封斋
fēng zhāi
to fast (she says it's only for Muslims, but I think she means is it has religious connotations, since it can also be applied to Lent)
This account does a lot of daily life scenarios, sometimes she'll interview a friend. This Ramadan explainer is a little over-simplified but has some good vocab! (also to note, yes the Hui minority is Muslim, but there are regional differences, and there are also non-Hui Muslim Chinese. for more on ethnic minority definition mess see)
It’s so depressing looking on zillow at places to rent in my area because it is SO mfing expensive in the Bay Area!!!?!??
I know I want to move to Oregon or Washington one day, but not quite yet. I need to finish school first, (1 year left) and then I’ll be done.
But I have been looking at places, I could never afford to move out alone atm, so a friend and I have looked here and there and it would be so neat to move in to a little place and have my own space and it would just be me, my friend (maybe her twin brother too, or even my brother too!) Thea, and Saoirse ❤️
Ugh, I want to be able to move out so so badly!!!!
I know some of you have more than one one blog and some of you guys might have done this already but no worries. Feel free to do one if you like! JUST KNOW I LOVE AND APPRECIATE YOU! ❤️❤️❤️
btw, i just started my depression meds so i might have trouble doing art for a few weeks.
it’s the first day, 3 hours later and i’m ready to go the fuck to sleep. which is weird cause a reason i went off is because i had a hard time going to sleep
edit: doesn’t mean i wont be doing art. just means there might be less art. will try at least once a day! :D
A bit late, but finally, a scene write up for a writing challenge posed by @captmickey at [this link], in which we were tasked to script out the mirror collecting scene from the prologue. Away!
His boots were unsteady, and he swayed back and forth, trying to keep his balance. Mattresses were for sleeping on, or surreptitiously jumping on when no one was looking, not for standing still on while moving slowly through the air.
Flying mattresses. Whoever would have thought of it. No one at all, because it was silly. It was magic carpets that were meant for air travel, not mattresses. Pegasi could fly, too. Or dragons. Definitely, dragons could fly. Fly high. Eat lots. Charbroiled lunch mid-flight. Al fresco. Fresco. Flight. Fight. Fright.
He knew his thoughts were a smidge scattered. Flying from place to place. Probably because there was a giant dragon chomping down on a huge slab of raw meat, like, maybe thirty feet beneath his unsteady boots.
Graham was one of the best adventuring knights Daventry had. Almost all his adventures were successful, and he’d done the kingdom proud in his years as knight. There was a magic mirror that had gone missing long ago. With his excellent record and standing in the kingdom, he’d been tasked to retrieve said mirror by King Edward. He’d found the mirror, which was the good part. There was, regrettably, a bad part: there was a dragon protectively curled around the magic mirror, at the bottom of a huge cavern.
There’d been a ridiculous dragon feeding contraption that used a bell, huge slabs of steak that came from stars knew what sort of animal (best not to ask, really), and mattresses instead of serving trays, probably because the meat slabs were just that enormous. If you used a pulley system, it seemed like you could send these mattresses to deliver meat to the huge animal without turning into meat yourself. Presumably. So he’d given it a go, sent some delicious meat as far away from the mirror as he could to lead the dragon away, so he might take the mirror without becoming delicious meat himself.
But to get down to the mirror, he’d been forced to use a mattress as a ride himself, so there wasn’t that much difference between him and one of the uncooked slabs of meat. They’d probably taste about the same, and they were delivered in the same manner. Straight into a dragon’s open jaw.
He wavered from side to side as the mattress descended on creaky ropes and chains, and he blamed it on the unsteady surface. His boots couldn’t stay still on a fluffy mattress. Definitely because the mattress was soft and hard to stand on. Not because he was scared. Nope. Not that. Couldn’t be that.
(Was definitely that.)
The mattress thumped gently on the ground, and Graham leapt off hastily. At least on solid ground he could get his feet under him and run if he had to. But the dragon was preoccupied with its current snack, and hadn’t yet noticed him. With one eye on the huge beastie, Graham carefully stepped across the broken stone floor, trying to avoid the little puddles and tiny mushrooms across his path.
Grab the mirror and go. Simple as that. Just get it, and get out. His hands curled over the ornate metal frame, and he instinctively glanced down at his reflection.
Everyone did it. You passed a mirror, you glanced at it. It was just something everyone did. Check your hair, check your clothes, check to make sure you were still you.
But he wasn’t him. This wasn’t his reflection. It couldn’t be his reflection. Graham hoisted the mirror high, up to his face, staring. It was him, of course it was him; what else could a mirror show but the truth? But it wasn’t him. It was, surely. But. So, so different.
He was wearing a crown.
Golden light was spilling out from the mirror itself, splashing across his face, his hands, his cloak, his adventuring hat with the feather his mother had so carefully sewn in, years ago. He wasn’t wearing a crown.
But his mirror self was.
And his mirror self was smiling ever so gently at him, warmth in his reflected eyes, twinkling with knowledge of the future, while the real Graham was sticky with nerves and cave dirt and mushroom dust and ashy dragon breath.
He didn’t know what it meant. But he smiled back at his reflection. It seemed like the only thing to do. They nearly matched up, then. Both sides smiling. Even if the hats were different.
Ahead of him, the dragon’s claws clicked on the floor, and it started to growl low and deep and earth rumblingly dangerous, and Graham hastily looked up, saw he was out of time, saw the dragon starting to lumber his way, and he shoved the mirror in his inventory and he shoved his thoughts away.
Something to process later. For now, he needed to fly. Metaphorically, of course, but also kind of literally, as he scrambled back on the mattress pulley system and shot up into the air like a phoenix taking flight, the dragon’s teeth snapping at the empty air where he’d been standing just seconds before.
