One of the most memorable interactions was Saturday. Into our booth strolls a small family, tempted by free samples of freshly brewed tea. We chatter and give them the spiel, that the tea is character merch and we’re a cozy health-based app called Forage Friends.
The young girl zeroes in on our pride pins.
“They have my pin!” She says excitedly. “They have my flag!”
The dad blinks. He is surprised, but also calm and positive when he sees it’s the lesbian flag. “Oh. That’s… different from what you told me.”
“That was months ago, dad.” And she rolls her eyes. Definitely a teenager.
I turn to him and say, “Yeah, dad.” And we share a little laugh about it.
He says, “No, it’s great. That’s amazing, honey. It was just news to me.”
“Well, I guess I just decided to stop lying to myself. About liking guys. Like right now.”
A little lesbian just came out to her dad and he was super cool about it.
I’m standing there in my tie-dye mask and my cheery blue apron pouring tea and making small talk and I’m trying really hard not to cry or compare it to my experience, the fire & brimstone, the disgust, the conditional acceptance as long as I never bring it up.
So as this beautiful bonding is going on, the girl’s even younger brother turns his gaze around. He’s in a snorlax hoodie and bored and wants to go look at the swords across the hall. But on the other side of our booth….
“WHY DO PEOPLE DRAW THAT?” He asks loudly, and we all turn to our neighboring booth.
Our neighbors were extremely lovely people. Every time we had a break we would talk, and we became good friends over the weekend. They kept apologizing that their booth was next to ours and we kept repeating that it was totally fine. Their booth was great. I even bought their merchandise.
The thing that was so contentious, that they felt the need to apologize for, was that they were selling explicit titty hentai stickers of popular characters. They were censored with little yellow R18 labels but the content was very clear.
So back to the family: I freeze and immediately go somewhere else to let dad handle this question. With adult customers I’ve been loud and positive about our neighbors. (“Man, how has it been boothing next to them?” It’s been great! They bring a lot of foot traffic and they’re kind and wonderful professional neighbors. If anything it’s a fun juxtaposition. We believe in artistic freedom. I bought a sticker too!)
But this is a kid, it’s not my place to explain anything…. But I was extremely curious about what this chill dad would say.
“Well,” dad says with a long measured silence between each word. “Sometimes people are horny.”
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The 7th
When the Wizard explained to Billy about his powers he forgot to mention that the Champion of Magic had a seventh patron who would manifest in his greatest moments of need. Although this one did not count as "official" since he was not exactly sharing his powers like the others.
So it's understandable that Billy would freak out at the new voice in his head telling him to steal a sandwich from one of the rude people on the subway.
Billy tried to argue with the voice about it since his parents had taught him all about good and evil but it had been a few days since his conversation with the Wizard Shazam and it had been weeks since his last decent meal other than leftovers. The Sandwich was packed and its owner wasn't paying attention, one little slip and he would have something in his stomach.
Solomon was very upset with the new voice, he was fully aware of who was talking and thought that he had left after the disaster with Adam but apparently the Ghost King had taken an interest in "The New Champion", Solomon had suspicions that it was because Billy was a kid.
The new voice introduced himself as "Phantom", he argued a lot with Solomon, didn't seem to have any moral and Zeus always muttered about his older brother's annoying best friend whenever he manifested. The boy did not know who the new God was but at least he gave good life advice. Or he liked to think so.
Phantom had many arguments with the other immortals, Hercules complained about his friendship with Kronos (which the boy found worrying but decided not to comment), Salomon about his recklessness, Atlas and Achilles bothered him constantly and Mercury kept challenging him to races. But it seemed that thanks to him everyone had become interested not only in helping Captain Marvel but also Billy!
Phantom even had a lot of good advices on being a young hero or keeping his secret from the League and for the first time since he got his powers Billy didn't feel so lost.
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Dearest Snow White, darling sweet angelface, you sexy little love affair for a lifetime, you lovely little girl who loves to be kissed on every inch of your fourteen square feet of creamy skin - I'll do it too - damned if I'm not a better person since we've been in love. I love you more than a hacker can show on yellow paper with a Grade B typewriter. My fingers wander idly over the noisey keys. I'm still looking for the lost chord. Until then you'll have to be satisfied with Chopsticks. I love you.
Kurt Vonnegut in a letter to Jane Cox, 1941
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I like to think that Stede hangs on to that twine, like the piece of silk or the cravat, maybe turns it into a little bracelet he always wears and that Ed one day notices…
Ed: Well, you did say we were…intertwined.
Stede: ......
(Also I so love Stede's look of fondness and the crack in Ed's voice as he explains the twine...)
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Love that scene in Pokemon Scarlet (and Violet but I played Scarlet) where the protagonists were in Area Zero and describing their parents, and Penny is like "Omg, my dad's so annoying! He gives me annoying names like Pen-Pen," and Nemona is like, "I grew up in a rich family, and my parents gave me a lot of freedom but still made sure to care for me," and then Nemona tells Penny about how nice the protagonists mom is, and then Arven, with his fucked up parents, is just watching like:
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I find it hilarious how similar Lance and Silver look. They both have red spiky hair and their skin tones are about the same. In some versions Lance and Silver both have gray eyes too. Nobody is gonna believe Silver’s ass is adopted. They just think Silver is Lance’s secret love child and the adoption is a cover story.
Or even funnier, after the adoption when Lance informs the press about his new son, he’s vague enough in what he says that everyone assumes Silver is Lance’s bio kid that he only recently found out about.
Lance says things like “his previous guardians were unfit, once I was made aware of Silver’s deficient living situation I took him in” and “I’m happy to be a father” and “I ask you to give my son privacy” and such. Not mentioning Silver isn’t his blood son because that is not important, family is who you choose. Lance does not realize that most of Kanto and Johto does not think that way lmao. Thus the secret love child assumption continues.
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