An interesting Passover fact is that the word "seder" literally means "order" in Hebrew, which is, coincidentally, the exact opposite of how I would describe what happens when your friends accidentally buy extra-spicy horseradish for the maror and everyone starts daring each other to eat larger and larger quantities of it

The chain thus far mailed:

The chain that remains:

A relaxing place

Y'all, the world is sleeping on what NASA just pulled off with Voyager 1

The probe has been sending gibberish science data back to Earth, and scientists feared it was just the probe finally dying. You know, after working for 50 GODDAMN YEARS and LEAVING THE GODDAMN SOLAR SYSTEM and STILL CHURNING OUT GODDAMN DATA.

So they analyzed the gibberish and realized that in it was a total readout of EVERYTHING ON THE PROBE. Data, the programming, hardware specs and status, everything. They realized that one of the chips was malfunctioning.

So what do you do when your probe is 22 Billion km away and needs a fix? Why, you just REPROGRAM THAT ENTIRE GODDAMN THING. Told it to avoid the bad chip, store the data elsewhere.

Sent the new code on April 18th. Got a response on April 20th - yeah, it's so far away that it took that long just to transmit.

And the probe is working again.

From a programmer's perspective, that may be the most fucking impressive thing I have ever heard.

Hope you all are enjoying my current tenure as a [checks posts] Pentiment-Dracula-Dungeon Meshi blog

acts of faith 🗡 my piece for @palimpsestzine

So many excellent textures in York

Gray Squirrel

Bullied in the groupchat today

Epiphany

Fandom: Pentiment Words: 1,327

While visiting the Frauenkirche in Nuremberg, Caspar discovers his calling. (Written for Palimpset: A Pentiment Fanzine)

[Ao3 Link]

So excited to finally share this piece with you all. I was lucky enough to be involved with Palimpsest: A Pentiment Fanzine /@palimpsestzine and got to write this short little story for it. It was a really fun one to tackle (I love Caspar so much) and I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

You should absolutely also go look at the zine itself -- my story got some amazing formatting work done, and everyone's works are so amazing and crafted with such love and care towards the game.

The zine is completely pay-what-you-want, but we're raising money for Librarians and Archivists With Palestine until April 30th, so definitely go have a look over on itch.io!

my full piece for @palimpsestzine 🧡 ursula defeats the basel basilisk! 🐔you can still purchase the zine until the end of april, please consider donating! everything raised is going to Librarians and Archivists with Palestine + it's the most beautiful pdf i've ever seen

EMAIL SUCCESSFUL

Slides an email across the table to the German/Nordic/Slavic/Dutch department to ask if I can take 4th semester German in the fall even though I tested into 3rd semester German, because the former fits into my schedule perfectly and I would have to take the latter at the god-forsaken hour of 8am.

More thoughts because this won't leave my head actually.

I imagine Jonathan's life trajectory would probably quite similar to many of the actual trans people alive in the 1890s whose stories we know--I'm in this for the history after all, which is to say, he probably began living as a man as a teenager. I think Mr. Hawkins has to know, given that Jonathan isn't just his assistant, so good on Mr. Hawkins for being remarkably open-minded? But also their half-familial, half-mentor-and-protege relationship might well explain Jonathan having landed the position he did, even as someone with a fairly big secret. Meanwhile Mina not only also knows, but very well might have been the one to encourage him to go through with it, since I am here for the idea that they've known each other since they were fairly young.

And then of course, there's Dracula. Who I think figures it out--whatever tips him off could be a good replacement for the shaving scene, and I think unfortunately for Jonathan only makes Dracula more intrigued by him. I imagine other things about the captivity would be additionally intolerable for him at that point. (Worst case scenario: what if there were a vampire keeping you prisoner and making your dysphoria worse?)

Mina, of course, is off having her own complicated thoughts about Lucy's engagement--and perhaps a bit resentful of the men who are able to court her openly--and growing increasingly anxious for her fiancé when she finally receives a letter saying a young English woman suffering from brain fever was brought some time ago to a convent in Buda-Pesth and has only just been able to provide the name of a friend back home.

They two of them aren't able to be married there as in the original novel, but Mina takes care to pack some of Jonathan's clothes when she goes, knowing he'll be wanting them as soon as he's well enough to travel.

I have blurrier thoughts from there on out--it feels like the suitors ought to find out at some point, just because I like the idea of it being another couple secrets binding the group together. Seward in particular probably has some knowledge of inversion theory and it could be fun to make him the sort of doctor to see Jonathan's case as an example of successful "treatment" (it was rare for that to be the case, but I know of actual historical instances not that long after Dracula is set where it did actually happen!) Also I like the idea of the suitors all considering Jonathan "one of the guys" knowingly. Self-indulgent, maybe, but I'm already rubbing my queer little hands all over this story, I might as well do it to the fullest.

One other thing is for certain though--in this version of events, it's Jonathan, not Mina who ends up partially-turned in October. Dracula seems to have a tendency to target young women for that, and I think it would really get into the gender of it all to have him again target Jonathan--who is not one, but who most of society would perceive as one if they knew the truth. I also think it's shortly after this that Jonathan and Mina do have a--incredibly hurried, intensely bittersweet--legal marriage ceremony, with the logic that Lucy might have had to go to her (undead) grave without one, but none in the group wish to let it happen to anyone else.

(Ironically, Jonathan is very neutral on the idea of being married, but the wedding makes him cry anyway)

Sits bolt upright.

What if. Trans aro/ace Jonathan Harker and lesbian Mina Murray who are best friends getting married to keep each other's secrets

Sits bolt upright.

What if. Trans aro/ace Jonathan Harker and lesbian Mina Murray who are best friends getting married to keep each other's secrets

this is a marcille donato appreciation post 🗣️‼️

Seabeck blooms

A story that the Jews tell each other is that when the slaves were fleeing Egypt they came to the edge of the Red Sea and thought: well, fuck, this is it. Water in front of them and enemies behind. They had escaped, sure, but all this meant was that they were going to die free instead of in chains. A meaningful distinction in an abstract sense, but the Jews are a practical people, and mostly what they were concerned with in that moment was: they would be equally dead either way.

A man stepped out from the group. He stepped into the water. He said: mi chamocha ba’eilim adonai? Who is like you Adonai, among the gods who are worshipped? He sang that verse over and over again. He sang it as he waded into the sea. He gave his body over to his faith as he walked. There was nowhere to go but forward. If he was going to die, he figured, and be equally dead either way, he was not going to die in slavery and he was not going to die at the hands of the Egyptians, either. He was going to die walking and singing, believing, trying to find progress in the chaos, in the waves. 

In the story, the water laps first at his feet, then his knees, his thighs, his ribs, his neck, finally flowing into his mouth as he sings and sings and sings. The words get choked, mispronounced: the hard cha of mi chamocha becomes mi kamoka, strangled but still certain. 

In the story, this man is why the people get their miracle, the waters parting to let them cross through on dry land. It is an act of divine intervention, but it only comes because someone is willing to put his life on the line to make it happen. I keep thinking about him this week, that apocryphal man and how it is a story we make sure to keep telling each other: when there is water in front of you and enemies behind, you do not wait for your god, or a sign. You trust in something larger than yourself and open your mouth to sing about it. You put your feet on the ground and walk forward.