#WATERMELONS PRODUCE FLOWERS

[oatbugs]

non-zero amount of swans and a non-zero amount of lakes.

#pretty pretty day #red leaves turning yellow the sun is so bright the breeze isnt too cold #i get to walk past all my friends houses on my way to a really cute study cafe . walk past a bubble tea place walk through tree lined #streets . sun against my friends window so i cant see if she could see me. today there was a double rainbow #in the sky from misty rain. so many squirrels and birds and rabbits and deer #i have a deadline soon and im massively behind bc im lucky enough to be able to do too much. need to #write an essay and do maths problem sets. smile + wave at ppl you know. last night i met a rly cute girl #and i dont think its gonna go anywhere but ill think abt her from time to time from now on #there is someone in front of me with bright blue hair. someone with their knuckles wrapped in bandages. two boys holding hands. #today people are dying but it is the 40th day of her death which means it is the 40th day of the revolution which is the 40th day of #not giving up. meanwhile the sun casts halos on a the wings of a magpie + a fresh pomegrante waits in the kitchen. #i have freshly cut watermelons in my fridge. there are so many flowers here. there are swans in the lakes. #my hair is a mess in the wind and forgetting a lot of things. my vision is declining and so i must remember the definition of leaves #before it's too late. one thing determinate from the other. #water reflects red. there are two girls feeding the birds. so many pretty people running into the same building. #youre cut from a different cloth. you especially are cut from silk. #you hate philosophy for its messy discourse and love maths for the clear consesus it produces. i only feel a little guilty #for laughing at that. last year two professors in functional analysis fought on blackboards until it became a team sport. a paper agains #a paper against. a paper against the paper for the against. on the walls for st joseph of cupertino we both pray for some mercy. offer up #some beautiful quantifier and i will drown inside it. break fresh chalk just for you.

[queenie435]

𝗘𝗗𝗠𝗢𝗡𝗗 𝗔𝗟𝗕𝗜𝗨𝗦 (1829-1880)

Edmond Albius was born a slave in 1829, in St. Suzanne, on the island Réunion. His mother died during childbirth, and he never knew his father. In his youth he was sent to work for Botanist Fereol Bellier-Beaumont.

The vanilla plant was flourishing in Mexico, and by the late 18th century, a few plants were sent to Paris, London, Europe and Asia, in hopes of producing the bean in other areas. Although the vine would grow and flower, it would not produce any beans. French colonists brought vanilla beans to Réunion around 1820.

Beaumont had been teaching young Edmond how to tend to the various plants on his estate. He taught him how to hand-pollinate a watermelon plant. Beaumont had previously planted vanilla beans, and had just one vine growing for over twenty years, but was also unable to produce any beans on the vine. Young Edmond began to study the plant and made a discovery. He carefully probed the plant and found the part of the flower that produced the pollen. Edmond then discovered the stigma, the part of the plant that needed to be dusted with the pollen to produce the bean. He used a blade of grass to separate the two flaps and properly fertilized the plant.

Shortly afterwards, while walking through the gardens, Beaumont noticed two packs of vanilla beans flourishing on the vine and was astonished when young Edmond told him that he was responsible for the pollination. Edmond was twelve years old at the time. Beaumont wrote to other plantation owners to tell them his slave Edmond had solved the vanilla bean pollination mystery. He then sent Edmond to other local plantations to teach other slaves how to fertilize the vanilla vine. Within the next twenty to thirty years, Réunion became the world’s largest producer of vanilla beans.

Edmond was rewarded with his freedom, and was given the last name Albius. Beaumont wrote to the governor, asking that Albius be given a cash stipend for his role in the discovery of the fertilization, but received no response. Albius moved to St. Denis and worked as a kitchen servant. He somehow got involved in a jewelry heist and was sentenced to ten years. Beaumont again wrote the governor on his behalf, and the sentence was commuted to five years, and Albius was subsequently released. A man named Jean Michel Claude Richard then set claim to have discovered the fertilization process before Albius. He claimed he visited the island in 1838, and taught a group of horticulturists the technique. Again, Beaumont stepped in and wrote to Réunion’s official historian declaring Albius as the true inventor, giving him all of the credit entirely. The letter survives as part of island history.

Albius returned to live close to Beaumont’s plantation and married. He died on August 9, 1880 at the age of 51 at a hospital in Sainte Suzanne. He never received any profits from his discovery. One hundred years after his death, the mayor of Réunion made amends by erecting a statue of Albius and naming a street and school after him.

#Edmond Albius #vanilla ice cream #vanilla #black history #black history month #vanilla beans #vanilla extract

[one-time-i-dreamt]

I was given a water-watermelon as a gift. They grow in ponds, and produce one large flower at a time. As soon as we replanted it in our pond, the flower bloomed. It was huge, easily larger than a normal watermelon, and was pink and white. 

#dream #text #watermelon #flower #queueueueueueueueueueueueueue

[desertdollranch]

It has become an annual tradition for me to help Antonia put together her farmer's market booth, where she sells all of the fruits, vegetables, and homemade goods that her family's community farm has produced over the past year. Every year, the harvest brings more and more goods. But this autumn, she has outgrown the farmer's market, and is now selling at a roadside stand!

Antonia is ten years old in 1978, when she is inspired by the American Indian Movement to help establish a community farm on land her family owns. It's been a huge success. It has strengthened bonds between friends and neighbors as they all care for each other and make sure that nobody goes hungry.

Whatever is left over after everyone is fed, is then sold at the roadside stand. Antonia is also supplementing with a few special handmade extras that help bring in a little more money. The money will help pay for everything needed to help Snow Mountain Farm grow bigger and better.

Antonia is so proud of what the fields and orchards have grown.

Just look at the size of some of these pumpkins!

Under the cut, Antonia will give you an up-close look at what she's selling....

Everything seen here was either made by me, harvested from the wild, or purchased. (See if you can guess which ones were handmade/bought/gathered!)

The gourd and squash harvest was abundant this year. Antonia managed to coax the garden into producing a few giant pumpkins.

Lots of other fruits thrived as well!

Pears are new this year.

Beautiful pink plums are also new.

Apples are a returning favorite. There are three varieties this year: sweet yellow apples, tart green apples, and a red striped variety that has its own unique flavor.

In the front row are apples, plums, chiles, and pears. On the shelf there are fresh flowers and packaged seeds, various fruit jams, honey, apple cider, dried ground herbs, potted herb seedlings, packaged seeds, and bottles of apple cider.

Up on the shelf there are several varieties of jam: rose petal, peach, grape, prickly pear, and strawberry. Next to them is honey that the farm's bees made from the local wildflowers. The apple cider is made from apples grown in the farm's orchard.

One particular farmer is very gifted in the art of raising flowers. Here you can buy fresh cut flowers, or seedlings for your own garden.

Fruit and vegetable seedlings or seeds are also for sale.

On the checkout counter, Antonia is selling popcorn and apple cider donuts. Directly below the donuts are cartons of eggs, which include white, brown, and speckled eggs.

Below the checkout counter is the small shelf offering some smaller items. In the plastic bags are freshly made tamales, which are like dumplings of meat, veggies, beans, or cheese mixed with a corn dough and steamed inside corn husks. To the right are two wheels of goat's milk cheese. In the middle are skeins of yarn dyed with natural sources, like prickly pear fruits and cabbage leaves. Next to those are bars of soap, in sagebrush or rose petal scent. And on the right end of the shelf are bagged pine nuts, gathered from the wild.

Below that is more produce! On the left, colored corn. In the crates there are potatoes, cherries, strawberries, tomatoes, peaches, and cauliflower.

Antonia is especially proud of the fancy colored corn she has grown. It's fun to open the ears and see what colors the kernels are!

Next to that are giant sunflowers. Above that are the pretty gourds and squashes.

On the bench are some lovely watermelons. And surrounding those are even more pumpkins and squash!

These, too, emerged in all sorts of different colors and shapes. Antonia lets the different varieties cross pollinate, so that the appearances of the resulting pumpkins are a surprise.

Thanks for stopping by! Here, take a sunflower home with you!

#antonia snow-flores #doll crafts #historicaloc

[gamerbearmira]

Diamond au -

So, I caught up on some more scenes from the show (Mostly just the diamond scenes and wiki) and here's what I got.

(So, the diamonds in the show typically run their own colony on a certain planet. The Diamonds used their essence to create new Gems, who would become subordinates and dedicated their lives in the name of their Diamond. Gems were distinguished by the diamond emblem on their uniform, corresponding to the color of the Diamond they served.

In order to expand the Gem race, the Diamonds took control of celestial bodies for colonization purposes. This would allow Gems to be mass-produced by utilizing outside resources. Each Diamond owned specific colonies and was in charge of making sure they were successful. Gems produced on a specific Diamond's colony was under their control; for instance, Gems produced on Earth belonged to Pink.)

I decided to change some things around a bit-

Gems naturally burst out of any planet (Ones not known to man) and are basically like babies. They somehow naturally know how to talk and are fully grown but that's as far as intelligence goes and height goes.

What do the diamonds do when that happens?

They teach morals, do's & don't do's, right from wrong, etc. They also help their colonies in a certain area they lack. (The "kids" help as well.)

Which diamond "owns" a colony?

Magenta, Blue, Yellow, and green do. The grand-diamonds are in training (if they want to be) or just don't feel like having that sort of responsibility yet.

Yellow/Pepa helps with the weather because the planet her colony belongs to has horrendous weather conditions. If she isn't managing it, her colony suffers.

Blue and violet/Isabela help with flora and medicine. Isa creates the plants and flowers needed and Blue uses her natural ability to create medicine. She also teaches her colony how to do it as well.

The diamond adults do "own" a certain colony on a certain planet. But they aren't all that authoritarian at all. While the Diamonds continue to rule over Home world, they allow every Gem to live freely the way they want without judgment or punishment. Gems are free to fuse with whoever they please, and the caste system was dismantled so that no Gem is better than another. 

Home world has some kind of democracy, meaning the Diamonds, despite retaining a level of importance on Home world, allow Gems to take charge as leaders of their kind through elections.

The diamonds don't see any non-gem life form as inferior, but more interesting. Humans are mainly a curiosity to them, but they see how humans...are mainly hostile to anything different from them (especially to each other) and don't feel like interacting at all.

As far as interactions go when it comes to earth is just watching things called "movies", just to look at certain cultures and behaviors, fashion, and way of life.

Magenta/Alma doesn't like the word "own". It seems a bit rude to say she owns something when she had no control over when or how gems came to be.

So, she instead uses the word "care". Because that's technically what she and her "kids" do. They care for their colonies as long as they need to.

Young diamonds typically explore their "parents" gem worlds. Having fun, making friends & what not.

Certain gems/crystals found on their planets:

Pepa's planet - Golden Barites, Golden Beryl's, Golden south sea pearls, Heliodor's, Honey Calcites, Honey Topaz, Lemon Jades, Lemon quartz, and many more.

Bruno's planet - Jades, Tourmaline, Verdelite, October birthstone, Alexandrite, Malachite, Peridot, Sapphire, Apatite, Chrysoberyl, and many more.

Julieta's planet - Blue agate, Apatite, Azurite, Aquamarine, Benitiote, Blue Chalcedony, Chrysocolla, Dumortierite, Blue fluorite, and many more

Alma's planet - Padparadscha sapphire, Rubellite Tourmaline, Ruby, Spine, Watermelon Tourmaline, and Viva magenta.

The grand-diamonds don't have gems to look after yet but they do have planets to watch over. Each planet is similar to their colors/name. It's truly boring for them so they don't spend their time watching them much.

I searched up "planet that rains diamonds" and I found out that Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter are rumored to have natural diamonds. So, that's where Alma, the triplets, and the grandkids came from.

The triplets came from Saturn, Alma came from Neptune, and the grandkids are from Jupiter.

Also, Antonio's name in this au is Apricot. It's cute and it has 'A' in front of it, so it fits. I

SO COOOOOLLL ‼️‼️‼️

W Diamonds for at the very least being decent gems 😭 give them mfs some sense of self, so at least there’s that. Planets are super cool 🤭🤭 also the fact that the grandkids find watching their plants boring is. So funny. Like there’s basically nothing on them, so it!s understandable 😭

Using plants that rain diamonds honestly makes a lot of sense. ALSO APRICOT LETS GOOOO 🤠🤠🤠

While not a dictator or authoritarian, I think Alma just has a very misleading face 💀

#my asks are open #my asks #encanto #encanto au #au #encanto alma #encanto Pedro #encanto julieta #encanto agustin #encanto pepa #encanto felix #encanto bruno #encanto isabela #encanto dolores #encanto luisa #encanto camilo #encanto mirabel #encanto antonio #diamonds au

[bloodblanks]

tili tili bom [eyeless jack x reader] — chapter iv.

Taken to the grim reaper’s realm, Y/N is met with both beauty and danger.

co-written with the lovely dawn_citrinitas! ♡

author's note: this fanfiction will not contain much, if any, dark or explicit content, but nonetheless,

please read at your own discretion.

<- previous chapter

“Alright, whatever. Let’s go,” the reaper spoke, taking the first steps in a direction unknown to the girl. It wasn’t like she necessarily needed to know where exactly they were going, though. She was satisfied just following the charming demon that walked before her. 

As she took her first steps in this foreign land, Y/N could feel the wispy blades of scarlet grass tickling her ankles as well as the parts of her feet that her slippers did not cover. She giggled under her breath as she continued walking, eyes wide and gleaming, taking in her surroundings. 

As the duo delved deeper into the enchanting forest, she noticed an abundance of unusually stunning, exotic plants inherent in the demons’ haven. 

The first thing to catch her eye was mushrooms. The fungi were blue with a green tint, giving off a slight glow reminiscent of a neon sign. From underneath the turquoise hats, lace skirts of the same colour could be seen, covering their thin and light mushroom legs. The mushrooms were scattered in all directions; under the violet bushes, on the graphite bark of the trees, in explosive clusters that bloomed over every corner, it seemed that an entire colony of fungi had occupied this place. 

While the mushrooms were fascinating, they didn’t manage to hold Y/N’s attention for long as she tilted her head upwards, her eyes instantly locking onto another magical sight. With her eyes now raised up, she could see what appeared to be flowers. They were also blue, although a darker shade, closer to navy than the previous bright teal of the mushrooms. Still, they shared a similar luminosity, with the flora emitting a soft light. The petals of the individual flowers were shaped like bells, faintly reminding her of the common bluebell she’d often spotted in various locations back in her own world. 

The flowers hung from many of the trees surrounding them, their weight supported by the mauve vines they were dangling from. Illuminating their path through the ominous forest, she thought they seemed like lanterns, lit in mass for a festival of sorts. It wasn’t just the combination of the appearance of the bell-shaped flowers and their luminance that made her think so; it was also the sheer size of them. They were colossal. Despite the height they hung from, she could tell they were enormous, perhaps even twice the size of her own head. 

The demon and the girl continued on their path, with brief pauses in between as Y/N observed the exotic flora and fauna of this new realm. 

After having seen both the mushrooms and the oversized bluebells, she noticed a pattern when they stopped near what resembled a shrub. The shrub itself wasn’t too eye-catching, being simply a bunch of lilac leaves protruding from ashen black branches; however, what the small bush produced was extraordinary. 

She could only assume they were fruits, as she couldn’t think of anything else to even come close to these foreign, round balls—both the shape and colour reminded her of blueberries. Only here, the local berries followed the pattern of being blue and glowing, like both the flowers and the fungi she’d already seen. Similar to the flowers, they were pretty big, with each berry being the size of a small watermelon. 

However, the uniform azure halo of the fruits was broken by bursts of neon pink light. The light came from the next bush over, and while the leaves were similar, the berries produced by this plant were instead a blinding flamingo pink. Like the ‘blueberries’ she saw, these fruits were of great size, although their shape differed. Rather than a smooth, circular form, they were instead composed of multiple smaller beads, much like the raspberry she knew. Under the weight of the fruits, the black branches of the bushes were fastened down, covering the fruits with periwinkle foliage. 

Behind the multiple bushes of seemingly ordinary demon berries stood a lone fruit tree, thin and lanky. It had the same dark bark she was slowly getting accustomed to seeing. However, there were very few leaves on the tree, just a few poking out from where its fruits grew. They, too, were glowing, although the light seemed far eerier, with the fruits being a shade of crimson similar to the untamed grass she trod upon. They were a bit smaller, closer to the size of an apricot; they came in sets of two and felt like multiple pairs of eyes peeking out from the darkness of the forest, staring straight into the depths of her soul. 

The walk was long and silent. Admiring the local flora and fauna, it was almost as if Y/N had teleported into the future with how fast time flew by. She had only noticed it when her legs complained, with a dull, aching strain on them from the hours of continuous walking. 

Maybe I should ask for a break, the girl thought. She didn’t want to be bothersome; the demon certainly didn’t seem to mind the walk, but her body was already in poor condition from her illness and extended hospital stay. (Surprisingly, the cockroach-infested white prison didn’t have a gym for her to stay fit in.)

“Mr. Reaper?” Y/N spoke quietly and carefully, attracting the attention of her companion. 

“Yes?” Mr. Reaper responded, not bothering to turn and look at the person who had just broken the enchanting silence. 

“Is it okay if we take a small break?” the girl asked, her second question not any louder than her first. She didn’t really turn to look at him, either. Instead, her eyes were wandering about the surroundings, fearing a negative response from the reaper. 

“Sure,” the demon shrugged, coming to a slow halt. “Why don’t you write in the meantime?” he suggested, finally glancing at the young girl. 

Y/N, too, stopped. She hadn’t really put much thought into the whole writing thing, not since her initial conversation with the reaper, and she had just blurted out the first thing in mind then. Now that she thought about it again, she could feel her usual hesitations return. 

“To be honest, I’m not so sure about me writing,” she confessed. “I’ve always wanted to, but I don’t think I’ll be good enough to write anything worth reading.” 

Her words were nothing but the truth. Indeed, she had written a lot as a child, outstanding stories about fantasy worlds with all her childlike imagination. But long ago had she abandoned her foolish dreams, and any of her former writing skills—that she wasn’t even sure she had—certainly had gone to rust and decay over the years of disuse. Surely the quality of her work now would not be worthy of even being called reading material. 

She watched as the eyeless man walked over to a nearby tree, setting down his scythe and leaning against it. 

“I’m going to be frank with you,” the demon started, “you’re dying.” Those words caught her slightly off guard, further piquing her interest in the charming but odd man across from her. 

“You’ve only got so much time and nothing to lose,” he finished. His words were indeed blunt, lacking any preludes or attempts to console her, but it was a refreshing change from the sugarcoated words of the hospital staff. It wasn’t that the reaper cared whether the childhood dream of his dying companion came true or not, or at least that’s what he liked to think. Still, he couldn’t help the slight tug, the hint of longing that he felt when he looked at her. 

“I guess you’re right,” Y/N answered in a drooping voice, proceeding to sit on the scarlet grass close to where the reaper stood. As harsh as it was, he had a point. The only thing she had to lose at this point was time, and in her position, time was a vital resource. Dying without even trying to make something out of her remaining time would be wasteful. 

The young girl opened her notes application, taking out her phone from her bag. She thought for a couple of minutes, and then her fingers started quickly tapping over the virtual keyboard. 

—

After finishing the first chapter of what she thought to be a failed read, Y/N tore her gaze away from the screen and towards the sky. The celestial canvas had noticeably darkened, and beyond the soft luminescence of the glowing navy flowers and violet leaves was a coal-black sky, the vermillion tones having seemingly dissipated into the barest hint of rust. It appeared that dusk had arrived. 

“Is it already past sunset?” Y/N inquired, her eyes still on the sky. 

“There is no sun in Daemon Regnum. Or any natural light, for that matter,” the demon replied measuredly, counting the leaves on one of the trees with his eyes. The explanation of such obvious things was tiring and bothersome for the eyeless man. 

“What’s the change of lighting, then?” she followed up with another question, now turning her gaze to the man. She couldn’t help but be fascinated by the new, unknown world in which she found herself. Plus, she was going to be here for quite some time; it was best that she figured out how the world she was in worked. 

“We have a mimicry of the sun.” The demon didn’t bother meeting the eyes of his companion. For him, these conversations were identical to having to explain to a child that the sky is blue and the grass is green, something so obvious to a reaper but utterly unknown to a human. 

“What do you mean?” the girl spoke gingerly, not wanting to irritate the reaper too much but still wanting to satisfy her curiosity. 

“We daemons have the ability to conjure fire. Our sources of light consist of individual flames that each daemon can create, or the big fireball in the ‘sky’, which is meant to mimic the sun. It’s active for sixteen hours each day.” The eyeless reaper spoke monotonously, not paying much attention to his interlocutor. 

“You have the same length of days as us?” She was far too eager to know about this world. 

“Yes and no. There is no day or night in Daemon Regnum, but we use the same schedule as mortals, anyway.” The demon continued talking in the same indifferent tone, silently hoping she’d be done with her questions soon. 

“Why?” the girl questioned. 

“We had it originally,” the reaper grumbled, still not bothering to look at her. 

“But how did you come up with this if you don’t even have a sun?” As soon as she finished her question, the demon suddenly snapped his head towards her. She knew that he didn’t have eyes, but she also knew that if he did, they would be staring daggers into her soul right now. She could sense it immediately. 

“Shut up,” the man spoke. His tone was as flat as before, but this time it carried a sternness that wasn’t there previously. 

“Sorry,” Y/N apologized, her voice softened, lacking the earlier vigour. She couldn’t tell what it was exactly, but she could tell that she had overstepped somehow. It wasn’t in her intentions in any way to actually upset the demon, and so she stopped her questions for the meantime. To her surprise, however, he continued to speak. 

“Anyway, multiple different daemons take turns conjuring the ‘sun’ as part of their job. It takes about a thousand daemons to conjure a fire large enough,” he explained. “The sun rests above the very centre of Daemon Regnum, above the castles. So the centre receives the most light compared to the outer regions, that’s why it’s so dark here.”

“I see,” Y/N responded simply to acknowledge that she had heard what he said, keeping quiet, not wanting to be more bothersome than she already was. 

The reaper then took a step forward, straightening his posture and leaning away from the tree, rising to his full height. He picked up his scythe, a signal for her to get up and going. 

And so, the girl stood up, shaking off a few blades of scarlet grass that had stuck to her legs. Meeting the eyes of the empty voids in his mask where her companion’s eyes were supposed to be, she put aside her wandering questions about the reaper’s behaviour and got ready to leave. She placed her phone back into her bag, throwing the strap over her shoulder and quickly followed behind the demon, who was beginning to make his way forth into the forest. 

Crushing the sinisterly red grass of the demons’ haven with her favourite slippers, Y/N moved forward behind the reaper through the noticeably darkened forest. While the occasional bellflower, mushroom, or berry provided some light, it was still not enough to distract from the ominous feeling the forest now gave off, drenched in ebony shadows. 

What was once majestic and royally coloured nature now transformed into something more eerie, more sinister. As if ghastly creatures with a craving for human flesh were hiding within the shadows of the coal-black trees that now wholly surrounded her. 

The slight fear that she felt only served to heighten the sensation of delight in the young traveller. Delving deeper into the forest, she noticed a dark silhouette of enormous size sprawled upon the ground. With each step that she took toward the mysterious pool of darkness, she could almost feel it beckoning her somewhere behind the trees and into the depths unknown. 

It was then that she realized the direction the demon was taking was almost, if not precisely, straight toward the mysterious cluster of ebony. 

Is he so tired of me that he decided to feed me to a terrible demon creature? As that thought came to mind, she eyed the reaper cautiously with a playful pout on her lips, knowing that the demon before her wouldn’t see it. 

As they neared the silhouette, the reaper changed the trajectory of the path to walk around the shape that she had been eyeing. The slight swerve of the road led them to an area with slightly fewer trees, just enough for her to be able to see past the ashen trunks and violet leaves. 

She felt the tension that she did not know to previously be there leave as she saw the shadowy form for what it truly was—a lake. At least, that’s what it appeared to be. 

The girl reached into her bag, hand fishing around for a second to retrieve her phone. After taking it out, she turned it on, using the phone’s built-in flashlight to better illuminate what she was looking at. The luminescence from the phone contrasting against the rapidly darkening sky reflected off of and revealed what appeared to be a translucent pink body of water. She wasn’t so sure if it was pink or if it was the phone lighting was perhaps confusing her sights, but she saw an undeniable rosy tint to the water pooling tranquilly before her. 

If only it were ‘daytime’ or if there was proper light, the sight before her would resemble something out of a fairytale storybook, illustrated with the magical scenery of what she imagined would appear to be an oddly translucent, pastel pink lake, complete with shimmering lavender pebbles that spanned the entire bottom of said lake. The pink waters blended its edges with the scarlet grass that carpeted the forest floors, the colours ever so enchanting. 

The young traveller paused there, wanting a better look at the details of her new surroundings. The light, calm murmur of water echoed through the dark forest, a calming sound to her ears. 

“Wow,” she breathed out, intoxicated by the sight before her. The demon, too, stopped beside her, turning his head to his companion and chuckling to himself at the presence of the pure enthusiasm on her face. 

“Roseus lacus. One of my favourite things in Daemon Regnum.” Without waiting for an avalanche of questions, the eyeless reaper explained, side by side with the girl frozen in admiration. 

“The water is beautiful,” the young lady muttered under her breath, still in awe at the sight before her. 

“It’s not really water,” the demon continued to explain. “Water doesn’t exist here in Daemon Regnum. We have substances similar to water, but not what you humans know as H2O itself.” His gaze spanned over the large body of water, also examining it. 

“So this is like a replica?” Y/N asked, turning her head to the charming reaper, pleased to hear his explanation of the lake, despite not having asked herself. Perhaps he finally realized that his silence did nothing to deter her. 

“To some extent. The roseus lacus is my favourite of all the ‘lakes’ we have here. Not only are they extremely uncommon, only a few existing throughout the entire realm, they also have a sedating effect on the mind. Not sure how it works, but there’s one closer to Adytum that many daemons enjoy relaxing in.” The demon continued his monologue, his tone calm, matching the tranquillity of the lake. While she couldn’t know for sure with the blue mask that concealed his face, she could hear the glimpse of a smile in his voice. 

“Can I try?” The girl couldn’t imagine what the sedating effect would feel like for sure, and therefore she set about trying to figure it out empirically. She wondered if it would feel like what some of her medications did for her or something entirely different. 

Despite the fact that she was afraid of lakes and rivers even in her own, much more familiar mortal world, it wasn’t every day that she was given the opportunity to plunge into mystical pink waters. She didn’t want to miss this opportunity. 

“Go ahead,” the reaper spoke, nodding his head towards the mysterious lake, making it clear that she could try out the miraculous properties of this water. 

Y/N approached the rocky shore of the lake in just a couple of jumps, and standing at the very edge of the lake, she took a deep breath, casting her fears away to the back of her mind. 

Sliding off her slippers, she carefully placed them on the soft crimson grass, not wanting to accidentally ruin the only shoes that heroically protected her feet from the abundance of dry branches and thorny nature that strove to prick her. 

With her bag and jacket placed down next to her slippers, the young traveller gingerly stepped into the beautiful waters before her, but as soon as the tips of her toes landed on the periwinkle pebbles beneath, she felt a current run through her body. 

With each tiny nerve of hers pierced by a thousand even more miniature needles, the current came along with a jarring jolt of pain that her brain barely had the time to register before it shut off, her unconscious body splashing into the rosy depths. 

next chapter soon...

#creepypasta #creepypasta nsft #creepypasta reader insert #creepypasta x reader #creepypasta x you #creepypasta smut #yandere creepypasta #eyeless jack x you #eyeless jack #eyeless jack x reader #eyeless jack x y/n #eyeless jack reader insert #eyeless jack creepypasta #yandere eyeless jack #eyeless jack smut #jack x reader #eyeless jack hc

[dougdimmadodo]

Mock Strawberry (Potentilla indica)

Family: Rose Family (Rosaceae)

IUCN Conservation Status: Unassessed

Although the jagged-edged leaves, juicy red aggregate fruits and 5-petalled flowers of the Mock Strawberry all resemble those seen in true strawberry plants, the Mock Strawberry is actually a member of an entirely distinct (albeit related) group of plants that has independently developed strawberry-like anatomy; upon closer inspection, the "fruits" developed by members of this species are rounder and have red achenes (small wart-like structures which are technically all small fruits in their own right - the iconic yellow "external seeds" of true strawberries are also achenes, meaning that what we typically think of a strawberry is not actually a fruit so much as it is a large bundle of tiny dry fruits surrounded by sweet, soft flesh to encourage animals to eat them, spreading the true fruits and the seeds within them in their dung.) Further distinguishing them from true strawberries, Mock Strawberry "fruits" are not especially sweet - they are typically described as being bland or tasting somewhat like watermelon, in stark and disappointing contrast to the sugar-rich "fruits" of strawberry plants. While the strawberry-like appearance of members of this species is typically thought of as being an example of coincidental convergent evolution (an evolutionary phenomenon in which different species independently develop similar characteristics,) the lower sugar content of their fruits has led some to speculate that it may be a rare example of mimicry in plants; the sugars that plants use to give their fruits a sweet and appealing taste come from the same supply that they produce through photosynthesis to fuel the metabolic processes that keep them alive, so by mimicking the appearance of wild strawberries (certain species of which coexist with Mock Strawberries in their native range of southern and southeastern Asia) members of this species may be able to attract animals to distribute their seeds without having to invest large amounts of sugar into making their fruits palatable. Mock Strawberries bear their yellow five-petalled flowers mainly in the mid-spring (with pollinated flowers developing into fruits,) but can also spread without being pollinated through creeping subterranean extensions of their stems.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Image Source: Here

#Mock strawberry #biology #botany #plant #plants #flowering plant #angiosperms #angiosperm #fruit #fruits #wildlife #Asian wildlife #wild plants

[magnetictapedatastorage]

“sugar baby” watermelons are a great beginner-friendly thing to grow from seeds, because the melons’ sturdy thick skin means you don’t really have to worry about slugs, insects, or birds. the fruits can also be left on the vine pretty much as long as you’d like. the seeds should be planted in wide mounds. the vines will creep along the ground and produce yellow flowers, then dark-green fruit which grows to be very heavy. put your ear on it and knock on the melon to hear if it’s ripe. it should sound hollow.

[scorchieart]

I hope I'm doing this right!

Luke / 5 / adventure / second 💜

Characters: Luke Randolph & F!Reader

POV: 2nd person Genre: Adventure

Prompt #5: “Do you want to talk about it, or do you want a distraction from it?”

Wordcount: 998

A/N: Hiya Violet, thank you for the request! I was super duper close to turning this into Luke's Pokemon journey, but maybe we'll leave that for another day.

Sand immediately seeped into the tears in your pants as you collapsed onto your knees, coarse and grainy against raw flesh. You heaved breath after breath, clutching your searing chest with quivering fingers, as briney salt invaded your nostrils, the scent unfamiliar and painful.

You peeled the heavy pack off your sweaty back just as another figure collapsed beside you. Luke landed eagle-spread in the sand, green hood obscuring the top half of his stung, sunburned face, giving him the appearance of a sliced watermelon shriveling under the sun. 

You inhaled a final shaky breath and pulled the map out of your shirt. Several new creases had formed since you hastily stashed it away, but Rio’s markings still showed clearly. Verdant Jungle: fire ant, tic, bee infestation. Avoid green-bark trees. Salt water good for stings.

Something buzzed nearby and you swatted your neck. The smushed remains of a fuzzy black bee, and purple venom oozed down your fingers when you pulled back. Great, that made seven stings. That you knew of. Of course they wouldn’t be honey bees, you thought, shooting a contemptuous glare at the panting Luke. You hadn’t seen a single living flower in days. 

You absentmindedly flicked the carcass and scratched your neck as you studied the map again. Scribbled just below the jungle, right on the bottom edge of the paper, was a pair of the goofiest faces smiling up at you. Sapphire Shores: hideaway paradise. 

Your breath caught in your throat as you looked up. The sand extended a fair way ahead then stopped abruptly to be replaced by the largest slab of blue you’d ever seen. You knew it was water, of course the ocean was full of water, but the stillness of the air and the trees against the roaring waves turned the scene into a semi-living being. Like an unfinished painting and you had front row seats to each new brushstroke. 

Flecks of warm ocean spray hit your tingling cheek as you opened your pack. You produced the rose stalk, what was left of it anyway, and slipped off your boots. The sand scalded your blistered feet as you approached the water, but the moment you stepped in the glistening puddles, it was as though a silencing spell had fallen. Cool, slippery foam pushed and pulled between your toes, and though your exhausted body threatened to collapse into its depths, for the first time in a month you felt strangely balanced. At peace. In control.

You plucked the final scarlet petal, let it fall, and watched the waves drift it out to sea. A tiny crab scuttled along the shallowest part of the shore, and you trained your eyes on its precise movements as it expertly maneuvered around pebbles and shells. 

Leon would make a good king. He already had experience as a leader and the people really liked him. Plus he was sincere, earnest, and easy to talk to… a little too easy. But you couldn’t count Chevalier out. He could command a room just by entering, and his actions were based on decades of knowledge and calculations. He was dominating and honest… but perhaps too much so.

The crab encountered a cracked pink shell. It could easily pass around it, but for some reason it halted and stared, as though transfixed by the chipped swirling patterns. 

Any prince would be excellent. And it’s not like the ones who weren’t chosen would simply cease to exist; of course they’d remain and help their brother. That was something even young children could expect. Yet they still expected you to make that choice.

The crab remained in place. Farther out at sea, the rumbling of a new wave burbled.

One month was hardly enough time to learn about a person, let alone eight. And select from among them a king? They were asking the impossible from you. A miracle. It’s like they expected you to fail. It’s like they anticipated a fail safe.

Rushing water enveloped your view as the wave crashed, soaking you up to your waist. Your hair frizzed as airborne froth stuck it out unevenly, but you still managed to locate the poor crab, rocking and kicking its limbs madly in the air. You crouched and tipped the crab back onto its legs with the tip of your rose stalk. It hurriedly scampered off without a backward glance.

“Amazing,” whispered a voice. Luke now stood beside you, bare feet submerged, staring at the horizon.

“First time in the water?” you asked. It was at that moment you realized that though you spent the past month traveling together, this was the first question you asked of him. All the golden opportunities to know more about this competitor for the throne, and you wasted them insisting on this perilous journey south. Truly, Sariel made a mistake selecting you as Belle. 

Your mind drifted to Rio and how he slipped you the filled pack with the map and rose the very night you were brought to the palace, and how he insisted he stay behind for “damage control” despite your protests. You’d encountered Luke at the city gates with nothing more than a broadsword and his own pack. You thought of the nights spent in dubious inns where you were sure Luke barely slept a wink. You thought about how that wasn’t his most peculiar behavior; about the time he’d fallen off a stool when an old man in an eyepatch drunkenly collapsed on your breakfast, or how he’d somberly whisper names in the few instances he did sleep, like a sinner possessed. 

“No,” Luke replied, “I used to visit a lake with my mom and stepdad.”

“And Leyla?” you asked hesitantly, and Luke’s gaze sharpened on the sea. You watched the welts on his face throb as you swirled lazy circles in the water with your hands, feeling at last the pain starting to quell.

It was almost comical; two outcasts escaping the crown, hopping the border, surviving a perilous journey usually only accomplished by highly-trained adventurers, and yet you still struggled to look each other in the eye.

“Do you want to talk about it?” you started, cupping some water in your hands, “Or do you want a distraction from it?” You splashed Luke and took off deeper into the ocean. He shook his head and began to follow, only to trip and fall face-down into the water. He picked himself up, removed his coat, and tied the sleeves and ends to a spherical shape. Your hearty laughter turned to squeals of panic as he scooped water into his makeshift bowl, a triumphant grin spreading across his features.

The next few requests will be more light-hearted, don't you worry guys :)

Tagging:@atelieredux @queengiuliettafirstlady @violettduchess @venulus @thewitchofbooks @leonscape @rhodolitesrose @venti-tangents @dear-sciaphilia @ikesenwritings @myonlyjknight

If you would like to be added or removed from my tag list, please send me an ask or a message.

#ikemen series #ikemen prince #ikepri #luke randolph #ikepri luke #scorchie writes #grab-bag prompt list

[anqaspond]

My dream life is to live on the coast in a big city, a good mix of the skyscraper kind and the european kind, where i can go down to the beach and get a coffee and eat watermelon and mangos and put flowers in my hair. I want to go downtown to the local markets and buy locally sourced things and trinkets and decorate my home with things that arent mass produced, that i thrifted or commissioned myself, things that have stories. I wanna join clubs and small communities and be able to wave to my elderly neighbors in the morning and visit their grandkids and pass candy around. I wanna work on something meaningful and write on the weekends.

#perhaps i do dream of labor but only a little bit #like the socialist kind not the capitalist kind #LOL

[garden-with-squid]

4/2/24

Finally added compost to beds 1 and 3 so it should be ready for planting - though one still needs ollas and the other a trellis. In bed 3, I sowed sunflower on the end, okra, and mini watermelon. They were requested by my uncle. I sowed some English cucumber in bed 1, next to the peas - I’ll probably have to pull them then it gets hotter.

I potted up the tomatillo, and the rest should probably go in the ground soon. I saved the eggplant from some caterpillars so it’s coming back soon, and they seem antsy to start producing.

The wildflower patch is definitely less full than last year, but still blooming. I practiced making a lovely bouquet - I want to grow more flowers next year.

#garden logbook #gardening #tomato #pepper #flowers #eggplant

[eddis-not-eeddis]

Every now and then my parents and the Golden Princess and I will bundle ourselves up into the gas-guzzler and hie unto the Amish produce auction. We always go with great ambitions, but we rarely get there on time (it is nearly a 100 mile drive, and tho my father drives like Jehu son of Nimshi, there is only so much you can get out of our old rust-bucket) and most of us forget our wallets, resulting in a mere 80 dollars scraped together between the four of us. When you want to buy 10 crates of watermelon, 80 dollars doth not suffice.

Tonight we made off with two bushels of peaches at the walloping price of $22 ea. (In context, everyone else got their peaches for about $18 a bushel, but Mama was determined to get those ones, and would not risk it.)

The peaches were our only acquisition, however, and Mama and Papa lost out on every other thing they bid on (except for a few ears of sweetcorn for roasting). Tomatoes. Cucumbers. Plums. Strawberries. Even the peppers my sister so desperately wanted, and the flowers my dad tried to get for my mom.

This wasn't the great tragedy it may seem, for Mom thinks spending more than $5 dollars on flowers is an extravagance bordering on a sin, and we really and truly did not need the tomatoes. Our own are still growing, and we were merely being greedy.

However.

The very last thing my mother had set her sights on was a single basket of broccoli. She wants to make a veggie pizza, and Dad has been pining for broccoli soup. She bid up to four dollars and was outbid by $0.50, and this, dear friends was not to be borne. I had upon my person twenty dollars in ones.

The auctioneer was winding down his spiel "...four-fifty, four-fifty, does anyone bid a five, five-five-five, anyone bid a five...going once, going twice--"

Up shoots my hand.

The Amish man brandishing the broccoli points in my direction. The crowd laughs. (Those broccolis were only worth about $4 to begin with.)

The auctioneer begins droning "Six-six-six."

I am ready to accept my basket of broccoli, when across the crowd, the man my mother was contending with once more raises his hand.

(Keep in mind that I am eating a hamburger throughout this entire scene. Just picture, if you will, myself, hamburger equipped, facing down a balding farmer in overalls. A bandanna is sliding out of his back pocket. The man has outbid my mother several times before. There is blood in the water.)

Before the auctioneer can rattle off his "Seven-seven-seven," my hand is up again.

The auctioneer is a master of his trade, but for all his skill, he cannot keep up with the two of us. Pretty soon my hand is permanently aloft--and so is my opponent's--while the auctioneer rattles off numbers as fast as he can.

The broccoli is nearing my limit. My parents know I only have twenty dollars on me, and my mother digs her elbow into my side and threatens "If you buy that broccoli, you will have to eat it all by yourself!

I do not like broccoli, so my hand falls faster than the millstone which smote Abimelech. The auctioneer keeps going until the Amish man displaying the wares follows my esteemed mother's example and jabs the man in the side with a well-placed elbow.

"SOLD!" The auctioneer shrieks, spitting out the price so fast it breaks the sound barrier and gesturing for his cohort to mark it onto the box before my nemesis can realize how much trouble he is in and stick me with the bill.

Afterwards the farmer came over to shake my hand and offer my mom some broccoli (which she very graciously refused—she felt he earned every bit of that broccoli) and the Amish men thanked me for getting them such a good deal.

I love the produce auction.

[incyrayinc]

f u i t

Most of the flora in hell spread by spores of some kind; some of them are powdery (like these ones), others are sticky- but the common thread is that they are usually 'pollinated' by demons. Some flora do flower before fruiting, and thus require two-stage 'pollination' (fertilization, and then spreading of spores that will grow into new flora), but others are more like fungi. Generally, by various mechanisms, flora will get spores all over a demon- who will then spread the spores as they travel, kind of like burrs. Spreading by wind is almost completely unseen due to the lack of frequent or strong air currents in Hell.

The lack of animals in Hell ALSO includes such small animals as insects, which means Hell flora have evolved little means of defense against pests. At most, the bodies are tough and toxic to discourage predation, and unripe fruits are unpalatable and/or ALSO toxic. Because demons don't usually dip much below human size, and instead often range above that- fruit sizes tend to skew larger. Small berries are most common in flora with sticky spores, banking on getting all over a demon's hands when tediously harvested; however most fruits range from plum sized to watermelon sized.

These ones (puffball fruit) are more straight up fruit-like, and their hollow interior is filled with spores that explode out when the fruit is bitten. The 'explosion' is more a puff, and is not dangerous even to humans- though the fruit IS under pressure when it is ripe. Think shaken seltzer, but powder instead of liquid.

Green and blue are common advertising colors in Hell flora, as they stand out well against the browns, greys, muddy reds, and blacks of the caverns. They do NOT get their color from chlorophyll, however- there are NO photosynthetic flora in Hell, and instead flora are either chemosynthetic or thermosynthetic producers, or heterotrophic decomposers.

The main bodies of flora are often similar colors to the caverns they are found in, and as such are often fairly dull compared to the bright greens of Earth flora. Thermosynthetic flora however are usually black. Some flora use bioluminescence for advertising their fruits and flowers, and contribute noticeably to ambient lighting in Hell.

Due to the lack of day/night or seasonal cycles on the rogue planet, Hell flora tend to fruit continuously rather than in cycles; a given specimen may have a mixture of unripe fruits and ripe fruits simultaneously. Those that do grow in cycles are usually flowering varieties, for whom the strategy is to flower, THEN fruit so that demons do not skip pollinating flowers in favor of eating fruits. In flora that do fruit continuously, unripe fruits are dull but still somewhat distinct, as they can count on the advanced memory of sophont demons to draw them back to same flora later when the next batch is ripe.

Also I guess this is my new OC's debut, getting spored in the face while eating puffball fruit incredible

#in which Inc fucking spec bio botany's the fucking flora for a fantasy setting #inc's art #inc's ramblings #demon setting #puffball fruit #Hell flora #OC: Fluorospar

[victorluvsalice]

-->But yes, with everything at home settled -- produce picked, animals tended, bees calmed, gnomes moved -- it was off to the store for this lot! I had Victor start in immediately with the magic, using Repairio on one of the flower arrangements in the front window to see what it did to the plants -- it DID increase their quality, but it did NOT do anything about their level of freshness that I could see (that is, it made the whole thing a better bunch of flowers, but it did not do anything about how wilted it was). Good to know, I suppose! I also had him catch the stink bugs that had started congregating outside the front windows -- can't have THOSE annoying customers! And you never know when you might need them for herbalism...

-->Anyway -- with that sorted, let's go over everyone's store jobs:

Smiler got banished to the dock to fish for a good chunk of the day (even when it started snowing -- it was only a little bit and not for long!), to help add some fish to the fish freezer I'd added earlier. They caught a cichlid, an angelfish, a couple of tunas, a tilapia, and a perch, which is not a bad haul! And I figured out which option on the fish freezer lets you mass-store fish – though I actually can't recall the exact label at this point in time. ^^; Something like "fresh ingredients!" Also lets you mass-transfer meat and eggs, which is nice. :)

Alice, naturally, got put on canning duty -- specifically, oversize conserve duty! I had her use up a bunch of the oversized produce in her inventory making jars of mushroom, aubergine, lettuce, pumpkin, and watermelon conserve to put on the shelves next to the canned green beans, canned green peas, and bottles of dried sage. It felt like the most appropriate place for them! Don't worry, though, she got a few breaks -- mostly because the werewolf instincts demanded she go outside for a bit and let out a Somber Howl to keep the Fury low. Gotta keep that inner beast satisfied!

And Victor was just all over the place, doing every job the other two couldn't -- making more boxes and bottles of dried sage to fill in that area; making more loaves of banana bread to fill out the bakery section; brewing up some more perfume in Inspiring scents for that endcap; and of course hitting everything he could with Copypasto to fill in gaps on the shelves. Seriously, that spell is the most useful thing on the PLANET -- it is so OP and I never want that to change. XD Copy every freaking jar of preserves you can, Victor! I just wish you could copy the mod-added stuff too!

#sims 4 #the lazy save #victor van dort #alice liddell #smiler always #yeah I was kind of hoping Repairio would reset the freshness level of a flower arrangement as well as its quality #but no dice #ah well just gotta replace the arrangements when they wilt #at least there's no loss of cash as we only make the arrangements that we have all the flowers for! #but yes everybody doing what they're best at most of the day #Smiler getting all the good fish for the fish freezer #Alice doing all the canning #and Victor running around making everything that we needed more of #or just straight up copying it from what was already on the shelf XD #I don't think I could have gotten this far with the store without Copypasto #seriously that spell is a total winner and I'm very pleased Victor has it #now it only it worked on Simsonian Library's stuff! #meeeh #can't have everything! #as we established it doesn't work on chatterbots either so #*shrug* #queued

[finitevariety]

Allan Troxler: Shirley's Garden by David Cecelski. "Listening to History," News & Observer. Published 10/11/1998 and reprinted with permission here

I talked with Allan Troxler in the garden behind the Blevins House, a group residence in Durham for people with HIV/AIDS. A 51-year-old Greensboro native, Troxler started this bountiful garden eight years ago to provide produce and cut flowers for the residents and their caregivers. We walked down dense rows of sunflowers and okra, beneath 7-foot-high trellises of tomatoes and cucumber, alongside lush patches of watermelon and cantaloupe. Troxler has been a volunteer at Blevins House since it was founded 10 years ago by a group of his friends, organized as the AIDS Community Residence Association. Many of his closest friends have died during the AIDS epidemic, including his own long-time partner, Carl Wittman, in 1986. Like so many other Tar Heel volunteers and families, he has responded to the AIDS epidemic by quietly taking care of the small things that one person can do for another to make life more bearable, more decent. He nurses the ill, makes endearing keepsakes - and tends this garden.

He began by telling me the story of the person who inspired him to start the garden:

Allan Troxler: Shirley was an old mountain woman. I think she might have gotten HIV from prostitution. When she came to the house, which is a very pleasant, middle-class ranch home, she just sat on the edge of the sofa for about a month. Like she was just waiting for the Greyhound to take her back to the hills - she was so ill at ease in what to her was this palatial home. I suspect she had only lived in little cabins and trailers. But she took to lining the porch with coffee cans full of houseplants. She was turning it into home. 

Shirley was real deadpan. When she was joking, you couldn't tell because she wouldn't smile, but then you'd see that her eyes were flashing. Didn't have many teeth. She dipped snuff and had a snuff can. Most all of her hair was gone. I had no idea how old she was. She looked ancient, but I remember at some point seeing her age and I was surprised at how much younger she was than I thought. We all knew that Shirley loved plants. Her birthday was on May the first, and so everybody gave her houseplants. I gave her a few seed packets. That's how the garden got started. The first year the garden was just a little patch with some zinnias and a few other things. Shirley would sit up on the porch - she didn't have any energy to work in the yard - and she'd boss me around. The residence is housing of last resort. It's for people who can't find anywhere else to live. Anyway, that first year the garden was for Shirley. And I planted her zinnias, because they were so colorful. 

She probably came here through the HIV/AIDS clinic at Duke. They refer most of the residents to the house. At that point - 1989 - there probably weren't adequate services up there in the mountains for her.  Blevins House, and several other residences in the area, are pretty cosmopolitan. Often times it's people from all over the state. 

Shirley took great pride in the garden. By fall, we had all kinds of beautiful things in bloom. In October, we planned an excursion to the State Fair with Shirley and other folks from the house. It was the first time she had ever been to anything like the State Fair. She was tremendously excited. We got Shirley over there in a wheelchair, all made up, in her bouffant wig. Along with J.R. and Tony, who was Lumbee. 

So we've been there maybe 10 minutes. We're right in front of the turkey shoot on the midway. The rifles all go off. Straightaway, Shirley goes into a grand mal seizure, which I had never dealt with at all. It was terrifying. She went white and rigid. Fortunately, Tony had had seizures as a complication from AIDS. He had a sense of what to do. 

We wheeled Shirley over to the Red Cross booth. It ended up I had to bring her back out here. As she was coming to, about when we were back to Durham, she said: "Where are we? How come we're not at the State Fair?" And I said: "Shirley, you had a seizure. I got to take you home." She was just furious, because she had been looking forward to this for weeks. I was feeling really bad, thinking, 'God, what can we do for Shirley?' 

The next morning, I came out to the garden, and there were these coxcombs, which are great big flowers - deep, deep pink and red - that look like rooster's combs. They'd been off in a corner and once or twice I had dumped Miracle Gro on them and otherwise I had ignored them. So I thought, well, there's another round of the flower competition at the fair. I'll take these coxcombs over. 

A couple days later, a friend and I went by the flower show, and there were the coxcombs covered with ribbons. First prize! Best of show! These huge, apricot-colored ribbons with three or four tiers of ruffles. It was perfect. So I bought Shirley a State Fair sweatshirt and we pinned on all the ribbons and brought it back to her. She was tickled. It wasn't all the same as being there, but it was next best. She died that next spring. 

Shirley, Ken, now Roosevelt - those are the three faces that the garden has most assumed for me. Ken loved the garden. He had grown up at an orphanage at Chalybeate Springs. They made the kids do field work - I think it was a strawberry farm - so he had this almost instinctive relationship with the garden. He was here for a couple years. Early on, it was rare that anybody was here for that long. It's changed now. With these new drugs and drug combinations, people are living a lot longer. 

Last fall, Roosevelt started coming out and puttering around, chopping weeds, clearing beds. Now he's gaunt and doesn't have much energy. He's on oxygen 24 hours a day, but he has a portable tank so he can come preside. I tell him he's our patron saint. So many people, once they're diagnosed, give up. He has no patience with that. He's from Durham, but he worked in New York, polishing diamonds at Tiffany's. 

Especially in those early years, I think the benefits of volunteerism were at least as much for the volunteers as for the people who lived here. We all needed reassurance. We all needed some sense of, well, there is something I can do. Everybody felt defeated. I think all of us were searching for a way to understand this very natural process, this epidemic, as something other than this terrible judgment, this holocaust, this tragedy. I've hoped that here, in the garden, is some solace in the cycles of life, death, and then regeneration. 

And maybe to have a vase of zinnias or a sack of okra matters in a small way.

#aids #aids epidemic #field notes #gay history #lgbt #im on a bit of a 'old activism reading' kick and allan troxler was one of the founders of rfd #which i am currently reading issue-to-issue #long post #allan troxler

[kpopvillage102214]

Seventeen 14th member

Stella profile

Stage name: stella Birth name

kim stella Korean name: ari  Myeong

English name: stella

Position: vocal team &  hip hop team

《☆Birthday☆》 July 3rd 1995 Age: 27 ( International Age)  28 (Korean age)

Sub unit: vocal s unit Group: Seventeen ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Zodiac sign: cancer

Hometown: Korean, Chinese, Australia

Height: 5'10"Weight: 34 kg Blood type: AB

Instagram: moon_stella21Stella meaning: star

Nicknames: Elle, star, starlight,stel,ellie, Estelle, ~

~~~~~~~~~Skills ranks~~~~~~~~~

Rap:☆☆ 9/10

Vocal: 10/10

Dance: 8/10

Visual: 8/10

Stage pesence: 9/10

Producing: 9/10

Composing: 8/10

Songwriting: 10/10

Choreographing: 10/10

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~🌷

Know for🌷《☆》 being tall, her Songwriting skills, writing for other group,       for her cute doe eyes,     being a female In a boy group, being Seventeen angle.

《Likes》mint chocolate chip ice cream, watching anime, sleeping, kind people, animals, sweet food, harrypotter, buying phone case, lily flowers, Disney movies,   plushies, piano, painting,

《Dislikes》rude people, rumors, toxic fans, airport crowds, rude staff, toxic friends, fake fans, malfunction.

《Habit's》: playing with her hair, sleeping on her members shoulders and chest, playing with her members, playing with jeonghan long hair, playing with her members fingers  

   《Hobbies》Reading, painting, playing piano,  running her fingers, playing volleyball with Dk and seungkwan, drawing people, cute draws, flowers,

《Idol friends》 Twice nayeon, red velvet yeri and Irene, blackpink  jennie and jisoo, tiffany young, all of monsta x , eunbi ex izone, straykids hyunjin and felix, NCT's mark, got7 yugyeom and Jackson wang, itzy Lia, all the super junior, bts jungkook and namjoon.

《Stella facts》

《-》 her stage name stella  from her English name stella

《-》 said she never had only one dream and always wanted to try multiple different things  and careers

《~》 had four brothers

《-》 her mother family had a family business and her eldest brother works there.

《-》 her father is a lawyer and she and she Closer to him then her mother but she still care for her mother

《~》 The second eldest Is a doctor and the twins are uni students

《~》Did ballet  for almost 5 years

《☆》 Favorite food would be sour cream and. Chocolate. Egg rolls.

《~》 Did musicals for almost 6 years  in middle school through high school.

《☆》 she speaks Korean, Chinese,  French, English, Japanese, Spanish

《☆》 Stella loves to cuddle jeonghan and seungkwan.

《☆》 Stella is jeonghan little angel

《☆》 became a trainee in 2012

《☆》 she has a cute laugh and  smile 

《☆》 her members say she's very clumsy.

《☆》 she had her driver's license

《-》 her hobbies is painting and reading, Taking photos of her members

《☆》 her favorite snacks is watermelon and  cupcakes.

《☆》 she is very  close with the 95 liners

《☆》 she is very flexible

《☆》 her favorite colors  is light blue and light yellow

《☆》 the members say that stella is very smart and fun to be with

《☆》 Stella has a phobia of fireworks

《☆》 she loves dancing

《☆》 she is a bubbly personality.

《☆》Stella love to poke the members cheeks

《☆》 she is Seventeen baby

《☆》 she loves giving hugs to the members

《☆》 she looks up to her eldest members

《☆》 she loves her members

#seventeen 14th member au #seventeen 14th member #Seventeen female member #seventeen fluff #Itzy #Yugyeom #bts #shinee #Twice #got7 #Super junior #OnlyOneOf