For Those Who Missed It, Here’s Phil Slam-dunking Quackity’s Face Into His Birthday Cake LMFAO, I

Sobbing because all of Loid's scenes are so sad and dull and grey before he sees his family

And then after he meets up with his girls his world becomes full of color and IM A MESS RIGHT NOW

Alright

I want to talk about how cryptozoology is often toxic for Natives interested in it. I personally love cryptozoology, but I'm often uncomfortable while going through it because of how much content with w*ndigo, sk*nwalkers, or thunderbirds in it. So I can't stress enough to those involved in cryptozoology, please stop adding these spirits in with cryptids. Mothman, Jersey Devil, Nessie are all cryptids, but not Native spirits.

You know what I didn't realise until now? Pirates of The Carribbean: At World's End ending for Will and Elizabeth doesn't make sense (unless Will is ferrying souls 24/7).

Elizabeth is Pirate King and captain of her own ship and crew (the Singaporean pirates); she doesn't have to stay on land and separated from Will for every 10 years that goes by. Not to mention the way Davy Jones handled having to be on the land (in a big enough tub/bucket of water). So does that mean the port in Singapore where Sao Feng was introduced would work? It's not exactly land even though it is port? It's wooden walkways above water...

I think a lot about how we as a culture have turned “forever” into the only acceptable definition of success.

Like… if you open a coffee shop and run it for a while and it makes you happy but then stuff gets too expensive and stressful and you want to do something else so you close it, it’s a “failed” business. If you write a book or two, then decide that you don’t actually want to keep doing that, you’re a “failed” writer. If you marry someone, and that marriage is good for a while, and then stops working and you get divorced, it’s a “failed” marriage.

The only acceptable “win condition” is “you keep doing that thing forever”. A friendship that lasts for a few years but then its time is done and you move on is considered less valuable or not a “real” friendship. A hobby that you do for a while and then are done with is a “phase” - or, alternatively, a “pity” that you don’t do that thing any more. A fandom is “dying” because people have had a lot of fun with it but are now moving on to other things.

I just think that something can be good, and also end, and that thing was still good. And it’s okay to be sad that it ended, too. But the idea that anything that ends is automatically less than this hypothetical eternal state of success… I don’t think that’s doing us any good at all.

Oh no! My car battery is missing! I hope someone on my dashboard happens to have a spare!

Devonian memories in the river

the moon

chapter II act II: kazuha🍁

The Train Station

(Also posted on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/38088436)

An older woman stands on an old and overgrown wooden station platform, waiting for a train to round the bend into the station. It’s foggy out, so foggy she finds herself unable to see anything past the platform and the bend where the tracks come from. In the corner of her mind is the faint memory of drifting onto the foggy platform and exchanging some coins for a one-way fare at the ticket booth.

She’s not alone in waiting, but she ignores all others in favor of looking at her watch. The hands don’t appear to be moving but she feels a strong anxiety in looking at the watch face.

“The train is late.” She mutters to herself, trying to explain away her stab of anxiety. “I don’t need to take a late train.”

She looks again at the watch with a frown. Making up her mind, she turns and walks through the crowd to the ticket booth. The young man stationed there has his feet up on the counter, leaned back with his hat over his eyes. Soft snores rise up every few seconds from under the hat. The woman huffs a sigh and rasps loudly on the window, startling him awake.

“Excuse me,” she said, but her tone held no politeness. “The train is late. I don’t even need to take this train, and I would like a refund on my ticket.” The man sits up, rubbing sleep out of his pale eyes and readjusting his hat. He takes a moment to look out over the station before leaning back into his chair.

“The train will be coming along soon, ma’am.” He mumbled sleepily.

She scoffed. “But I don’t need to take the train! I’m not sure why I wanted to take it in the first place, but I changed my mind. I don’t want to take the train. I would like my refund. Please.” She emphasized the last word like it was all she needed to get her way. The man just shrugged.

“Train’s coming. You got a ticket; you get on board. Look there.” He pointed down the tracks into the fog. She turned to see a bright headlight, a train following close behind. It emerged from the fog to come around the bend, breaks squealing as it slowed to a stop at the platform. Its cars were completely empty.

The woman resisted the childish urge to stomp her foot out of irritation at the whole situation. She wasn’t going to admit she was wrong.

“Fine!” she snapped. “I’ll take the damn train. Your customer service is terrible! You lazy kids nowadays. I should report you.” The man looked unbothered and slumped back into his chair to resume his nap. The sight only further irritated the woman, and she stomped off to join the others boarding the train.

She stood in the line as the conductor took tickets from the passengers. The conductor wore so much black that in the foggy station they looked almost like a shadow. People around her seemed to drift in and out of line with no real organization. She refused to look them in the face, their bodies like ghosts out of the corners of her eyes. She shoved past a few, who made no noise of objection as she did so.

“This train is late!” she exclaimed loudly to the conductor. “I came here to take the train, I expected it to be on time. This is unacceptable.”

The conductor offered her an apologetic look that looked out of place on their bony face. “There were more passengers today than normal ma’am.” They said in a soft tone.

The woman huffed. “That’s not an excuse. The train is empty! And this is your job, you do it every day! Shouldn’t you be able to do your job right?”

The conductor simply tilted their head and offered a small smile. “Apologies ma’am. Are you ready to board? I understand you are upset, but you are holding up the line I’m afraid.”

The woman scoffed. “I don’t know, are you going to do your job and get me where I need to go? You need to run a tighter schedule. This is ridiculous.”

The conductor sighed and shook their head. “This sort of attitude isn’t going to get you anywhere ma’am.” They said in that same soft tone. “If you aren’t ready to board, I suggest you wait a bit longer on the platform. But right now, you are disrupting the other passengers who are just trying to get on board.”

The woman glanced around at the people in line behind her. Her eyes slid off their faces like water off a duck’s back but seeing that no one else was making a deal out of the lateness of the train she felt a bit embarrassed at making a scene. She turned back to the conductor, who was waiting patiently.

“I have old eyes and waiting for so long on this foggy platform didn’t help. Now you get here late and embarrass me. I have rights as a customer! You should do a better job to make your customers happy.” She said with an air of entitlement.

The conductor didn’t rise to any bait. “Alright ma’am. Would you like to board now then? I can show you to a seat.”

“Well can’t I get some sort of compensation for being made to wait? Some decent customer service?”

The conductor shook her head. “We don’t do anything like that ma’am. Either you get on or you don’t, but everyone paid the same fee to board.”

The woman though for a few seconds before trying again. “Can I get a refund then? There are other trains, I could just take my business elsewhere. Just fix this.”

The conductor leaned against the door to the train car. “Good luck with that. This is a train station ma’am, I’m not sure what you would have me do. If you don’t get on this train, you’ll have to wait for the next. Or you can hand me your ticket and hop on the train and be on your way.” They said, soft and slow like they were taking to a wild animal.

“That’s not good enough.” The woman said crossing her arms across her chest. “I’ve been waiting for so long and I have places to be. Can’t you just do something for me? What about customer satisfaction?”

The conductor opened their mouth to speak but was cut off by the woman’s rambling.

“I’ve been so stressed out and I just want to get where I’m going. Can’t you just find me a seat away from others or something? I’ve never been on a train, but I don’t trust people on trains. I want to sit by myself. Can you do that? Do something?”

While she rambled, the conductor had started taking tickets from other passengers as they slipped past her into the train car. She attempted to glare at them, but they were gone before she could get a good look at their faces.

“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do. This train will be leaving soon, with or without you. That’s a choice only you can make, ma’am.”

The lady’s anger drained out of her body as frustrated tears filled her eyes.

“I’ve been waiting so long.” She choked out, trying to hold back tears. “I’ve been here in the fog on this falling apart platform, and no one is helping me! I just want to be on time and now I’m going to be late!” a few traitorous tears fell from her eyes. “Don’t you understand? I can’t be late! I can’t be!” she broke down in sobs as the conductor gestured to the few left in line to wait a moment. Carefully they circled their bone arms around her and gently coaxed her into the train car, slipping the ticket out of her hand and into the handful of others they had collected.

“Hush now, it’s okay. You’ll still be on time no matter what.” The conductor pressed a handkerchief into her hands as they lowered the woman into a seat by the window. With one final smile, the conductor slipped away to get the other passengers boarded onto the train.

The woman slowly stopped crying at rested her head on the cool glass of the train window. A few more passengers boarded the train before she heard the voice of the conductor ring though the car. “Now leaving the station. Thank you for riding today.”

As the train slowly started to pull away from the station, the woman saw that some people had stayed behind, although her view of them was quickly blocked as the train turned the conner into the fog. Suddenly she was aware of a figure sitting next to her. Turning, she met the eyes of one of the passengers who had taken the seat next to her. He seemed pale, no just skin but his whole person, like all the colors of him had been dulled.

“Hello.” He said, in a voice that struck a chord of familiarity in her.

“Hello.” She responded, suddenly feeling a bit shy. “Have we met before?” she asked. “You seem familiar.”

His face took on a thoughtful expression as a hand pushed his hair out of his face. She noted the wrinkles on his face and figured they must be around a similar age.

The passenger gave a shrug. “I can’t say I’ve seen you in the station before. I’ve been waiting around for a bit. I’ve never gotten on the train before today.” The woman studied him, the familiarity he carried making her heart ache with fond memories she couldn’t quite remember.

She leaned towards him. “What changed this time?” She whispered.

He frowned and said, “I don’t know. I was waiting for a while at the station. The train came and went a few times, but I just wasn’t ready to get on yet. Today I felt I had to.” Then his face broke out in a smile. “Glad I did, or I wouldn’t have met you.”

The woman smiled back before her face fell. “Where are we going?” she asked, suddenly worried when she realized she didn’t know the destination of the train. The passenger turned his whole body to face her in the seat and slipped his hand in to hers. When she looked down, she saw her hands too had that pale, dull tone. Looking back at the passenger’s face the woman noticed that he looked nervous as well.

“I don’t know.” He said honestly. “Does it matter?”

The woman pulled back. “Of course it matters! We got one-way tickets!”

The passenger’s smile returned, but it was sadder. “I don’t think the destination is important. In the end, we are just moving on. And that’s okay. The train won’t be late, and neither will we. We got on the train today, so it must be our time to move on.”

The woman again smiled back, a smile his eyes had seen many times before, although he didn’t know it.

“Well,” she started, “Your right. It doesn’t matter where we are going, only that we are going together. It feels right.”

As a blinding white light began to fill the train car, the woman stayed calm and for the second time in their intertwined existences, the last thing the two passengers were concerned about was seeing each other’s smiles one more time.

And somehow, that was enough.

equal rights for women will never truly be achieved until we have more female noir detectives