Day 1- My love for you is true, I swear it is, it will just kill you in the end
I have been doing a writing challenge on AO3 this past week, and decided to begin cross-posting it. Basically I have to write everyday.
AO3 link to chapter one- here
Next part on tumblr- here
Word count- 700 words
It was through heavy research that Edwin had found the potion in the first place.
It was not too complex to make, however some of the ingredients tended to be pricier than the agency could afford, so Edwin did try to keep its usage to a minimum. It was a handy little potion though, capable of temporarily increasing one’s level of magical energy so they could do more demanding spells without easily tiring. It was a vital potion, one that meant the two of them could take more difficult magical cases with less worry.
It was helpful that Edwin quite enjoyed the taste as well. The side effects were minimal, even if what they did to him were things he kept from Charles.
What if I was wrong by never moving on I-
The idea came about because of Crystal.
It would be wrong to believe that there had never been music in the office, Charles and Edwin loved to dance, when there was a lull between cases and no desire to explore, the two would often set a record on the ancient victrola they had acquired and dance. Edwin loved music, in a way he couldn’t find himself to while listening to waltz music, or while playing the violin or piano. Charles’ music was upbeat and loud and, in your face, it was amazing.
Charles was amazing
Crystal had been using the office to study in, something she had begun to do shortly after they came back to London from Port Townsend. Edwin, despite his desire to, hadn’t pushed the issue. She at least kept quiet and wasn’t too much of an annoyance beyond moaning about her schoolwork.
For the past century Edwin had not had to worry about schoolwork, but with the Night Nurse’s new demands for a paper trail in their cases, it could be said he understood the sentiment.
The idea came from Crystal though, while she had been studying for one of her many exams, she had begun to hum a small tune, followed by whatever equation or series of names for hierarchies that she had to remember with a tempo and rhythm that resembled a song.
It was quite easy to take the idea from that.
Edwin had always hated how much he relied on his texts for his magic, how burdensome it could be for Charles to ensure he had the most important books safely stored away in his backpack for their cases. As evident by their encounter with the World War One ghost, then everything in Port Townsend, Edwin should not rely solely on Charles to keep them safe.
So much was changing so quickly.
So, it was easy, to translate the idea from Crystal into practice. He had always been musically gifted, always finding small ways to incorporate music into his life and style, steps and movements following an unheard tempo that had branded him a Mary-Ann.
Still, it reminded him of the first time he successfully cast a spell, when he had gotten through the tune and a small flame appeared at his fingertips. Emotions flooded through him, relief being chief among them. He wasn’t sure it’d work.
It wasn’t what Charles meant, when he asked him to learn how to defend himself, but it was close enough, wasn’t it? Not having to rely on texts that could get ruined or lost or, any number of things really. It had to be enough, to show Charles that he listened to him when he spoke. Charles was probably the only person who Edwin would willingly listen to at any rate, a fact that the other boy somehow failed to notice.
Edwin would protect Charles, and Charles would protect him.
Crystal and Charles were getting closer, and sometimes, maybe, Edwin worried that he was keeping Charles from his afterlife, or even just, where he truly wanted to be.
There is no one else, no one else, I would go to Hell for.
He should not have been so naïve as to believe his confession would change nothing at the agency.
Edwin also, perhaps, couldn’t help but wonder if he should have stayed in Hell, if that would have freed Charles to his.
people will say “they’re only friends” and then show me two people who would crawl through broken glass to hear the other laugh once. two people who have memorized each other’s coffee orders, fears, childhood stories, and emergency contacts. two people who would haunt each other’s houses as ghosts. be serious.
Just an FYI—the original intention of this post was to challenge the way people say only friends, as though friendship is somehow lesser than other forms of love. As if being deeply known, cherished, and chosen by another person could ever be a small thing. Normalize profound platonic love. Some of the most fulfilling, transformative, and enduring relationships we will ever have are friendships. 🫶🏼
Um actually scrub daddy is my comfort character and it physically and psychically hurts me to see you chop him up and eat him after freezing and cracking him up with liquid nitrogen while naked with big boobs?
We NEED to talk about this scene because it shape-shifts when you watch the movie a second time???
On your first viewing, when Grace leaves the party to join Stratt on the deck, you’ve been following Grace's POV for the whole movie. You can feel how he's trying to break the ice and connect with Stratt via humor: "Permission to come aboard, captain?🫡"
And Stratt being Stratt kills the joke immediately: "You’re already aboard." And by killing that joke she also kills his attempt at connecting with her. That's her thing. You feel it in the knock-knock scene and you feel it here because Grace is feeling it. He stammers and he's nervous ("Talk too much, that's my problem, like right now"). His attempt at human connection is painfully unrequited (again).
When you finish the movie, you learn, however, that that is not true at all. You hear Stratt's voice crack when she has to do what she has to do, and you realize how her carefully constructed armor fractures because of him. He is not nothing to her.
And when you (inevitably) watch the movie again, and your POV is not limited to Grace's anymore but you can shift your view to Stratt ever so slightly, then suddenly the whole connecting-via-jokes business drops away to make room for the metaphorical meaning of "coming aboard".
"It is okay to be in your space? Am I allowed to be closer to you?"
And her answer?
He is already in her space, behind her defenses, and he doesn't even realize it (blissfully unaware about SO many things in fact). He is asking to be allowed inside the house while standing in the damn living room.
Of course watching a movie a second time will always deepen your understanding of the characters, but it's remarkable that Stratt's answer does not just gain a more differentiated level of meaning. Instead, it is transformed into it's opposite, from a very clear "I am not letting you in" to an equally clear "You've come in uninvited a long time ago", and both can be true at the same time!
I really want toy story explored with an adult perspective. By this, I mean that I can’t help but think of the scene from the 2nd movie where the old guy pulls out his kit and so delicately fixes woody. I know the scene ends with the sentiment that he’s restored to prime condition and is ready to be put into a museum to never be loved again, but I want a perspective where it branches from that. Where the act of restoration is the love, and the toy can continued to be loved until it needs repairs again. I want a toy story to explore the perspective of a toy that was hand-crafted by somebody to be loved, and what it means for them to know that they were created to be loved. I want a toy story where the toys continue to be loved into adulthood, that they still are needed and are important to their person, that they realize that they don’t need to fear being outgrown. I want to know what toy story would have been like if Woody did end up going to college with Andy! I want to see toy stories with adults beyond “likes toys for money” and parents of kids who have toys. As someone on twitter put it, I want to know what the concept of toy story is like for anime figurines. I want to know what toy story is like for the one person who selfships with Randy Marsh. I think I would feel seen.
Something I will never get over with Heated Rivalry is that a large part of the reason why it was so successful as a book-to-screen adaptation is because it was a passion project made by a fan of the book. So often the people hired to make screen versions of beloved books don’t actually give a fuck about the story they’re adapting or the genre they’re adapting from. Heated Rivalry only exists as a show because Jacob Tierney read it and just *had* to put it on screen. He slid into Rachel Reid’s DMs! He convinced executives that being book-accurate (sex and all) was the way to ensure a dedicated fanbase! He sold the show by promising that it had an existing fanbase who would ride for it!
His love for the source material is so evident in not just the show, but also all of his interviews and it is truly so refreshing.
it's kind of crazy climate change has occurred at such a remarkable pace that I and everyone else around my age can remember a completely different climate in our childhoods. I truly watched winter gradually disappear in my life.
"You're too young to remember this, but there used to be so many insects outside that you would have to clean them off the windshield after a long car ride" is the kind of sentence that would have been in a cheesy scifi short story earlier in my life, perhaps submitted to a literary magazine and accepted to show support for its environmentalist message - now it's something I've said in earnest.
I feel so bad for the annoying women at work. Like I actually feel sick when we’re interacting and I feel the annoyance occurring in my brain like she really doesn’t mean to be this way and she just doesn’t want to feel alone or rejected. you can tell she’s experienced being an outsider everywhere she goes it’s only a matter of time. And it’s not cool chic or edgy but in the ugliest most desperate and dehumanizing way. They always start hopeful. they want to connect and they go searching for someone receptive to her so she can find her people but everyone turns away from her slowly and u hear it in her voice. It’s happening again. she starts hesitating to speak and when she does you hear a shaky child ending every sentence like it’s a question. Testing the waters to know if she’s wrong for even trying. And then I realize I took her smile for granted now that it’s gone.. I have to make it up to her I can’t let something like this continue. Life is so hard for people everywhere, so building a tolerance for being irritated is nothing in comparison especially if the reward is less pain and loneliness in the world I will always be the bestie you have my word
People who flinch at this or jump to hating on OP have never been completely honest with themselves and it shows. Like, you know this person. You've met this person. The under socialized outcast who everyone thinks is kinda annoying and weird, including you. People think that acknowledging their own annoyance towards someone who's essentially harmless is the same as killing someone and being ontologically bad. Like, as long as you don't shun that person you're good. Actually, that's exactly what OP is fucking talking about. They acknowledge and see that this woman is the way she is and also express sympathy, but because there's no over the top performative moralizing everyone thinks it's mean when it's just a true assessment of the situation. Like, two things can be true at once—yes, this person is annoying and they make me cringe and yes, I'm not gonna be an asshole about it because I know that's not right. I have a sneaking suspicion that the reason everyone got so fired up about this is because they're scared that they might've been the annoying coworker in someone else's story. And guess what you probably were. Yeah. Sit with that. Did you die? Did the discomfort kill you?
It’s so funny to me that soccer games can end with a score of 0-0 like imagine going to see a soccer game and both teams just run around the field for 90 minutes doing absolutely nothing and nobody scores any points and at the end of the 90 minutes they’re like well. Guess that’s that. Great soccer game guys.
you know i understand that a lot of the time wilson simply exists to be the writers vessel for either comedic emphasis or explanation but like. it really creates this weird vibe where he knows random facts like these or says random things about house while doing nothing at the same time. it creates the impression that he knows house is an arse but also does not care and does not want to do anything about it
“spicy pillow” jokes aside, I think @flowerkrone’s tags deserve a serious reply:
#my old phone looks like this on my shelf lmao #im too scared to touch it to throw it away #idk what trash this even goes into when its at this point
The pillow-shaped object here used to be the phone’s battery. It’s not a battery anymore. Now it’s a balloon full of corrosive, pyrophoric chemicals and hydrogen gas and it’s one puncture away from burning your house down. I am 100% serious. You should be scared to touch it.
But you gotta touch it, because you gotta get it out of your house before the pressure builds up to the point where the balloon pops. This isn’t going to happen soon – there is no need to panic – but it will happen eventually.
And, indeed, it doesn’t go in the ordinary trash. You put this in the ordinary trash and you’re gonna set the garbage truck on fire. Don’t do that to the garbage collectors, their job is hard enough already.
The first thing you need to do is get a fireproof container. The most common household item that qualifies as a fireproof container is a cast-iron cookpot with a cast-iron lid – often sold as a “Dutch oven.” Any other cooking container that’s unreactive, has a very high melting point, and has a lid made of the same materials will also work: enameled or stainless steel, Pyrex with glass lid, etc.
However: Do not use a pot with a PTFE-based non-stick coating. If the battery does explode, the fire will probably be hot enough to degrade a PTFE coating, producing toxic smoke. (Not that you should breathe the smoke from the battery fire either, but PTFE breakdown products are worse.) Do not use a pot made of aluminium or copper. The fire might even get hot enough to melt those.
Whatever container you use, you might have to throw away along with the phone, so don’t use your good Dutch oven for this. Go to a thrift store and buy a cheap one.
Once you have the fireproof container:
Gently pick up the phone and put it in the fireproof container. If possible, gently tape the phone to the bottom of the container to prevent it from bouncing around. Don’t put any padding in there, that’ll just make a fire worse if it does happen. Put the lid on and tape it shut.
Put a label on the container, something like “DEFECTIVE LI-ION BATTERY – FIRE HAZARD”.
It is now reasonably safe to move the container around. However, if the battery does explode, the container is very likely to leak smoke and get hot, so keep it in a well-ventilated area and away from things that will be damaged by heat. Don’t leave it exposed to the weather, either.
You need to find either a hazardous waste disposal site, or an e-waste recycler that will accept defective Li-ion batteries. I can’t help with that because I have no idea where you live.
However, your local fire department, if you have one, will probably be happy to help. Call their non-emergency number. Nothing is on fire yet, so this isn’t an emergency, but things that can easily start a fire are still within the fire department’s responsibilities. Tell them you have a phone with a bulging lithium-ion battery, you put it in a fireproof container, and you want to know how to dispose of it safely.
If the fire department tries to tell you this isn’t dangerous or it’s okay to throw it out in the regular trash (with or without fireproof container), hang up on them and write a cranky letter to your local government representatives, then keep looking for a proper disposal site.
When you do find a a hazardous waste disposal site or an e-waste recycler, call them and make sure they will take defective Li-ion batteries, before showing up. That’s also a good time to ask if they will let you have the fireproof container back.
