#ramblingandpie

[bemusedlybespectacled]

I want to do the ship ask meme thing but I'll admit I'm not super familiar with your favorite fandoms. Couls you list some?

Okay, naming only ones that have more than one ship:

Leverage

The Pitt

Our Flag Means Death

Wicked

Maleficent

Pacific Rim

The Man from UNCLE (movie, but I've been known to watch the TV show)

The Queen's Thief series

The Tortall books by Tamora Pierce

The Emelan books by Tamora Pierce

[unforth]

Pining. Mistaken identity. Someone gets in a fistfight with the concept of gender. There is an arranged marriage. Size kink. Someone cried beautifully. Slow burn, 230k words.

Initial author’s note: I think this’ll be about 20k words, and’ll take me maybe a week?

I don’t think I’ve ever written a fic with a fistfight about the concept of gender but I really, really should.

(my wife knows my so well lmao)

[kitkatcabbit]

Tagged by @ramblingandpie​ to list 7 comfort movies. So, in no particular order-

1. Princess Bride

Adventure, revenge, true love, a dastardly prince...what more could you want?

2. Singing in the Rain

A classic. I could watch this pretty much any time.

3. Clue

An all-around great movie, plus Madelaine Khan. Perfection.

4. Fifth Element

Another fun one I could watch pretty much whenever.

5. John Wick

Why not spend a couple of hours watching Keanu Reeves be hot and delightfully competent?

6. John Wick 2

Yet more of Keanu being hot and competent, along with even more of the incredible world-building from this franchise.

7. Hunchback of Notre Dame

One of the first Disney movies I saw that had something of a darker tone. Also it spawned a stage version that I wish had gotten more traction, because I’d loved to have been able to see it live.

Bonus: Hunchback of Notre Dame, stage version

Everyone feel free to tag yourself if you like :)

[doctorspork]

@ramblingandpie replied to your post “Coming full circle”

Sending love your way. I am not in medicine (I am in disability law) and stumbled into that once when a claimant's doctors had not even mentioned the *possibility* of cancer (I asked her to call me if the bronchoscopy came back that the mass was cancerous.) We got through it but now I am so, so, SO grateful when doctors are frank with their patients. So. Thank you.

@simplysupergirl replied to your post “Coming full circle”

*hugs* <3 you

@dogemd replied to your post “Coming full circle”

Beautifully done. I’m proud of you for doing these hard conversations, and helping this man have a clear idea about what is being done and why. Sending love to you and him.

@doctor-doomz replied to your post “Coming full circle”

This is one of the more frustrating parts of medicine. I wish my own sub specialty would do a better job of being more transparent with patients. I’ve already encountered way too many people getting palliative-intent chemo who seem to have no idea they are not curative. It’s disheartening.

@pharmdup replied to your post “Coming full circle”

Sometimes our patients heal us, too. Well done.

Love to all of you as well <3

@doctor-doomz - 1000% agree. That’s my biggest beef with many of our oncologists. I don’t think I’ve had a single patient on palliative chemo who understood that. But I also do think this is very important for primary care & hospitalists & ED docs to do as well - they/we are often the ones seeing patients first, and at least making the presumptive diagnosis, if not the definitive one. And if we’re pretty sure it’s cancer, it’s our job to communicate that. I really don’t think anyone should ever undergo an oncology workup without being aware that’s what they’re being tested for.

[dollsonmain]

ramblingandpie replied to your post: I have bathed. Tested the shampoo that came in the...

I still vote for migraine because they be like that sometimes.

No pain, though.

[amassingeffect]

Ficlet Prompt Friday - Molecular Gastronomy - Suvi Anwar, Kallo Jath

@ramblingandpie: Suvi discovers some DELICIOUS science

“Do you know what I miss?” at Kallo’s questioning sound, Suvi followed up with, “Ice cream. Honest to goodness ice cream.”

“… Isn’t that the foodstuff made from the lactation secretions of an earth mammal all churned up?” Kallo wrinkled his nose.

“See, when you put it like that, it does sound fairly revolting.” Suvi sighed. “I really miss chocolate ice cream.”

Now Kallo looked aghast. “You take perfectly good chocolate and put it in that?!”

“No, not the super dark chocolate you like Kallo. Though how you eat that…” Suvi shook her head. “No, it’s the sweeter stuff.”

“Well, we sort of have milk. Couldn’t you just freeze that?”

Suvi shook her head again. “It’s all in how you freeze it. The longer and slower it is, the bigger the ice crystals will be when it does freeze. No one likes grainy ice cream. The trick is to freeze it quickly enough to get small ice crystals but not to snap freeze it.”

For a few minutes Kallo as silent. Then he mused, “I bet Vetra would know what to do.”

“We need something to churn it and we don’t have a blender…” Suvi pursed her lips in thought. “Do you think Gil has any liquid nitrogen floating around.”

Kallo shook his head with a sound of disapproval. “If you want some juryrigged container that’s liable to leak on you,” his face lit up with realization. “Solidified carbon dioxide, same low temperatures that would give much more stable results that liquid nitrogen. Plus it sublimates so less to worry about when you go to freeze it.”

“So... dry ice then. How soon until we’re back at the Nexus?” Suvi couldn’t help but feel excitement.

“Mm, about three hours,” Kallo slid her a knowing look, his grin growing. “Did you want to conduct a science experiment?”

“You have no idea how much!” Suvi exclaimed before she added on, “I’ll message Vetra.”

_________________________________________________________

Six hours later, Suvi grinned as she caught Kallo peering at sweetened, flavoured milk with mild revulsion. Vetra had delivered on the dry ice and where Kallo found a stand mixer was a mystery to to her. But here they were standing in the galley and Kallo was eyeing the empty carton as she crushed the dry ice.

“Is that less than pea sized now?” Kallo looked into her bowl, putting down the carton.

“Almost there.” Suvi smashed the end of the rolling pin in the bowl a few more times. “That ice cream base ready?”

“Sugar, vanilla and the…milk,” Kallo made a face as he held up the bowl. “The directions say that you add the dry ice to this base…,” he looked at the written directions again. “A spoonful at a time.”

“Can’t we just add it all at once?” Suvi kept pounding at the dry ice. The smaller the ice, the better.

“On no, the last time you did that in an experiment there was that explosion—”

“Okay, okay, spoonful at a time. But next time —”

“You assume there’s going to be a next time?!”

“It’s ice cream, of course there’s going to be a next time!”

“If there is a next time, let’s make that fruit flavour ice slush, those are wonderful.”

“We can try. Isn’t it called something like granary?”

“Granita.”

Suvi shook her head, fighting down her smile as Kallo set the bowl in the mixer and set it to a low speed. She slowly added in the dry ice, spoonful by spoonful.It felt like it took forever, even though Kallo said it was only about six minutes. It took all her willpower to not dig out a spoon and try it right that moment. If Kallo hadn’t given her a stern look as he put it in the small freezer, she probably would have shattered a tooth on a small chunk of dry ice and wouldn’t that have fun to explain to Lexi.

The next thirty minutes that passed were some of the longest of Suvi Anwar’s life. The ice cream was done, they had followed the recipe guidelines to the letter and it was Kallo’s insistence that they give it enough time to let all the dry ice sublimate. By his calculations, it would take 25 minutes, with an extra 5 minute buffer window.

Honestly, she was starting to think it would be worth the shattered tooth. Lexi could fix those, right?

“I can feel you dying over there,” Kallo chuckled as he hit some buttons on his omni-tool. He pulled out a spoon from somewhere and handed it to her with a small flourish. “If you may do the honours.”

“Kallo… are you saying…” Suvi didn’t even try to fight the grin coming to her face.

“This may be one of the rare few times I saw this, so savour it: you may lick the experiment.”

“Ahahaha, yes!”

Suvi grabbed the spoon and had the bowl out of the freezer and digging in before she even sat back down.

“Oh my god,” she mumbled around her mouthful. “Oh my god, Kallo, you have to try this.”

“Oh, no.” Kallo shook his head. “But it’s good to know the experiment is clearly a success. Can you describe the results better than that?”

“Oh my God,” Suvi drawled out before eating another spoonful. “Totally worth it if I break a tooth. Just tell Lexi I did something else like… walk into a wall. Again.”

“You really need to pay more attention in the mornings.”

“Anything before caffeine and all bets are off.” Suvi paused, looking at the creamy concoction on her spoon. “What time is it?”

“Ship time is 21:10.”

“Ice cream for dinner, even better. Best experiment ever!”

“Granita next time!”

[analisegrey]

@ramblingandpie asked: “ PTSD/flashback: Sam Wilson using his experience as a peer counselor to help Bucky through a flashback.”

Bucky had more or less come to terms with the fact that he was kind of fucked up. He’d been assured by a lot of people- some professionals, some friends- that given all he’d been through, what he’d suffered, it was completely normal that he’d have some lingering issues.

He knew he was at risk for flashbacks, and was getting better at avoiding triggers. The problem was, he was working through 70 years of hell, and while some of it had been understandably traumatizing, there were still some triggers that were just completely unpredictable. They knew to keep him away from war films, from anything involving electrocution, loud noises or sudden movement. But his mind was a minefield, and he never knew what small, mundane thing might set him off. The big triggers were relatively easy to prepare for; the smaller ones, not so much.

During his recovery, he’d learned to be wary of pistachio ice cream, the smoke from certain cigarette brands (but not others), blue umbrellas, and granola with raisins (without was fine). He didn’t always have context for why something was a trigger, just that the flashback would hit him like a truck, rushed images flying past his mind’s eye, snatches of sound, and he’d come back to the present shaking, sweating, unsure briefly of where he was, or in the worst cases, who he was.

This time, it was the lingering smell of black licorice. The smell overwhelmed him, cresting over him like a wave and pulling him under. Flashes of dark, poured-cement walls, leaking cold rivulets of water down the sides. Rough cement underneath him, no clothing between him and the floor. Yelling, words in Russian, though he wasn’t coherent enough to grab them and figure out what they were saying. The words slid by him, just out of reach, and he let them go; he probably didn’t want to know what they’d been yelling, anyway. Eventually it faded, the world coming back in blinks. He opened his eyes, he was in the cement room. Blink, and he was somewhere else, somewhere warmer, softer. No cold cement here, no one yelling in Russian. After another minute, he realized there was a voice nearby, speaking in a quiet, soothing tone, in English.

“-and ya know, I can never turn down my nana’s bread pudding, so I went on ahead and had some, even though I was ready to burst already. You’d think somebody would’ve told her that a man can only eat so much, but she was having none of that- oh, hey. You back with me?”

Bucky blinked a few times, clearing his eyes enough to see the shape of Sam, sitting on the floor across the kitchen, his back leaned up against a cabinet door. Bucky’s awareness of his body started to filter back in- he was hunched over on his knees, arms up, protecting his head. His knees ached, and he wondered how long he’d been out this time. He hummed, acknowledgement that he’d heard Sam.

“That’s great, buddy. You know where you are?”

“Tower kitchen. On the floor.”

Sam snorted in amusement. “Yeah, that’s close enough. Any idea what set you off?”

Bucky had to take a few deep breaths to be able to get the words out. Even saying them made him queasy, though he didn’t know why. “Smell. Black licorice.”

Sam hmmed, nodding. “Yeah, that one’s on Clint. He raided the snack cabinet earlier before heading to watch a movie. Want me to check the cabinet for you?”

Bucky let his eyes slide shut and nodded, curling down to let his forehead rest on the cool tile of the floor. He could hear Sam get up and move to the cabinet that routinely got stocked with a wide array of snacks- cookies, candies, crackers. There was a rustling of packages, then the cabinet closing again, and the soft thud of Sam sitting down again, though closer to Bucky this time.

“All gone, Buckster. JARVIS?”

“Yes, Sam?”

“Can we please make a note in the grocery order to exclude any black licorice from future orders for the main kitchen?”

“Of course. I’ll make the note for the next order.”

“Thanks, J.”

“You are quite welcome, Sam.”

“How-” Bucky coughed, his throat dry. He cleared his throat and tried again. “How’d you get him to call you by your first name?”

Bucky could hear the smile in Sam’s voice when he answered. “He likes me best, that’s why.”

Bucky huffed, not quite a laugh, and pushed himself up and over so he was sitting on his ass, back up against the center island of the kitchen. He gently thunked his head back against the island, cracking his eyes open. “That sucked.”

“Yeah it did.” Sam rolled a bottle of water across the floor so that it came to rest against Bucky’s thigh. He picked it up and opened it, taking a sip. The cool water was soothing on his throat, and after a few more sips, he could feel his mind starting to clear.

“You wanna talk about it?”

Bucky shrugged, looking down at his hands and rolling the water bottle back and forth, listening to the label crinkle. “I mean, it wasn’t anything too terrible. I think it was in Russia, probably one of the outposts. The whole ‘deep, damp, dark hole’ type place. Lotsa yelling.” Sam nodded at him to go on. “Didn’t remember anything really awful, though. Don’t know why I got a whole flashback out of it.”

Sam was quiet a moment before he spoke; Bucky appreciated that Sam gave consideration to what he was going to say before he said it. The thoughtfulness was nice.

“You know, just because you don’t remember something bad happening, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Your body still remembers, and even if it’s buried a little, on some level your mind still remembers, too. And don’t pull any of that ‘it wasn’t super bad so why am I reacting to it’ nonsense with me, I know you know better. Everyone’s scale for ‘that bad’ is different, and yours is scaled up higher than most people’s. Even then, it’s not a competition, even, and especially, against yourself, about whether something was bad enough to react to. You’re allowed to react to anything and everything they did to you. You’re allowed to feel how you gotta feel about what happened. That’s part of the healing process. Sure, there are some ways to cope that are healthier than others, but I don’t wanna hear you saying that something wasn’t bad enough to warrant a reaction. Cause we both know that’s straight up bullshit.”

Bucky nodded, a small smile pulling up at the corner of his mouth. “When did you get so smart, Wilson?”

“It’s part of the whole Falcon Deluxe package, my man. Good looks, great brain, and more flying skill than you can shake a stick at.”

Bucky snorted. “Yeah, yeah.”

Sam pushed himself up off the floor and stretched with a groan, his back popping as he twisted. “I should not sit on the floor for that long, though, damn.”

Bucky rolled gracefully up to his feet, smiling at Sam’s playful scowl. “It’s ‘cause you’re old.”

“Old my ass, you ungrateful geezer. You wanna go hit things til you feel better?”

“Yeah, that...that sounds good.”

Bucky was still kind of fucked up, and likely would be for the foreseeable future, but the warm feeling in his chest as Sam heckled him from the sidelines of the training ring helped get rid of the last of the remembered chill, and he thought he might end up okay anyway.

[naamahdarling]

ramblingandpie

  Can someone please explain to me why I can’t stand...

I think it’s a maturity/tolerance thing? Like there is a point in a person’s life where they encounter too many Calvin-like people (and too many Calvin’s-dad-like people) to be able to enjoy it in a comedic/satirical context. Like. The dudebros who Aspire To Be Like Calvin.

Oh.

Oh, wow, that’s . . . certainly . . . very fucking true, isn’t it?

I . . . yes.  Yes, I believe that may be a very large part of why I want to blow them both out an airlock.  Yikes.

A huge percentage of mostly dudes don’t seem to realize that Calvin isn’t admirable.