his base of operations to the most stable business; the Casino.

A week before Christmas, the seasonal celebration most of the city has preoccupied itself with to feed their sullen souls, Mordecai gets an unexpected visit from Gabriel in his office at Casino Royale. Since they usually only converse at the old quarry - their new interrogation site, after the factory was reopened to manufacture artillery for the war effort - the tom is wary when the man is shown in. Offered a drink, Gabriel gladly accepts before sitting down in a plush chair opposite Mordecai with his usual broad, toothy grin. 

Working closely with the family for a year allowed Mordecai to gather more intelligence on his coworkers, and Gabriel is no exception. The pure white persian is Mr Savage's most trusted Cleaner, a man who finds, secures and after an interrogator is done with them, disposes of the loose ends that running a shady business tends to produce. He's also technically the monochrome tom's direct manager, paid enough to give Mordecai a third of it after his work is complete, a lucrative arrangement for the cheerful feline.

"Afternoon, Kosher," he states, taking off his hat and placing it on the desk before getting comfortable, slinging a calf onto the opposite knee and leaning back in his chair. Sharp eyes scale around a room far larger and more appealing than the Launderette store room before returning to bored emeralds, the cheerful feline digging in his breast pocket for a smoke. "Nice digs. Who'd you have to kill for this pretty piece?"

"Fiores," the monochrome tuxedo responds blandly, closing his ledger with a sigh as the persian cracks up with laughter,  an ear flickering in irritation as he waits for him to settle. It takes an enforcer placing a scotch on the rocks before him for Gabriel to quiet down, though he chuckles even through sipping the liquor. Mordecai sits back and regards him with narrowed eyes, unamused. "Why are you here, Gabriel? I'm exceptionally busy."

The man hums through a mouthful of whiskey and swallows with a gulp, lowering the glass slightly to point at Mordecai with his index finger. "You're always busy," he observes, not at all perturbed by the other, as he's grown accustomed to Isaiah Fitzgerald's direct style of communication. When he deepens his glare, Gabriel dips his spare hand into a pocket and withdraws a Christmas card, offering it across the table. "The boss asked me to deliver this in person."

Mordecai sighs softly before he leans over to take the card, placing it face down on the table, without looking inside, his gaze remaining on Gabriel. While unoffended by the gaudy, decorated tree and snow-surrounded robin on the front, he's had enough of the imagery already; the city seems to have gone mad with it this year. "Jewish practices don't observe Christmas," he states. "But I can send a return card, if that is customary."

Gabriel pauses to light up, apparently not put off by the lack of an ashtray. Mordecai wrinkles his nose as he sucks on the offensive stick, the scent of burning tobacco permeating the small office before he even exhales.

"Open it," the persian feline instructs, leaning back with that same irritating smile still plastered across his face. Mordecai begrudgingly opens it flat on the table and finds no seasonal greetings.or message besides the name 'Kosher', above a date and time, scrawled in the bottom left corner. Mordecai frowns and glances up. "It's an invitation," Gabriel clarifies. "To the boss' annual poker game; a Christmas thing, but I don't know anyone brave enough to refuse an invitation. I don't think you're fool enough to be the first, either."

He pauses to down the rest of his whiskey, the ice clinking against the glass, before placing the empty tumbler down and retrieving his hat. "Be outside and ready to go," Gabriel elaborates as he replaces his hat, wide smile not leaving his muzzle. "And bring a gift. We usually aim for about half a month's wage. Just don't try giving him money; if he wanted cash, he'd cut your wage."

The persian stands, laughs at his own joke and sees himself out of the office. Once he's gone, Mordecai frowns at the invitation again, holding the card open with a splayed palm. December 24th; 1300 hours. With no prior plans and certain a refusal will see him floating in the bay Christmas morning, Mordecai is forced to think on what gift he could source in six days for the head of New York's largest crime syndicate.

What do people even give for Christmas?

oOo

Unfamiliar with Christian traditions and without the energy or time to conduct sufficient research, Mordecai falls back on Passover tradition and purchases a bespoke Seder plate; a simple white ceramic with a gold leaf trim, and a central tree of life motif. The branches of the tree link to six shallow, gold trim bowls set into indents on the plate, as another gold tree motif adorns the interior of each bowl to match.

While a traditional Seder plate may possess inscriptions to denote intended contents of bowls, Mordecai is painfully aware Mr Savage doesn't care for Passover traditions, so forgoes the inscription to allow free use of the ceramic plate as a serving dish for any occasion. He even fills the bowls with dried fruits and nuts before boxing up the bastardized Seder, securing a simple card inscribed with the traditional chag sameach on top.

He waits outside on Christmas Eve in heavy winter gear; his coat collar popped against the cold, a deep red scarf tucked into his overcoat and thick leather gloves. Standing under the awning over his front door to avoid the wind, he still shivers, so is thankful when his ride is punctual. At exactly one, the usual estate car pulls up to the curb, and Mordecai wastes no time getting in if only to get out of the cold.

Placing the gift down on the left hand seat, Mordecai sits far to the right, diagonal to the driver, who only glances over his shoulder before they pull away. No words are exchanged, which isn't unusual, so Mordecai spends the time blowing into his palms or briskly rubbing his hands together in his gloves, shoulders hunched and coat pulled high around his neck, until he's sufficiently warmed up.

The drive downtown is short. They turn into a neighborhood the tuxedo isn't familiar with, though the tall, narrow homes, boarded windows where shattered glass would otherwise let in the cold and flaking exterior plaster is familiar enough as they pass through. 

Soon enough, they leave the slums and pass into a middle class area, before slipping into the entertainment district.

Mordecai has never been this far into the city before. Bright neon lights glimmer and shine outside every restaurant and bar, denoting cocktails, liquor or burlesque shows, all a stark contrast to the dim storefronts of his own neighbourhoods. In addition to the visual clutter, muted music thrums around the car, swelling and abating as they pass establishments in a constant tide against the dark.

Despite it being new and mildly overwhelming, he takes it all in through narrowed eyes, no change in expression besides folding ears back at the cacophony of conflicting sounds or squinting against the glare reflecting off his pince nez. Silently, he hopes he has no reason to return to this area of the city besides forcibly attend another of Savage's parties; it's abhorrent to tolerate.

A short while later, they pull up outside a diner deep in the heart of it all. Mordecai thanks the driver, tips him fifty cents and slides out of the cab with the gift box in hand, pausing to study his destination as the cab pulls off. Stanley's sports a cursive neon proclaiming its existence for miles, though its green and red words flicker as the power grid fluctuates and stabilizes, likely due to the egregious electrical consumption of the surrounding area.

The diner is double fronted, with large windows either side of an equally large door covered by drapes, reducing those inside to simple, dark shapes set to a blinding backdrop. A raucous racket escapes through windows, left ajar to vent cigarette smoke. Classic music rounds out the affronting mixture; one of a dozen Christmas songs on repeat all over the city, drawing guests into screeching along, many already half-drunk anr celebrating their half day off work.

Dark ears folding back, Mordecai grimaces. Establishments like these are a personal nightmare, usually filled with drunk patrons getting too handsy in dark corners, deafeningly loud conversation and a considerable lack of personal space. Yet I have no choice, do I? He thinks bitterly, his personal invite to this shindig tucked into a breast pocket. If I don't partake, I may as well sign my own death certificate.

With that sobering thought, he takes a steadying breath and stepping forward, pushes the door open to step inside.

The decor is excessively bright; chairs, tables and even wall decor of bright red is offset by plain white wall tiles, a single black accent tile periodically set in walls and floors. Booths line the walls, while metallic folding chairs and tables line up to create walkways between the booths and the counter, at which a number of red leather stools reside facing an open kitchen, the chef stressed and hot, sweat running down his face to the towel around his neck.

Classic Christmas music, jovial laughter and off-key singing assaults the tom's senses, accented by the clang of kitchen utensils and conversations being shouted over the noise of it all. Unable to spot Gabriel in the diner, Mordecai flattens his ears to his skull and carefully approaches the bar. 

He's briefly interrupted by a drunken construction worker tripping over his own feet, reaching for Mordecai to catch him; the monochrome swiftly pivots out of reach, present held away, and the man lands face-first in someone's side salad, the momentum of his fall dragging it to the floor with him. There's a heartbeat of mostly silence before the worker sits up and languidly licks mayonnaise and lettuce off his face, to which the whole dinner bursts out laughing, many a drunkard raising their glass in cheers to a fallen comrade.

Mordecai backs away from the scene, turning around only when his back hits the bar. A young woman behind the bar giggles as the construction worker tries to get back up, slips on a sliced tomato and falls right back down on his behind. The tom clears his throat, placing the gift box down on the counter once 'Kendall' meets his gaze. "My presence was requested by Mr Savage," he states, cringing as he's forced to raise his voice to be heard above the ruckus. "However, I cannot locate him. Please hand him this with my regards."

She looks him up and down, chewing gum with her mouth open, then Kendall smiles and leans her elbow on the bar, resting her chin in a palm to meet his gaze. "Well, ain't you a sight for sore eyes," she drawls, blonde ringlets framing her face having escaped the messy bun on her head. Mordecai wrinkles his nose as she leans closer and bats her lashes "You goin' home with somebody tonigh', sugar? 'Cause I'd sure like t'open you up after midnigh'."

Unable to decide if he finds her proposition or her incessant gum chewing more abhorrent, Mordecai is blunt, though the current political climate forces him to reconsider the obvious 'I'm Jewish' response. "I'm not interested," he states after a moment of consideration, pushing the present towards her across the counter. His own expression stays disinterested as her own smile sours. "But as previously stated, I'd appreciate it if this could be handed to Mr Savage. Tonight, if possible."

"You got an invite?" Kendall asks sharply as she straightens behind the bar, still obnoxiously chewing the wad of gum as she taps her claws on the counter top. She regards the tom with a slight glare, all semblances of friendliness gone. "Savage always sends 'em invites for private par'ies. Ya got one, ya can hand it to 'im ya'self. Otherwise it's goin' out that there door with ya."

With a tired sigh, he reaches into his coat and produces the invitation, holding it between his index and middle fingers as he offers it to her. Kendall takes the card and flips it open, then glares at Mordecai through thick lashes. "Should'a guessed you was the Yid, with them manners." White brows knit into a scowl, but Kendall only rolls her eyes, unlatches a hinged countertop and raises it, beckoning him through with a curled finger. "C'mon. The boss' waitin' on ya. This way."

[odder-oddish]

Between Breaths

From the beginning, they had each other. Though that was sometimes more of a curse than a blessing. The constant threat of a painful death doesn't leave much time for connection, but two souls move closer nonetheless. A look into the progression of Claudette and Meg's relationship, through glimpses of the different trials AKA, I absolutely adore this ship and think these two were made for each other. Because if there's one more thing we need in this world, it's queer women.

Also, this is my account now. I posted once about a week ago on @oddest-oddish, but now, I can't even log into it. So, it's me again, with a new blog and a hope that things go a little more smoothly.

The nurse is downright terrifying. Meg has seen her four times now, and only escaped against her once. Having Nea around certainly evens the playing field; it's nice having another competent survivor around. The two of them trade hits for each other and manage to steal the attention of some of the killers when the other needs a breather. But there's only so much she can do.

Meg hates her role in many of the trials. She knows that she could act more selfishly, like Dwight or Claudette do, but when her heart starts going, she can't help but step into the spotlight, always going out fighting, often the only one in the group willing to take the risk.

Which leads to her current predicament. Her shoulder is bleeding badly, having been dug into by a rusty bone saw several times already. Meg's head is pounding as she runs back to the top floor of the coal tower, the nurse right on her heels. The generator up here must have been recently finished, as it hadn't been lit up the last time she was here. The nurse teleported right next to her, but Meg was faster, bolting out of reach and leaping off the building.

As she ran from the tower, Meg spotted movement behind a stack of crates. Claudette was kneeling behind them, attempting to remain out of site from the nurse. So this was why generators still weren't finished. Who knew how long she'd just been waiting around, letting everyone else take the heat from the killer.

"Would you stop being a coward and do something?" Meg shouted, loud enough for Claudette to flinch and back away from her. It wasn't just the nurse she had to worry about; Meg was furious. "I've been running my ass off over here"

"So-Sorry. I'm sorry," Claudette whisper yelled, but as the nurse came in for the kill, she still made no move to help.

Meg cursed at Claudette as the bone saw knocked her to her feet. While she hadn't succeeded in evading the nurse, she had piqued the killer's curiosity. Instead of picking up Meg, the nurse began to look around, locating Claudette and beginning chase.

Maybe it was cruel, but Meg felt a smug sense of satisfaction as the nurse dropped Claudette on a hook only a minute later. That feeling was quickly replaced with a tearing pain as Meg met the same fate soon after.

____________________

The Hillbilly was a cruel killer, especially today. After knocking Meg to the ground with a vicious attack from his chainsaw, he left her bleeding out on the ground. Maybe a nearby generator was nearing completion and he wanted to disrupt the progress or perhaps he'd seen someone else and wanted to give chase. Either way, Meg was left on the ground, slowly bleeding out. Her vision was blurry and her head hurt. She felt like crying, but forced herself to stay strong, trying to get back on her feet.

Suddenly, she heard a rustle in the bushes. Through hazy eyesight, she made out a familiar brown jacket nearby.

"Help me dammit!" she said, voice strained. The figure, Claudette, made no effort to move. "He's not even here. Either help me out or do a generator or something." Nothing.

"I'm coming Meg, hang on," shouted another voice.

___________________

The Trapper must have been having a bad day. That or he really wanted Meg dead. He'd been so focused on chasing her that Meg hadn't come across a set trap yet. Sure, there were times he'd leave her, but those were probably to chase David or Feng Min. At least, that's what Meg assumed.

"Maybe stay away from the gas station," she told David, as he and Claudette worked together to bandage her injuries. "He broke a lot of the pallet over there. Nothing you need to worry about, of course." The last sentence was directed towards Claudette, who bowed her head, looking away from Meg. She finished wrapping Meg's shoulder then turned away, probably to sit in the corner again.

Several minutes later, Meg was running through stacks of abandoned cars, evading the trapper when she saw Claudette from the corner of her eye. She was about to yell instead when a loud snap stopped her. Claudette was hunched over a massive bear trap, having just disarmed it.

Later, as she ran to the old shack after knocking a pallet over the trapper's head, Claudette's head poked up from the other side of the window. She held up a hand to stop Meg from leaping over the window as she once again disarmed a set trap.

Wait, had she been doing this the whole time? Maybe the trapper had been setting up traps, but if Claudette was sneaking around behind him, she could have stopped him from getting any use out of them. Meg gave Claudette a curt nod before turning to the generator in the shack. As it neared completion, Claudette scurried off again, this time to close a trap in front of the exit that Meg definitely wouldn't have seen.

"Good eyes," said Meg, as Claudette began to open the door.

"Thank you. I'm happy to support you when you keep putting yourself in danger for us," she answered.

____________________

Claudette was indeed becoming an extremely supportive teammate. Sometimes, when Meg was injured, Claudette would follow blood trails on the ground and find her to give her a quick patch-up. She worked on generators whenever she wasn't needed elsewhere to keep the team moving towards their goal. Recently, she'd asked Jake to teach her how to break the hooks. Because she moved so stealthily, killers didn't know she was nearby until she was there, knocking the hooks to the ground. Meg began to appreciate seeing her near the campfire as they burned offerings together, preparing for the trial ahead.

"Do you want this back?" Meg asked after an extraordinarily easy trial. They were waiting by the exit, waiting for Yui to work her way around the map, just in case the Clown managed a lucky couple hits. She held out a flashlight to Claudette. Meg had been using one of her own at the beginning of the match, and when the batteries ran out, Claudette came out of nowhere, pressing a new one into her hand.

"No thank you. I don't use them often, and I found a really good med-kit in the basement," Claudette answered. "Thank you though. I appreciated you saving me earlier."

"Couldn't have done it if you hadn't found it for me," said Meg, clicking it a couple times. "Hey, can I show you something that might help you in the future when you're jumping windows?"

Claudette nodded, so Meg led her over to a nearby window. "If you put more effort into the initial jump, and then use your hand as a guide, you can avoid hitting your feet against the top of the ledge." Meg took a running start and cleared the window with ease. "It's a lot quieter this way, so the killers won't notice. Give it a shot."

Claudette ran towards the window and tried to copy Meg's move. But without the same level of coordination, her hand slipped and she tumbled over the window instead. Meg immediately rushed to her side. "Fuck. I didn't explain that well. Try to focus on getting more heigh on your lower foot," she said. "It takes a lot of power. Even I can't pull it off consistently."

While they waited, Claudette tried a couple more times, eventually clearing the vault silently, though she staggered a lot as she landed, trying to right herself after the vault. Meg whooped for her, and at the same time, she saw Yui in the distance.

"Let's get outta here," she said, opening the exit door. "Maybe we'll find a fallen tree and you can give it another go."

"I'd like that," said Claudette, offering a bright smile that Meg had rarely seen. Her heart thumped aggressively, and she didn't think this was the Clown's doing.

____________________

The first generator had been completed without anyone being found. Either the killer was having a rough start or someone was being stalked. Meg shuddered at the thought of the latter but brushed it off as she leapt over a window to the bottom deck of the abandoned ship. To her surprise, she landed just inches away from where Claudette was standing. When she saw her, Meg's jaw dropped.

Meg had always thought Claudette was attractive, in the cute, nerdy sort of way. But today, she was wearing a sleeveless golden dress with a stunning pattern embroidered on the front. It was backless, and Meg had to tear her gaze away before she got too distracted by her friend. Were they friends now? Claudette's hair, which was almost always pulled up or fit under a hat, hung freely, framing her face perfectly. She was stunning.

Meg wasn't the only one distracted by Claudette's outfit. The other woman was looking at the swamp ground hesitantly, sticking a foot out almost as if she was testing the temperature of the pool.

"You good?" asked Meg, voice oddly hoarse in her throat.

"Oh, you startled me. It's just, all muddy and gross, and I'm wearing sandals and…" Claudette trailed off.

Meg frowned. They'd been through a lot worse than this. Through the months, Claudette had braved chainsaw wounds, hatchets to the back, and drops from second story buildings. A little mud shouldn't mean much, unless-

"Is it like, one of your sensory things you told me about?" asked Meg.

Claudette nodded. "I don't like the way it feels on my feet. It's all cold and distracting." She looked embarrassed about it.

In the distance, Jane screamed in pain. They had to get moving to make the most of their early lead. "What size are they?" Meg asked.

"Um, I don't know. Probably like an eight," said Claudette, clearly confused by the question.

"Not much smaller than mine." Meg kicked off her shoes and gestured to them. "Will these work?"

"I- are you sure, Meg?"

"Course. Need you on your A game for this."

"Thank you so much," said Claudette, hurrying to slide the shoes on. They clashed horribly with the dress. Meg privately thought she looked adorable with the mismatch, then cursed herself for thinking it.

Meg didn't know for sure that the shoes made a difference, but the trial went smoothly. Twice she looked up to see Claudette running from the Trickster, ducking and weaving around throwing knives. She looked confident, in control. Meg watched as she faked moving one way before running back and slamming a pallet down on his head. Claudette had come so far in these trials, and she was a thrill to watch.

Next to her, David cleared his throat loudly. "We're supposed to be doing generators, not oglin' our teammates," he said roughly.

"Shut it," said Meg, but she ducked her head down and began working with some of the wires on the generator.

The rest of the trial went by quickly, Claudette and Jane keeping the Trickster from getting a single hook. On her way to the gate, Meg spotted Claudette's sandals on the boat. She hooked a finger through the ankle straps and carried them with her. Maybe she'd appreciate having them back.

____________________

"Meg, you okay?" Claudette asked, pulling her off the hook. Meg had spent the last five minutes running from the Hag, and only one generator was left. She panted from exertion, sweat sticking her hair to her forehead.

"Yeah. Let's get out of here. No point patching me up when we're so close to finished." Meg began to walk to the basement of the preschool. Suddenly, there was a gasp behind her. Claudette grabbed her around the midsection, pulling her back.

"Trap!" she said. Meg looked down. Claudette was right. One more step and she would have stepped on one of the Hag's traps, summoning her right to them. She'd almost gotten them both killed.

"Good eye," said Meg, straining to catch her breath. "I owe you one."

"Just, be careful next time."

Suddenly, Meg became extremely aware of the fact that neither she nor Claudette had attempted to move. They were still standing at the top of the stairs, Claudette's arms wrapped around Meg's middle. The preschool was a rather chilly realm, so having someone this close was… warm. Calming.

All too soon, and yet, far later than she should have, Claudette's arms dropped to her sides. "Here, let me destroy it, and we'll get this generator done." Meg nodded and followed Claudette to the basement, her mind slightly hazy, lingering on the touch.

And that night, if she wrapped her arms around herself and pretended it was someone else, who could blame her?

____________________

Dying to the Entity wasn't as bad when Meg knew she was the only sacrifice of the trial. The ground was alight as the realm threatened to collapse on them all, and the Huntress had posted up right in front of Meg's hook, hatchet in hand, humming that dark lullaby. They'd been extra sharp this time; a single blow had knocked Meg to the ground.

But knowing that her friends would escape made the pain more bearable. Three of them surviving made it all feel okay.

Suddenly, she heard a noise from behind her. "Dun dun duuun duun duun duuuuun," a low voice was copying the Huntress' tune, a poor mimicry of the original. The Huntress turned, searching for the source of the sound and Ace popped his head out from behind a bush, clicking his flashlight and shouting at her.

"Ace, what the hell?" she shouted, when suddenly, hands were at her sides, pulling her off the hook. Claudette had used the lapse in the Huntress's attention to pull Meg off the hook. She held a finger to her lips, and Meg did her best to hide her cries of pain as they ran for the exit. They were just about to leave when Meg spotted a glowing totem next to a rotting fence. It definitely had not been lit the last time Meg passed it.

"Hah- you missed me! Is that the- wait why are you so fast?" Ace shouted in the distance.

"Take this," said Claudette. She handed Meg her med-kit before crouching down to destroy the totem.

"So I take it we're gonna go save grandpa?" Meg asked, pulling out gauze and beginning to treat the worst of her wounds.

"If that's ok. He didn't want to go back, but insisted I didn't go alone."

"Saving me was your idea?" Claudette was never one for reckless rescue attempts. She assumed it had to have been Ace's plan (it certainly wasn't Felix's). But Claudette had insisted they come back for her. Meg's heart did a weird flip again as she finished bandaging herself up.

Claudette nodded as she finished cleansing the totem. "Shall we?"

"Yeah, we got this. Together."

What followed was sixty seconds of absolute chaos. The two picked Ace off the ground while the huntress searched a nearby locker for another hatchet. After dodging the next throw, the women shielded Ace from a nearby hit before Felix stole her attention, running for the opposite door. With Ace staggering along behind them, Meg and Claudette made it back to the original exit.

"Thanks, man," Meg told Ace as they passed through the open doors.

"Don't mention it," said Ace. "I was just surprised Claudette suggested it. Well the whole distraction bit was my deal, but she was adamant we go back for your ass." Claudette looked away as soon as she was mentioned, hiding her face in her jacket. Curious.

"Felix is never gonna let you hear the end of it," said Meg, punching him in the shoulder. The Huntress's melody carried over the air, so the three of them left the realm.

"I know, I know," said Ace. He sighed dramatically but couldn't help but smile at his partner's mention.

"I think it's sweet," said Claudette. "Having someone look after you like that."

"You mean like you just did?" Meg asked. It was meant to be a joke, but Claudette's expression immediately went blank. She sped up through the fog, hurrying back towards camp. "Did I say something wrong?" she said to Ace.

"I don't know. You tell me," he said. His eyebrows were raised high above the lenses of his sunglasses, and he seemed to be holding back a laugh. They returned to camp, Meg even more confused than ever.

____________________

The generator must have been about halfway completed as Meg approached it. She could hear muffled voices as she climbed the stairs of the asylum. She peeked into the doorway to see Zarina and Claudette working. Zarina was laughing about something as they worked.

"You don't really think so, do you?" asked Claudette. Her voice had risen in pitch and taken an airy tone, a sign she was embarrassed.

"What are you guys talking about?" Meg asked, opening a nearby chest.

"Nothing!" Claudette's answer came suspiciously quick and Zarina laughed again.

Towards the end of the trial Claudette was running for her life from the Oni. One more unfortunate hit and she was dead. He chased her into a narrow passageway between two large walls, easily closing the distance.

Zarina was just outside the alley, but not close enough to help out. Without thinking, Meg leapt over the wall's only window, coming between Claudette and the demon as his sword swung down. She grunted in pain and Claudette made a surprised noise. "Let's go!" shouted Meg. With Zarina's assistance, the women made it to the gate that Yun-Jin had finally gotten open.

Zarina leaned in close to Claudette. "I told you so," she said, just barely loud enough for Meg to hear.

Claudette slowed as they made their way back to camp. She was always quiet, but her expressions seemed even more stoic. Her eyes were glassy and she kept looking up at Meg before quickly averting her eyes. Meg wanted to ask what she was thinking about, too see if Zarina had offended her or made her upset, but she sensed that now wasn't the time. Meg would just have to wait and see.

____________________

"Did we all make it?" asked Meg, running up the hill of the swamp towards the exit gate where her best friend waited.

"Yeah, I had the siblings leave early. They're a little too new to risk having them wait behind," said Claudette.

"Aw, waiting for me all by yourself? You almost sound like you care about me."

"You know I do." Claudette took Meg's hand as they left the trial grounds together. Meg's heart leapt at the touch as they headed out into the fog.

____________________

"Claude, I've got another EMP if you need it." Meg entered the shack with the device in hand. A strange orb was stuck to Claudette's back, and two others lined the shack's walls.

"That'd be great," said Claudette, busy at a generator. Meg fired the device and the mess on Claudette's shirt disappeared. "Thanks."

Meg nodded and knelt by her side. The generator was nearly complete, so in a few seconds, the shack was filled with a bright light. "Remember when all we had to deal with was chainsaws and bear traps?" she asked. "Now we're fighting evil robots with 3d printers."

"A lot sure has changed," said Claudette. "You don't run full speed at the killer anymore."

"And you don't sit on the sidelines, letting me."

"Touche."

____________________

Meg was nearly finished with a generator in the red forest when she heard two sets of footsteps. The people were out of view. Meg left the generator to join them when she heard the sound of Claudette gasping in pain, but froze when she heard a voice.

"So, are you two like, official yet?" came a low, yet feminine voice.

"Elodie, shh. She's in this trial, you know," Claudette answered.

Meg turned the corner to see Elodie and Claudette. The older woman had a med-kit and was mending a tear on Claudette's arm. Claudette's other arm was covering her face; she was completely flustered.

"Hey guys, need some help with that," Meg asked, crouching down next to them. Claudette made a small sound of embarrassment but leaned closer to Meg anyway. The chainsaw had left gnarly gashes on her side, taking a little more time to patch up.

"There, all better!" Meg announced after a moment. She leaned forward and placed a kiss on Claudette's forehead.

"Meg!" she gasped. Elodie chuckled and left to find a different generator.

"Sorry. You're just adorable when you're flustered," said Meg, not sorry in the slightest. Claudette's face scrunched up further as Meg led them back to the generator.

"You're lucky I love you," said Claudette. Meg froze on the ground, looking up at her. Claudette seemed frightened at what she'd just said, covering her face with her hands. "I- I'm sorry. I know we haven't been a thing for long, but just, I've known you for so long and-"

"Claudette, it's okay. I feel the same way; I just don't know if I can say it yet. But it's alright. I liked hearing you say it." Claudette didn't move, so Meg pulled her into a hug and held her for a moment.

"Thank you," whispered Claudette.

"You're welcome. But you kinda smell like shit right now, so let's get out of here before anymore cuddles, okay?"

Still flustered, Claudette joined Meg at the generator, and it lit up a moment later. When the trial ended, Meg threw an arm around her, going to make good on her promise.

____________________

"What?"

"Nothing!"

"Dude, you're staring."

Meg, Claudette, and Dwight were all working on the same generator surrounded by a corn field. Jake was somewhere else, running from the Wraith. The trial felt like it had years ago, when it was just the four of them. And yet, as Meg looked at her girlfriend, she realized just how much had changed.

Dwight kept glancing up from the generator, looking between the two women. He opened his mouth as if he had something to say, then closed it.

"Just spit it out already!" said Meg.

"Fine. But, please don't be mad," said Dwight.

"Whatever. Just say it."

"Okay, okay. Wouldn't- wouldn't the generator get done faster if you weren't holding hands?"

____________________

I just, I like these two. They make me happy. More writing coming soon. I've got a few different pieces in the works. Open to suggestions or requests, btw, so let me know if there's something you'd like to read more of.

[sillypinkboy]

Too Late To Say I Love You

Charcters: Joe Fixit, Bruce Banner, Jake Lockley, Leonard Samson

Relationships: Bloody Protectors (Joe Fixit x Jake Lockley)

Word Count: 785

Tagging: @goodoldfashionedengineer

Notes: Hey it's angst I wrote after the last issue of the main moon knight run. So. Yeah. Major character death. Sorry in advance!

──────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Callused hands gently grazed scared skin. A single breath hung on hot air, ash and coal fell around them. The night was as dark as it could get in such a big city. Originally two faces just meant to - that just wanted to blend in, they’d grown into more. Both knew to keep their heads down. Both knew the danger they were putting themselves through. The thought never could stop them.

Electricity danced between their hands, dying with a sudden wind. Silver eyes dragged against tanned skin, desperate for something. A pulse. a wish. a word.

Both knew death wasn’t something they should deal with - or they did.

Joe had seen the explosion, or at least, the aftermath. He knew that he was supposed to be there. He moved as quickly as he could. Nothing.

Shouldn’t the cabbie be back? Why is he just laying there? Why won’t he breathe?

Joe begged for anything. Just a sign. A small movement. Something to say he was still there.

Nothing came. Nothing changed. An unfamiliar panic bubbled up behind his throat. In his chest. Tears burned in the back of his eyes, but didn’t leave.

Just a bloody corpse. No, a lover. Someone that he didn’t want to lose. Someone he shouldn’t have been able to lose. Someone that he should be able to have lunch with, someone to keep close.

Someone special left to just another body. Just another number. Someone to be forgotten by anyone that knew anything.

It’s not Jake’s name to the body. It’s Marc’s. It’ll be Marc’s funeral. Maybe Steven’s. But not the unknown cabbie.

Why? Why did he have to do this?

Why couldn’t he have stayed out of it for once?

Joe sat silent. He knew it wasn’t Jake’s fault. Dying came with the business.

The heroes won’t remember who Joe won’t forget. He knows that. Tears threaten to pour.

They feel like a fire against his skin, enough to hurt and hurt until you can’t take it. He holds the body close, before he falls. And falls and falls and falls.

Bruce woke up, eyes burning. A familiar hero in his arms. Ash sticks to blood soaked fabric, turning a gray into a red.

His chest beats heavily and he tries to figure out where they ended up.

A destroyed building. A grave site. There’s a desire to leave that pulls at the logical side of his brian. A knowledge to alert the other of what’s happened. His reasons for being there sat unknown, but he tried to leave. But, his body betrays him.

It sits unable to move. Unable to stand. Unable to register what has fully happened.

Blood seeps onto his hands.

He stays unable to move.

Why had Joe brought him here? They’d never been close to the vigilante, Moon Knight. Was it something about the person behind the mask?

His hand twitched.

Recognition set in. Jake. The guy Joe had been seeing.

His throat tightened at the thought of losing someone that close. He took a deep breath - like Leonard had taught him. He took another. And another.

Eventually, he gained control over his movements. A control to leave them. To tell the others. To try and plan for the aftermath.

Bruce gently moved the body off him, laying it face up. He stood up slowly, his body still shaky.

He sent a simple alert- just one to the other heroes. He hoped it reached. Knowing he needed to get out, he left the beeper behind, tucked into the vigilante’s hood. Then he left.

He tried to get as far as quickly as he could, not that it mattered. He just needed to get out. To try and find someone, anyone to help them.

He sits tucked away in a coffee shop, dialing their closest friend.

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

Months passed, days blurred. Concern had been sparked in everyone. Joe never seemed to let himself be alone. He stopped reaching to be in charge - instead choosing to hold himself to the side. To being a passive viewer.

The change was welcomed by Bruce at first. It was one less fight in his head. One less problem to worry about. The joy of it wore thin, eventually.

The worst of it all was the worry that Leonard had towards it. There was a call. It was late into the night. Unexpected, even. The doctor had asked if Joe was still there, if he had been heard from. The worry for Joe was somewhat unexpected, keeping in mind how much he had been a problem. Bruce had been honest. Told the doc what he knew. The call wasn’t much of a long one, but enough to leave something sour behind.

[mariacallous]

One hundred miles west of Johannesburg in South Africa, the Komati Power Station is hard to miss, looming above the flat grassland and farming landscapes like an enormous eruption of concrete, brick, and metal.

When the coal-fired power station first spun up its turbines in 1961, it had twice the capacity of any existing power station in South Africa. It has been operational for more than half a century, but as of October 2022, Komati has been retired—the stacks are cold and the coal deliveries have stopped.

Now a different kind of activity is taking place on the site, transforming it into a beacon of clean energy: 150 MW of solar, 70 MW of wind, and 150 MW of storage batteries. The beating of coal-fired swords into sustainable plowshares has become the new narrative for the Mpumalanga province, home to most of South Africa’s coal-fired power stations, including Komati.

To get here, the South African government has had to think outside the box. Phasing out South Africa’s aging coal-fired power station fleet—which supplies 86 percent of the country’s electricity—is expensive and politically risky, and could come at enormous social and economic cost to a nation already struggling with energy security and socioeconomic inequality. In the past, bits and pieces of energy-transition funding have come in from organizations such as the World Bank, which assisted with the Komati repurposing, but for South Africa to truly leave coal behind, something financially bigger and better was needed.

That arrived at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, in November 2021, in the form of a partnership between South Africa, European countries, and the US. Together, they made a deal to deliver $8.5 billion in loans and grants to help speed up South Africa’s transition to renewables, and to do so in a socially and economically just way.

This agreement was the first of what’s being called Just Energy Transition Partnerships, or JETPs, an attempt to catalyze global finance for emerging economies looking to shift energy reliance away from fossil fuels in a way that doesn’t leave certain people and communities behind.

Since South Africa’s pioneering deal, Indonesia has signed an agreement worth $20 billion, Vietnam one worth $15.5 billion, and Senegal one worth $2.75 billion. Discussions are taking place for a possible agreement for India. Altogether, around $100 billion is on the table.

There’s significant enthusiasm for JETPs in the climate finance arena, particularly given the stagnancy of global climate finance in general. At COP15 in Copenhagen in 2009, developed countries signed up to a goal of mobilizing $100 billion of climate finance for developing countries per year by 2020. None have met that target, and the agreement lapses in 2025. The hope is that more funding for clear-cut strategies and commitments will lead to quicker moves toward renewables.

South Africa came into the JETP agreement with a reasonably mature plan for a just energy transition, focusing on three sectors: electricity, new energy vehicles, and green hydrogen. Late last year, it fleshed that out with a detailed Just Energy Transition investment plan. Specifically, the plan centers on decommissioning coal plants, providing alternative employment for those working in coal mining, and accelerating the development of renewable energy and the green economy. It is a clearly defined but big task.

South Africa’s coal mining and power sector employs around 200,000 people, many in regions with poor infrastructure and high levels of poverty. So the “just” part of the “just energy transition” is critical, says climate finance expert Malango Mughogho, who is managing director of ZeniZeni Sustainable Finance Limited in South Africa and a member of the United Nations High-Level Expert Group on net-zero emissions commitments.

“People are going to lose their jobs. Industries do need to shift so, on a net basis, the average person living there needs to not be worse off from before,” she says. This is why the project focuses not only on the energy plants themselves, but also on reskilling, retraining, and redeployment of coal workers.

In a country where coal is also a major export, there are economic and political sensitivities around transitioning to renewables, and that poses a challenge in terms of how the project is framed. “Given the high unemployment rate in South Africa as well … you cannot sell it as a climate change intervention,” says Deborah Ramalope, head of climate policy analysis at the policy institute Climate Analytics in Berlin. “You really need to sell it as a socioeconomic intervention.”

That would be a hard sell if the only investment coming in were $8.5 billion—an amount far below what’s needed to completely overhaul a country’s energy sector. But JETPs aren’t intended to completely or even substantially bankroll these transitions. The idea is that this initial financial boost signals to private financiers both within and outside South Africa that things are changing.

Using public finance to leverage private investment is a common and often successful practice, Mughogho says. The challenge is to make the investment prospects as attractive as possible. “Typically private finance will move away from something if they consider it to be too risky and they’re not getting the return that they need,” she says. “So as long as those risks have been clearly identified and then managed in some way, then the private sector should come through.” This is good news, as South Africa has forecast it will need nearly $100 billion to fully realize the just transition away from coal and toward clean vehicles and green hydrogen as outlined in its plan.

Will all of that investment arrive? It’s such early days with the South African JETP that there’s not yet any concrete indication of whether the approach will work.

But the simple fact that such high-profile, high-dollar agreements are being signed around just transitions is cause for hope, says Haley St. Dennis, head of just transitions at the Institute for Human Rights and Business in Salt Lake City, Utah. “What we have seen so far, particularly from South Africa, which is the furthest along, is very promising,” she says. These projects demonstrate exactly the sort of international cooperation needed for successful climate action, St. Dennis adds.

The agreements aren’t perfect. For example, they may not rule out oil and gas as bridging fuels between coal and renewables, says St. Dennis. “The rub is that, especially for many of the JETP countries—which are heavily coal-dependent, low- and middle-income economies—decarbonization can’t come at any cost,” she says. “That especially means that it can’t threaten what is often already tenuous energy security and energy access for their people, and that's where oil and gas comes in in a big way.”

Ramalope says they also don’t go far enough. “I think the weakness of JETPs is that they’re not encouraging 1.5 [degrees] Celsius,” she says, referring to the limit on global warming set as a target by the Paris Agreement in 2015. In Senegal, which is not coal-dependent, the partnership agreement is to achieve 40 percent renewables in Senegal’s electricity mix. But Ramalope says analysis suggests the country could achieve double this amount. “I think that’s a missed opportunity.”

Another concern is that these emerging economies could be simply trapping themselves in more debt with these agreements. While there’s not much detail about the relative proportions of grants and loans in South Africa’s agreement, St. Dennis says most of the funding is concessional, or low-interest loans. “Why add more debt when the intention is to dramatically catalyze decarbonization in a very short timescale?” she asks. Grants themselves are estimated to be a very small component of the overall funding—around 5 percent.

But provided they generate the funding needed to bring emissions down as desired, the view of JETPs is largely positive, says Sierd Hadley, an economist with the Overseas Development Institute in London. For Hadley, the concern is whether JETPs can be sustained once the novelty has worn off, and once they aren’t being featured as part of a COP or G20 leadup. But he notes that the fact that the international community has managed to deliver at least four of the five JETP deals so far—with India yet to be locked in—shows there is pressure to make good on the promises.

“On the whole, the fact that there has been a plan, and that that plan is broadly in progress, suggests that on balance this has been fairly successful,” he says. “It’s a very significant moment for climate finance.”

[fenrislorsrai]

even with new administration, there were a lot of things already approved and in the pipeline for this year.

End of 2025, we should have 10x the offshore wind as we did at end of 2024, due to one project that broke the bottleneck for building.

The bottleneck was lack of a specific type of ship operating within US. It's currently working off Virginia. The prep work for similar project off Connecticut is currently underway, and as soon as Virginia is done, that ship switches up here. And is likely fully booked through 2030 with similar items.

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Intiative has been operating for 15 years, reducing co2 power plant emissions in new England and midatlantic. They did such a good job they hit their 2020 goals in 2018... and set new more aggressive ones for 2030, at least some members shooting for zero power plant emissions by 2030.

Thats 10 members, plus Virginia just joined so just starting that process Pennsylvania and North Carolina may join with next year or two, once legal challenges solved.

RGGI used model of taxing CO2 emmission via permit and permit auction money goes to direct utility assistance for low income folks, weatherization & energy efficiency to reduce demand, and green power projects.

Those green projects are all small, but lots of em. So no one big solar farm, it's 20 warehouses with solar panels. So invisible infill you don't SEE happening. But that's been chugging along for 15+ years and will keep going because it's a state, not federal, program.

Justice40 under the Biden administration prioritized historically undeserved and economically depressed areas for funding for climate resiliancy projects and green projects. It's been in place since 2017 so a lot of money assigned to it that's still working through system and all those will complete in next few years.

Trump could reprioritize how money for those programs is allocated, but it is a lot of very rural areas so he will get push back. Noooo, we need that money! And they do.

Since they're very poor and undeserved areas, it means you get a much bigger improvement vs better off areas. Swapping out a coal plant from 1940 vs one that upgraded in 1990 is a way bigger potential improvement!

The US military has been putting lots in alternate energy for last few years entirely due to security of being reliant on oil they have to get places, leaves supply lines vulnerable. So they will continue adding capacity for foreseeable future. And anybody complaining about it being "woke nonsense" can get told off about how many fuel convoys get struck in conflicts and how much better on-site solar and wind is than generator use.

So there's good things in process that likely can't be stopped. So even if us fed stopped new project funding entirely (unlikely), there's lots in process that will complete in next few years and continue building capacity.

Keep on your reps about it at the federal level, because msny will still go through. But don't forget to annoy state reps as well because they CAN keep on those smaller state projects and keep building capacity. And other states already did a lot of the work. These are proven technologies. Copy other states homework.

We have already averted truly apocalyptic levels of global warming.

Yes, read that again. Let it sink in. This is what the science now says. We have already averted truly apocalyptic global warming.

To quote David Wallace-Wells, author of The Uninhabitable Earth, from his huge feature in the New York Times:

"Thanks to astonishing declines in the price of renewables, a truly global political mobilization, a clearer picture of the energy future and serious policy focus from world leaders, we have cut expected warming almost in half in just five years... The window of possible climate futures is narrowing, and as a result, we are getting a clearer sense of what’s to come: a new world, full of disruption but also billions of people, well past climate normal and yet mercifully short of true climate apocalypse." (New York Times, October 22, 2022. Unpaywalled here. Emphasis mine. And yes, this vision of the future is backed up by the current science on the issue, as he explains at length in the article.)

So we've already averted truly apocalyptic warming, and we've already cut expected warming IN HALF in just the past five years.

The pace of technology, of innovation, of prices, of feasibility, of discovery, of organizing, of grassroots movements, of movements in other countries around the world, have all picked up the pace so fast in the last five years.

Renewable technology and capacity are both increasing at an exponential rate. It's all S-curves, ones that look like this:

-via The Economist, June 20, 2024.

How much more will we manage in another five years? Another ten? Another twenty?

I know the US is about to fucking suck about the environment for the next four years. But the momentum of renewable energy is far too much to stop - both in the US (x) and around the world.

(Huge shoutouts to India, China, and Brazil for massive gains for the environment in renewables, and Brazil for massive progress against Amazon deforestation.)

We're going to get there.

Say it with me. We're going to get there.

[travelingtheusa]

KENTUCKY

2024 May 24 (Fri) – We didn’t do much today.  Stayed in the campground and watched all the RVs coming in.  This is Memorial Day weekend and we expect the place to be full by tonight.  Glad to be leaving tomorrow.

2024 May 23 (Thu) – We had a delightful tour of a historic town in Tennessee.  Rugby was founded by a British gentleman.  It is kind of ironic to think that an Englishman moved to the United States to build a town for Englishmen.  He, along with many friends, were disgusted with the customs of the times.  The eldest son of wealthy families received everything when the father passed away.  The other kids had to depend on the kindness of that older brother.  So Rugby was established as an egalitarian town for “second sons” where everyone would be given a chance to succeed without the shame of doing menial labor.  There were several Victorian style homes around the area.  We watched a video about the establishment of Rugby, then followed a guide around to three buildings – a church, a free public library, and the original home of Hughes, the founder.  The library had over 7,000 books and magazines all printed prior to 1900.  It included the complete works of Charles Dickens. 

      On the way back to the campground, we stopped at Phillips Drive In, number one in Oneida.  I got a Jerry pizza, which was basically a cheeseburger on a pizza.  Paul got a corn dog.  Both meals were OK.

      We had ferocious thunderstorms last night and today.  A camping club of some kind was setting up yesterday afternoon.  At 9:00 p.m. I heard doors closing.  When I looked outside, I sat some people trying to put up a tent in the pouring rain.  I put on the outside lights for them, hoping it gave them some light to see by.  They packed up and were gone this morning.  So were the teenagers from the camping club.  The weather cleared up for a little this afternoon then storms moved in again later in the day.  Poor Sheba has been spending most of the last two days hiding in the closet.

2024 May 22 (Wed) – We drove to Yahoo Falls and took a hike on the trails.  It was about 2-3/4 miles roundtrip.  There was one part that was pretty rough with steep steel stairs.  Otherwise, it was a very pleasant walk through Daniel Boone Forest.  We had a small water fall, muddy trails, rocks, tree roots, and an intermittent creek.

2024 May 21 (Tue) – We drove to the Blue Heron Outdoor Museum.  It was a most unusual museum and very interesting.  The Blue Heron Mining Camp used to exist on the site.  There were about 200 workers and 24 families living and working there at one time.  The museum consisted of a tipple, covered pavilions with story boards, and a large area for loading rail cars.  They could load 6 rail cars at a time with different grades of coal.  A tipple is a sorting machine that divides the coal into different size pieces, each having a different purpose.  The pavilions each had recordings by people who used to live in the town, recalling their happy days there.  Unlike so many other mining operations we have visited, the Blue Heron Mining company was very paternalistic with its employees and treated them very well. The mine (also called Mine #8) was in existence from the early 1900 until the 1960s.

      After the self-guided tour, we drove into Stearns for lunch and Taco Bell.  Then we picked up groceries at Kroeger.

2024 May 20 (Mon) – We stayed in today, nursing our sore muscles from yesterday’s strenuous cave tour.

2024 May 19 (Sun) – We drove to Mammoth Cave for our reserved tour.  It was the first tour of the day in that category.  There were other kinds of tours going on already.  They have about 8 different types of tours.  Ours was called the Historic Tour.  There were 110 people on our tour.  Way too many to really enjoy the tour.  It started with a park ranger giving an introductory talk.  The group then walked down a long, sloping walkway to the natural entrance to the cave.  The tour itself was disappointing.  They walked straight in until they came to a large area that the group could assemble in.  This continued throughout the tour.  We were not able to stop and admire different features because we had to keep up with the group.  There was one part of the tour called the Fatman’s Misery.  It was a narrow walkway that wound its way through waist high rock.  The walkway was so narrow that you could not walk naturally.  You had to shuffle one foot behind the other.  A couple of places, I had to squeeze around the projecting rock.  I wonder if the park rangers ever look at someone and say, “You won’t fit on this tour.”

      The cave was interesting.  Wish we could have had more idle time to explore it.  It was a 2 mile walk for 2 hours.  No formations.  No stalactites.  No stalagmites.  None of the usual cave formations.  We were as deep as 350’.  The end of the tour was a grueling 150 steps all at once.

      After the cave tour, we went to lunch at the Windmill Restaurant.  There was a big line when we walked in and it kept up for over half an hour.  Even so, we were served fairly quickly.  The food was good.  Paul had a bologna sandwich and I had something called the Manhattan, which was an open faced roast beef sandwich with mashed potatoes and gravy.

2024 May 18 (Sat) – We drove to Mammoth Cave for a tour.  We got there at 11 and the earliest tour we could get was 1:30 p.m.  We would have had to hang out for over 2 hours.  So we bought tickets for a tour tomorrow and just toured the museum.  Mammoth Caves is over 400 miles long and they believe there are 600 miles to be discovered yet.  This is the largest cave system in the world.

      After we returned to the campground, we did the laundry.

2024 May 17 (Fri) – We tried to go to the Lost River Caverns this morning.  It was an hour drive only to find the tours have been cancelled for 2 weeks because of all the rain they have been having.  They could have put it on their website.  We stopped at Slim Chickens for lunch.  I guess the name is a play on the singer, Slim Pickens.

2024 May 16 (Thu) – We went to Crystal Onyx Cave.  It is a privately owned facility.  There are lots of funky figurines and statues around the place – items taken from old amusement parks and shops.  There were lots of aliens and dinosaurs along with other stuff – old jeep, gas pumps, broken rides, tent, etc.  The building where we checked in was stock full of jewelry, gemstones, rocks and geodes.  When I asked if they were all from the cave, I was told they were not.  The owner, who bought the place in 2011, goes to shows and buys all the stuff around the place and in the store.

      Gary, our guide, brought us into the cave for a half-mile walk through some of the coolest formations we have ever seen.  He even pointed out cave crickets and salamanders.  The overall color of the cave was brown – very UNcolorful.  But the cave was alive!  There was moisture and water run off everywhere.  Also, a couple of puddle, a tiny jet stream of water shooting out of the wall, and a small pool about waist deep.  It was a very enjoyable tour.  And it was just Paul, the guide and me.

      For lunch, we ate at El Mazatlan.  It was quite good.  I had a taco salad in a giant taco rather than a bowl.  Paul had a tamale and burrito with rice and beans.  Afterward, we stopped at IGA to pick up a few things.  That is a very small grocery store with limited selections. 

2024 May 15 (Wed) - We went out to lunch at Cracker Barrel today.  Otherwise, we stayed in for the most part. 

2024 May 14 (Tue) – We stayed in the campground all day.  It rained again tonight.  There were a few lightning bolts and Sheba took off for the closet.

2024 May 13 (Mon) – We packed up, said goodbye to all our Rocky Tops Chapter friends, and headed out from Smyna, TN, at 11:00 a.m.  We only had a little over 100 miles to drive today and check out was not until 1 p.m.  As it was, the GPS took us on a local, traffic light littered roadway and we wound up getting into Cave Country RV Park in Cave City at 2 p.m.  The staff was very nice and we were led to our campsite by a staff member driving one of those ubiquitous golf carts.  We have a pull through site with full hookups.  There is a pool (not opened yet) and a small exercise area with a stair stepper, a treadmill and a stationary bicycle.

      After set up, we drove out to Food Lion to get water and then to Bojangles Chicken for lunch.  It rained tonight.  The sun has been burping massive solar flares and providing fantastic views of the aurora borealis as far south as Florida.  I have been trying to see them but the sky has been overcast every night.

[notwiselybuttoowell]

Backers of the European Union's ambitious Green Deal suffered a major blow on Tuesday after the European Commission scrapped plans to push farmers to use fewer pesticides and slash carbon emissions.

The volte-face by the EU's executive body was a response to weeks of protests by farmers who are angry about falling profits, red tape, rising costs and the burden of the EU's flagship Green Deal, a pioneering effort to make the EU the world's leader in fighting climate change by drastically reducing carbon emissions by 2050 and restoring natural systems.

Tuesday's developments could be seen as a defeat for those advocating Europe must move away from heavily subsidized industrial farming both for the good of nature and for the fight against climate change.

The Green Deal set out to make agriculture in the EU more organic and less polluting, but those aspirations are now in jeopardy.

In a speech to the European Parliament, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the end of a proposed law seeking to slash pesticide use by 50% by 2030.

She said the bill had become a “symbol of polarization” and that it had be nixed after its progress stalled within the EU's legislative process. The rules already had been watered down considerably, upsetting environmentalists. She said a new pesticide bill would be proposed after negotiations with farmers, environmentalists, agrochemical companies, banks and others.

In a separate announcement about a new strategy to reduce emissions by 90% by 2040 compared to 1990 levels, the commission deleted language calling on the agriculture sector to make big cuts in its carbon emissions. In earlier drafts, the plan targeted emissions linked to farming, such as methane belched by cows, and called on farmers to reduce their livestock herds and Europeans to eat less meat.

Also angering environmentalists, the new goals omitted deadlines for phasing out coal, oil and natural gas, and did not call for an end to subsidies for fossil fuel projects, environmental groups said. Earlier drafts included tougher measures.

Instead, the guidelines focused on reaching the 90% target by using technology and methods to remove carbon from the atmosphere or stop it from being emitted at industrial sites. Such approaches are controversial because they are deemed ineffective and untested by many scientists.

The European Environmental Bureau, a Brussels-based non-profit, called it a “careless plan” unlikely to achieve its goals because of an “over-reliance on expensive and unproven technologies.”

Tuesday's concessions to farmers came a week after the commission delayed by a year new requirements compelling many large farms that get EU funds to set aside 4% of their land for nature. Under this rule, farmers will need to leave land fallow or plant such features as hedges and trees.

In her speech, von der Leyen made it clear that she was ready to take farmers' complaints seriously and she showed willingness to retreat from the Green Deal, a policy she's made central to her presidency.

She is coming under intense pressure not only from farmers but also her political group, the conservative European People's Party, the main force in the European Parliament.

The EPP has increasingly spoken out against many of the more stringent aspects of the Green Deal, arguing they are too costly for industry and farmers. In doing so, the EPP is seeking to stave off far-right rivals who are courting farmers as they surge ahead of June elections for the European Parliament.

For her part, von der Leyen may be shifting her stance along with the EPP because she is likely to seek a second mandate as commission president following the elections.

Environmentalists blasted von der Leyen's backpedaling and said weakening the Green Deal will end up hurting farmers by worsening the climate crisis and causing further damage to nature.

“Politicians ignoring scientific advice on helping farmers move away from overproduction of meat and dairy makes climate change worse and leaves European farming more exposed to extreme weather,” said Marco Contiero, an agriculture policy specialist for Greenpeace. “Farmers are nature's best allies, when the rules, markets and subsidies don't force them into a desperate choice between industrial production or bankruptcy.”

Philippe Lamberts, a leader of the Greens in the European Parliament, accused the EPP and other political groups of “disinformation” and “outright lies” about how the Green Deal and Green parties were to blame for the problems faced by farmers.

“They pretend to listen to the farmers; actually, they dictate to the farmers what they should say: Point the finger at the Greens,” he said during a news conference. “When you listen to the farmers, what do they tell you? That they are crushed by an economic system that gives them zero profitability, zero degree of freedom.”

He said the cause for the farmers' woes lies with political groups like the EPP that back free-trade deals, big agrochemical companies, the food retail sector and banking institutions.

“They've been screwing the countryside and then they pose as their saviors,” he said. “And that's just an outright lie.”

Lamberts said carrying out the Green Deal will involve big changes for farmers. To achieve this change, he said the EU needs to reform its hugely subsidized agricultural system so that farmers aren't paid subsidies for what they produce but rather for taking costly environmental measures.

“In a well-functioning market economy, they [farmers] should be able to sell their wares, what they produce, with a profit and then get rewarded with subsidies for services they provide to society that they cannot be paid for,” he said. “I mean, when you restore biodiversity, you cannot sell biodiversity on the market; but that is work and every work must be compensated by an income.”

More on this component in the ongoing saga, in the form of an article from early February

[kudosmyhero]

Transformers (vol. 1) #15: I, Robot Master

Read Date: April 09, 2023 Cover Date: April 1986 ● Writer: Bob Budiansky ● Penciler: Don Perlin ● Inker: Keith Williams ● Colorist: Nel Yomtov ● Letterer: Janice Chiang ● Editor: Mike Carlin ◦ Michael Higgins ●

**HERE BE SPOILERS: Skip ahead to the fan art/podcast to avoid spoilers

Reactions As I Read: ● Megatron is hangry! ● Megatron is… out of gas? ● this is kind of an interesting reason to have this so-called “Robot-Master”—to keep the public from panicking too much. the idea is the public can accept a single human villain better than they can accept a race of sentient giant robots

● ok, this image of Megatron is a little terrifying…

● 👏👏👏

Synopsis: Megatron has come to an Easter Wyoming coal mile in a desperate search for fuel, however, he runs out of power before he can get any and freezes in place. While in Oregon, Walter Barnett meets with his superiors at III, where they ask him to do something to create a smoke screen to give the public an "enemy" associated with the frequent robot rampages so that the public doesn't go into a hysteria. After going over the most recent incidents, including Megatron's attack on the coal mine, they invited G.B. Blackrock to talk to them about his experience with the robots. When Blackrock attempts to explain a distinction between the Autobots and Decepticons, director Forest Forsythe interrupts him and thanks him for his time and sees him out. Forsythe tells his men that while there is evidence to support this he wants them to treat all robots as potential threats and gives his men 48 hours to come up with a cover story on who controls the robots to prevent public panic.

Barnett returns home to his wife and son, he scolds the boy for leaving a mess, however stops when he notices the boy has a Marvel Comic book called Robot Master, which features a villain who controls robots. Intrigued he decides to take a trip to New York City and pay a visit to the writer of the series, Donny Finkleberg. At the offices of Marvel Comics the next day, Donny is fired due to inability to write stories that sell. He ends up running into Barnett in the lobby who offers him a proposition. The two come up with the idea to create a real life Robot Master to give a more plausible reason for the robot attacks to the general public, who would find the notion of alien robots from another world to impossible to believe. Barnett then offers him 40 thousand dollars to not only help create the role of the real life Robot Master but to also play the part.

While aboard the Ark, Bumblebee, Skids, and Tracks return from a fruitless patrol and report to Optimus Prime. They are then all called into the communications room by Wheeljack who shows them a televised news report of a self-proclaimed "Robot Master" who is claiming responsibility for the robot attacks. Unaware of the government's hoax, the Autobots are puzzled by this story. While at the headquarters of Blackrock Enterprises, G.B. Blackrock knows exactly what's going on and is furious. With the phony broadcast over, Finkleberg is thanked by Barnett for his work. The next day reporters swam G.B. Blackrock's home to have him confirm the news. He denies ever seeing the Robot Master before the broadcast the previous night but declines to comment. Spotting Bumblebee parked in the driveway he decides to take this vehicle instead. As Bumblebee drives Blackrock to work, Blackrock explains the situation and the government's attempt to cover things up and tells the small Autobot that he will try to convince them to work with the Autobots.

At the headquarters of III, Forsythe is angered when the media has gotten footage of the deactivated Megatron out in the Wyoming coal pit. However, Barnett realizes that they can still capitalize on this and offers Finkleberg more money to reprise his role of Robot Master once more. The news also gets to the Autobots who rush off to the site to prevent Megatron from being reactivated. While on an information gathering mission Soundwave, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw and Ravage hear the news about Megatron's body and also rush to the site in order to revive their former leader.

III arrives there first and begins setting up camera crews to do another Robot Master broadcast when they are interrupted by G.B. Blackrock who begs them to consider the idea that there are two robot faction and that they should be telling the public the truth. Barnett tells Blackrock to butt out of their affairs, Blackrock warns them that they are playing with fire and that if the Decepticons figure out he's posing as their controller they'll surely kill him.

When the Autobots arrive the military attache that has accompanied III attacks them head on, but despite Blackrock's demands and the Autobots lack of aggressive action, the military continues to keep them at bay. While they are busy with the Autobots, Soundwave, and his cassettes arrive and revive Megatron with fuel. Megatron then simply blasts away all the tanks sending the military and the Autobots fleeing from the scene. When Laserbeak recognizes Donny Finkleberg, it brings him to Megatron and Soundwave explains who he is. Megatron is furious and is about to kill Finkleberg when Donny appeals to him by saying that they can use the Robot Master persona to turn the public against the Autobots and convince them that all Transformers are the same.

Sure enough, Megatron agrees and a broadcast promoting the idea that the Robot Master is real and that he controls every Transformer is broadcast across the country. With the broadcast over, Finkleberg relaxes by lighting a cigarette by striking a match on Megatron's foot while gloating about how sweet a deal he has. Megatron is not amused at being used as a strike pad and threatens Donny that if he smokes another cigarette he will kill him.

(https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Transformers_Vol_1_15)

Fan Art: Bumblebee by Novanim

Accompanying Podcasts: ● Transformers Chronicles - episode 15

● Transformers University - episode 30

[spellucci]

Joggins Fossil Cliffs

Saturday, August 5, 2023

Joggins Fossil Cliffs refers to a 15-km (9-mile) stretch of cliffs exposing rock strata from the Carboniferous era, commonly known as the the Coal Age. This era, about 310 million years ago, featured swamp forests which produced massive quantities of organic matter, including deep beds of peat. Over millions of years, this peat created the coal deposits for which this period of history is named.

The strata were buried by the last ice age. When the ice melted, the strata rebounded on a tilt, leaving younger 299 mya (million years ago) rock exposed to the elements at one end of the cliff face and older 318 mya rock at the other. The exceptional Bay of Fundy tides relentlessly eat away at the cliffs twice a day exposing a completely new set of fossils every 3 years.

We left camp after having leisurely attended to showers and other domestic chores, and made our way 20 minutes south to Joggins Fossil Cliffs. We had reservations for a short guided tour to get us familiarized with the site.

Our tour guide was very green. She made a joke about her infallible knowledge, then told us to ask her if we had any questions about what she said. It didn't go well. Guide: "These fossilized trees are from the Carboniferous era." Margaret: "What does Carboniferous mean?" Guide: "Um..." But she did show us a lot of fossils that recently emerged due to high tide erosion. The beach is covered with sandstone rocks, and many of them have plant fossils. Tree fossils take the form of both molds and casts.

Each kilometer one walks down the beach represents a journey million years back in time. There are six distinct coal seams on the cliff face, most of which have been mined to some extent.

Margaret heads into the gift shop and emerges with a handful of informative pamphlets and books, and a bag of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. We happily consume both.

Then lunch and a long five-hour drive through Nova Scotia and across the bridge onto Cape Breton Island. We stop to admire a Storyteller Overland camper (our model) in a restaurant parking lot. They have an Instagram icon on the side with their name on it. Tim messages them with thoughts of connection.

A final push up the Cabot Trail takes us to Petit Etang (little pond) at the gateway to Cape Breton Highland National Park. We pull into the Riverview RV Park where we will be spending the next three nights.

It was supposed to rain all day, but we lucked out at Joggins. It started to pour just as we were leaving. Not so lucky for Margaret at night. She made it safely to the washroom when she went to brush her teeth, but got completely drenched on the way back, knocking on the camper door to get her towel to take back to her tent.

[xtruss]

Tourists walk the beach at low tide at Hopewell Rocks in New Brunswick, Canada. The shoreline is on the Bay of Fundy, where the world’s highest tides regularly turn up fossils. Photograph By Eric Carr, Alamy

Anyone Can Discover a Fossil on This Beach—If You Wait Out the Tides

In New Brunswick, the world’s highest tides reveal fantastic fossils, from giant dragonflies to dinosaur footprints.

— By Robin Catalano | February 27, 2023

If you want to see where dinosaurs walked and giant, ancient centipedes crawled, just follow their footprints. That’s what scientists are doing in New Brunswick, Canada, where the world’s highest tides rush and recede over 40 feet twice per day in the Bay of Fundy. Amid rugged foothills and rock cliffs along the Atlantic Ocean, this phenomenon is revealing one of North America’s richest caches of fossils.

While researchers make most of the discoveries in this less visited province, citizen scientists—students, local residents, and even visitors—have been involved in a number of significant finds. It’s a welcome assist in a place where a piece of the ancient history puzzle might vanish as quickly as it emerges.

“It’s a race against the tides,” says Matt Stimson, a geology and paleontology curator at the New Brunswick Museum in Saint John, the province’s largest city. “Mother Nature is doing the excavation work for us. Something new is continually exposed. But it can also be erased.”

Here’s how travelers can see fossils—and help find new ones.

A Rich Fossil Record

Scientists have recognized New Brunswick’s paleontological abundance since the 1840s, when coal mining revealed fossilized flora and fauna. Over the Earth’s three evolutionary eras, the region has been a volcanic incubator of invertebrate life; an oxygen-rich, biodiverse rain forest that gave rise to dinosaurs; and a tundra dominated by furry, roving giants like mastodons.

Ancient ferns are preserved in rock that washes up on the shores in the Bay of Fundy. The 170-mile-long basin in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia has one of the richest caches of fossils in the Western Hemisphere. Photograph By Kitchin and Hurst , All Canada Photos/Alamy

Significant recent discoveries include invertebrate and vertebrate tracks trapped in stone along the beaches of the Atlantic coast. “When we stopped looking just for bones, the discoveries were eye-opening,” Stimson says. “An animal can only leave one body or skeleton, but thousands of footprints.”

New Brunswick Museum research associate Olivia King has made several notable finds over the past three years. They include the jaw of a proto-reptile about the size of a salamander and the tracks of the continent’s earliest, possibly tiniest, dinosaur (about two inches long).

“Until recently, people thought all the important fossils were being found in Nova Scotia,” she says of the province southeast of New Brunswick on the Bay of Fundy. Nova Scotia is sometimes called the “coal age Galapagos” due to its fossilized trees, trilobites, and early reptiles from the Carboniferous Period (about 359 to 299 million years ago). “But what we’re finding in New Brunswick is equivalent to or older than sites in Nova Scotia,” says King.

Citizen scientists have turned up many recent finds. Two local college students, Luke Allen and Rowan Norrad, uncovered hundreds of artifacts over the last few years. They include the wing imprint of a previously unknown falcon-sized dragonfly and amphibian footprints dating to Romer’s Gap, a largely undocumented break in the tetrapod (four-limbed animal) fossil record.

How To Go Fossil Hunting

Travelers can dip into New Brunswick’s fossil history at parks and preserves up and down the province’s 1,400-mile-long coastline. Tour guides lead walking, hiking, and paddling excursions. There’s also beachcombing at low tide, when the water recedes as much as 650 feet and you can walk along the gurgling mudflats of the ocean floor.

You can also go fossil spotting on your own, but consult a tide chart for safety; you have about six hours between the water’s lowest and highest points. Once the tide begins to roll in, it rises a foot every six minutes, and can easily overwhelm a beach in less than an hour.

Some fossil footprints—stuttering zigzags of toe and tail-drag impressions—are found embedded in cliffs; others turn up in rocks the tides scatter across the sand. By provincial law, discoveries must be left in place—like crime scene evidence—and reported to the New Brunswick Museum, which then deploys researchers to evaluate them. If the find is significant, you might see your name recorded in the museum.

To experience the ancient side of New Brunswick, base yourself in Saint John, part of the UNESCO Stonehammer Geopark. Start at the New Brunswick Museum, where more than 23,000 fossils include a juvenile mastodon that perished about 80,000 years ago.

Head 30 miles east to the UNESCO Fundy Biosphere Region, more than a million acres of rugged woodland and craggy coastline stretching from the village of Saint Martins nearly to the Nova Scotia border. Along the biosphere’s beaches, there’s fossil hunting when the waves slurp out.

Fishing boats sit on the beach during low tide in the Bay of Fundy. Photograph By Robbie George, National Geographic Image Collection

About an hour-and-thirty-minute drive north, the otherworldly red sandstone cliffs of Dennis Beach and neighboring Waterside Beach have revealed ancient tetrapod and proto-dinosaur footprints. Visitors can go tide pooling here to see tunicates or sea squirts.

Sixty-five miles northeast of Saint John, Cape Enrage gets its name from the turbulent waters that churn over its reef at low tide. The six-acre provincial park offers rappelling, zip-lining, and beach fossil tours where you can spot ferns and large, bamboo-like Calamites.

Hopewell Rocks, New Brunswick’s marquee attraction, is about 20 miles northeast of Cape Enrage. It holds the province’s largest concentration of sea stacks, free-standing rock formations whittled out of the coastline during the last ice age. A limestone ledge along the far end of the beach preserves 340-million-year-old stromatolites, blue-green algae masses that range from the size of a grapefruit to the height of a toddler.