#llama drama
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Pampérigouste escaped today and I almost didn't make a post about it because it's just more of the same isn't it? do people who read this blog really want to hear about yet another Pampe escape? Then I thought, that's like asking if people who read detective novels really want to hear about yet another mysterious murder. Probably yes. Also Pampe would have been offended to have such a successful escape go unreported.
I would like to say that my new fence is still fully Pampe-proof. She has not escaped a single time through breaking or outsmarting the fence, so now she does it by outsmarting me. Which doesn't happen all that often, because we are intellectual equals. But I let my guard down this morning—I'd just peeled some greenhouse carrots to make purée and I went into the pasture to distribute the peelings even though it was raining (see how I got punished for my selflessness?), and I left the gate open because I was right in front of it, obstructing it with my body.
Pampe dropped her carrot peelings and acted like she couldn't find them even though they were right under her feet, so I took pity on her and crouched down to gather them and offer them to her again (see how I'm getting punished for my compassion??) and she took advantage of this diversion. In the span of 0.2 seconds she slithered around me and she was out. It was a little bit beautiful. I don't know if you remember this photo of Pampe & Pyrgus, but it's a perfect illustration of what happened:
I sighed and ignored her and finished distributing the peelings to the other animals, and then went to the barn to get muesli to lure my nuisance back to her pasture. After escaping she initially ran towards the woods, but since I ignored her the whole time, she emerged from the woods when I returned, like, wait, did you notice I escaped? Behind your back, just earlier? Did you notice how I won and you lost?
It shouldn't have been difficult to get her back into the pasture with the help of her favourite snack; unfortunately Pampoldine is still a big baby who was distraught that her mum had left her behind yet again (she should be used to it, honestly, it's been like this since she was an infant), she started making these little panicky noises that Pampe has never paid any attention to—
—so when I propped the gate open with a branch to get Pampe back inside, Poldine hurried out instead. I wasn't expecting this, I thought it was clear that I had the situation under control and her mum would be back in 5 seconds. You could have just waited 5 seconds, Poldine.
Pampelune had no interest in escaping, but she's the matriarch and where her herd goes, she goes, so once the other two were out she barrelled past me as well. I opened the gate to bring 1 llama in and instead 2 llamas went out. Pirlouit besides me was like
For some reason the llamas galloped towards the road, instead of just hanging out in the woods where there's stuff to eat. Maybe because Pampe hadn't gone out in a long time and she wanted to be admired for her feat. Her wish was granted—2 cars stopped to say hi as I was miserably trotting after my llamas on the road in the rain. One of them was the post office lady who once herded my animals out of a pasture with her car, and she was like hop in, it'll be like old times!!!
The two people who stopped their car were enchanted with the encounter and they both told me that they missed the days when Pampe Sightings on this road were a regular thing. No one sides with my fence in the Pampe v. Fence conflict. I love the post office lady though, she had a Niagara song playing in her car when I got in and a minute later I muttered "I'll sell her to the butcher" and she started singing "Pampe ♪ Je vais devoir te vendre au boucher ♫" to the tune of that song. It fit the tune really well, too.
After we managed to get the llamas off the main road and back in the woods, she was like, godspeed, I wish I could continue chasing them with you but I have to go make lunch for my kids. I told her that now that the llamas were no longer on the road I'd just let them roam, they'll come home before night, no way I'm going to chase after them in the woods in this dog weather. So I went home and grumpily resumed peeling carrots and potatoes for my mash.
I sat in front of the window to do it so I could keep an eye on Pirlouit, who was wandering around the pasture like a cursed soul, drenched with rain, lonely and llamaforsaken. Sometimes he brayed to try and guide his friends back home, wherever they were, but he never brayed while I was filming. His braying is a poignant display of emotion and is not for public consumption.
I figured, if the llamas come back Pirou will spot them and perk up his immense ears, and I'll know to go out and open the gate. Instead at some point I looked up from my potatoes and saw my donkey finally at peace, grazing rather than pacing restlessly, and I went to look outside and his friends were back! And so was his appetite.
I had new peelings + some muesli to offer, but of course Pampe could tell this offering was a crude and blatant trap and refused to fall for it. Meanwhile her innocent daughter was like yay, snacks :) and followed me in the pasture, a llama entirely devoid of wiles.
After I got Poldine back inside I went like WELL since NOBODY else wants that delicious MUESLI I guess these deserving chickens can have it—and Pampe was here in the blink of an eye to shoo the hens away from her muesli.
She was grudgingly smiling about it, too. Like, point for you.
I love this pic where my chicken looks like she's herding the animals back in their pasture all by herself.
Everyone is home! Pampe and Pandolf are walking away in search of new adventures, Poldine follows her mum because of her abandonment issues, and Pirlouit is also following everyone very closely, like, I'm not getting left behind again.
I finally managed to cook my mashed carrots & potatoes (+ herbs from the greenhouse) and it's so nice to make food with nothing but ingredients you grew yourself! (To be completely honest I only managed to grow 3 carrots in the past few months but that's because I neglected them in pursuit of more flashy summer vegetables)
I also had an apple-plum compote for dessert made with my own fruit <3 Okay, the cheese course in between was store-bought. One of my friends really wants me to get goats and be self-sufficient in cheese and when I told her I would be constantly chasing my goats over hill and dale because they have a reputation to be insufferable escape artists she was like, what difference will it make to your life...
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one day remus finds out sirius and james have been fucking here and there and to sirius he's like "you've been cheating on me this whole time???" and sirius is like "what?? no!! I would never!!!" and remus is like "well i know about you and james so explain that!" and sirius is like "well yeah but that's james. you know james doesn't count, it's JAMES, we've been fucking ever since sixth grade, it's a friendship service! IT'S JAMES!!" and they fight about it for a bit because remus thinks he should be mad but secretly he's not, secretly he's thinking "actually, that's kinda hot, and actually, he's right, it is james, and actually. actually i would like to see it." and anyway, that's how wolfstarbucks got together
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OP @hedgehog-moss
I cannot find this original post (and I mean I searched the whole blog) so I @ed OP
#llama#hedgehog-moss#crawling along#pampérigouste#llama drama#farm life#french jokes#french#country life
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It's December 9th, 🦙 Llama Day in the United States and Canada! The origin of this special day is murky, but one thing historians agree on is that it began in the 1930s. Americans say they held the inaugural event as a way to protest their government's newly-imposed ban on Llama imports because of hoof-and-mouth disease outbreaks.
Canadians say they held the inaugural event when they recognized the Llama's importance as a livestock animal following a drought in the province of Manitoba that killed many sheep. Indeed, the Llama is known for its hardiness. Llamas can deftly navigate rocky terrain at high altitudes and can withstand harsh environments. They don't need much water, either.
Meanwhile, in the US, the ban on importing Llamas was finally lifted in 1984 – at least for Chilean llamas – but by then, Llama Day had grown so popular, celebrations have continued every year in both the US and Canada. People in both countries dress up like Llamas, carve butter Llama statues, sing Llama songs, play Llama-related games, and more.
Millions of wild Llamas live today in their native South America, primarily in Peru, Chile, Ecuador, and Bolivia. Since the Inca and other South American Indigenous Peoples didn't utilize the wheel (except for children's toys), they domesticated the Llama to serve as their primary pack animals. Llamas can carry about 25-30% of their body weight and travel 20 miles in a day. They're smart and very trainable. Some are used as therapy animals, while others are used as guard animals to protect sheep from coyotes and wild dogs.
But mostly we appreciate Llamas for how soft and cute and gentle they are. If you've never met a Llama in person, today's a good day to do so if you live within reach of a farm or petting zoo that owns one of these cuddly animals. Have fun! ☮️ Peace… Jamiese of Pixoplanet
#Jamiese#Pixoplanet#llama day#llama#national llama day#llama love#llamas#llama llama#llama drama#llama life#llama lover#llama lovers#llamaste#llamas rule#llama selfie#llama farm#llama shop#llamas are awesome#my llama#farm#drama llama#llama party#llama squad#happy llama day#llama live#save the drama for your llama#adopted a llama#no probllama#llamame#llama nation
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Stray Kids
Stray Kids in compliment battle by teen vouge.
#the whole video was so funny#hyunjin was a drama llama throughout#their expressions#stray kids#skz#bang chan#lee know#changbin#hyunjin#han jisung#lee felix#seungmin#yang jeongin#skz comeback#樂 star#teen vouge
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Oh Don’s got a banishing technique that “might have started off as a bit of an internet joke”.
Don, is it from Tumblr again? It’s from Tumblr again isn’t it.
Yeah, it’s banging pots and pans together and cursing.
Alright, that’s vague enough that I’m not adding it to his hbomberguy file, but my man, you have GOT to stop deciding that blogs are good enough to take from but not to source. Fuck off.
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Proshipper = you're against censorship and harassment over fiction & curate your experience on the internet to have a healthy distance from things that make you uncomfortable
Antishipper = you're okay and even encourage harassment towards "freaks" and "weirdos" society deems acceptable to hurt
#drama llama#fandom etiquette#please stop filling ship tags with hate#moving this post from twt to here#PROSHIPPING IS JUST A STANCE ON HARASSMENT AND CENSORSHIP#It doesn't mean you actually ship or like dark things#only that you're against censorship and attacking real people over fiction#you don't need to identify with the terminology especially when people are afraid of harassment#but don't fill ship tags with misinformation and hate#just mentioning the ship adds your post to the tag btw#just tw for incest??????#literally just tw for the kink#WITHOUT leet speak!!! you can say incest its okay!!!#this isn't about one person in particular#people do this on twt too#if people seek out anyone in the tags to attack i WILL block you too DO NOT harass people
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Huh. I forgot there was a reason I switched to building/strategy games a few years back.
The adrenaline I was getting from playing Dishonored (sneaky fun times! try not to get caught or you get stabbed!) triggered such a strong stress response my mast cells decided I was in danger, and now I have hives and a POTS headache.
... absolutely worth it. I will now, however, be playing farming simulators for a while. Just to calm things down 😂
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i had to draw this, his ass was in a situation
Said before I love their shenanigans and the mental image of this could not leave me alone.
#qsmp#q!badboyhalo#q!richarlyson#they are just lil drama llamas and i love them dearly#badboyhalo#richarlyson
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Okay all you Skz fans, I have a new name for our lovely Hyunjin:
Handsome Prince Slay Queen Drama Llama Hwang Hyunjin.
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I'm watching the Granada adaption of the Copper Beeches and Holmes is yelling at Watson and going on this long monologue about how the great age of crime has past and all the criminals are pathetic losers now. Beeches is from the first short story collection, Holmes is still relatively early in his career. Dude hasn't faced the hound of the Baskervilles or Charles Augustis Milverton or flipping Moriarty. Dude's just grumpy he hasn't had a case in a few days and is proclaiming no more criminals exist and the universe took that personally.
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Look, friends.
Do you think this is a post about my adorable baby succulents? No. Look harder.
It's about the GIANT HOLE IN MY FENCE that I had to patch up with cardboard.
I can't blame Pampérigouste for this one; the brutish nature of the damage is not consistent with her usual modus operandi. Pampe outsmarts locks like Arsène Lupin; she doesn't charge at fences like a bull who saw a red cloth. This is Pampe Pondering A Fence Problem:
No, the damage to my fence looked a lot more mindless this time. Boorish. Boar-ish. I'm blaming a boar. A deer would have destroyed the whole thing rather than just the lower half. Note that there is not a single tuft of llama wool on the damaged wire mesh.
(Note no.2: the boar's smile was originally meant to be a tusk but it really just looks like a sardonic smile)
I brought some chicken wire to patch up the hole—but there wasn't enough of it. Then it started raining and I felt persecuted and decided to just cover the hole with cardboard and go have my morning coffee and get back to this later.
This is not an Innocent Pampe post; there is no such thing. My temporary cardboard solution lasted 8 to 10 minutes. I'm not sure exactly when she got out, but by the time I went back outside to repair the fence there was a Pampe-shaped hole in the cardboard.
(Not really; she just kind of lifted or ate a corner then wormed her way through the very small opening. I think.) (See, this is how you recognise a Pampe escape: you're not entirely clear on what went down, you just know there was a llama inside and now there is a llama outside.)
It was still raining and I didn't feel like going after her, plus it felt pointless to bring her back in her pasture before the fence was repaired, so I went in the barn to look for my tools and rummage through leftover pieces of previously-destroyed fences, hoping to find something the right size.
Then I heard Pampelune's hyena shriek, aka the llama alarm call. It was followed by:
horrified chicken screams and frantic feather noises; the soundtrack of a violent fox attack
infuriated barking from Pandolf
very loud panicked braying from Pirlouit
basically, chaos.
I ran outside just in time to see Pampe emerging from the woods at a full gallop, pursued by a bear. I didn't immediately identify the animal that was chasing her as the giant dog that he was, because he was running with a weird gait, with his legs going everywhere like he was frolicking at top speed (I now know that this dog is a puppy that has learnt to run just a few months ago, but that didn't occur to me at the time because this puppy is the size of a calf.)
Pampe was running towards the cardboard through which she had escaped and she managed to squeeze through her small corner hole again (I assume—there were trees blocking my line of sight and I only saw her again once she was in the pasture, running for her life along with the other 2 llamas + donkey.) Meanwhile, the dog didn't see the corner hole and tried to power through the cardboard much like a boar, or was carried away by his momentum and didn't brake in time; I don't know. In any case, when I reached him, he was stuck.
My large piece of cardboard was tied to the fence posts and still holding strong, but the middle was a bit soggy with rain and not too solid, so the dog's head went right through it. The rest of his body didn't.
He could have probably finished breaking the cardboard quite easily, but for some reason he instantly gave up. On life. By the time I got there the dog was half-in and half-out of the pasture and he looked defeated. Which made my piece of cardboard look like a mediaeval beheading apparatus with just a hole for the head.
I went to lock an angry Pandolf in the barn and checked on the chickens along the way (ruffled & offended but fine); I was hoping the dog would figure out how to extricate his head from the cardboard in the meantime. He did not. I tried to call him in a friendly tone (from behind) to encourage him to free his head by stepping back, but the concept of taking a couple of steps backwards in order to extract his head from the hole might as well have been advanced engineering. He clearly had no idea where his head was, where his body was, how to make the two a coherent whole again, and he started whining pitifully.
I untied the rope I had used to attach the cardboard to the fence posts, then wriggled the piece of cardboard a bit to try and free the dog's head. The dog was alarmed by the wriggling and took several steps back—but I didn't manage to hold on to the cardboard so it just moved with the dog. He clumsily ran away, taking the cardboard with him, wearing it around his neck like the world's largest cone of shame.
He immediately got stuck between two trees.
I was starting to find the situation hilarious, but the poor dog did not—he lay down and started making sad broken noises like a malfunctioning dog-robot. He didn't look very threatening but he was still a very big (and stressed) dog so I felt a bit wary of touching his head to help him, and decided to run home to get a box cutter. I figured I could easily rid him of most of the cardboard and leave him with just a soggy cardboard collar that would soon fall apart. I heard my landline phone ringing from afar and ran faster, and it was one of my nearest neighbours, the retired lady who lives on the plateau.
"I've been trying to reach you!! I saw your llama in my garden earlier, I was going to give her a little treat—" (she loves Pampe, for some reason) "—but then my dog saw her too."
I know this woman's dog—he's a tiny thing with fragile nerves who thinks the whole world is out to get him, so I asked anxiously, "Did Pampe scare your dog?" and she said "Oh no! Domino is here with me; but I have a new dog. His name is Texas."
I thought of the gigantic puppy currently sobbing in my woods, held prisoner by two trees, a self-inflicted cone of shame and his total lack of reasoning skills.
"Yes", I said. "I've met Texas."
The old lady asked worriedly if he'd scared Pampe ("Il est un peu zinzin" she said—he's a bit crazy. "I wanted to call him Rex, but then I met him and thought—Texas!!") I told her I was pleased with her dog for scaring Pampe, because she needs to learn that her pasture is her only hope for safety in this cold uncaring world and as soon as she steps out of it she returns to her lowly status as a prey animal. Then I ended the phone call because I was worried both about Texas and about the large hole in my fence. Thankfully all my animals were still terrified and hiding far, far away from Texas.
Texas actually managed to free himself before I attempted to cut the cardboard, but he still thought of me as his saviour and was very happy to follow me through the woods back to his owner's place. Before we left I propped up the cardboard against the damaged fence, and despite the hole in the middle no llamas escaped in my absence; I think the whole area still smelled like Texas and fear.
I'll admit I was initially tempted to leave Texas with his head stuck in the cardboard in a more permanent capacity in order to patch the hole in my fence with this amazing anti-Pampe Cerberus. Like this
(I know this artistic rendering makes my llamas look like frightened carrots and my donkey like a bunny but I will not be taking constructive criticism at this time)
#crawling along#llama drama#i spent an hour at his owner's place eating biscuits and being told all the reasons why texas is ''a bit zinzin''#for example he runs away to the nearest farm to steal the cow feed (pellets) at feeding time#he was caught red-pawed by the farmer and just. stole the entire plastic tub that contained the pellets#and ran back home. holding this very large tub in his mouth and sprinkling cow feed everywhere along the way#this time around his owner must have feared he would come home dragging a bag with pampe inside or something
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thinking about how sirius probably didn't know how to cook or do chores at all until he lived with the potters and effie tought him how to do his laundry and how to make all their family recipes and it became a comfort to him to do chores and prepare homecooked meals even after he moved out
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Good Morning!
I’ll start with some tags because I haven’t seen any posts yet this morning. Throwing out some no pressure tags to some folks in case you’d like to share something: @fatalfangirl @whatevertheweather @cutestkilla @facewithoutheart @artsyunderstudy @thewholelemon @hushed-chorus @raenestee @bookish-bogwitch @moodandmist @ileadacharmedlife @ivelovedhimthroughworse @aristocratic-otter @nightimedreamersworld @martsonmars @youarenevertooold @cosmicalart @valeffelees @toonysart @shrekgogurt @iamamythologicalcreature @whogaveyoupermission @athenapitch @run-for-chamo-miles @mysterioussheep @wellbelesbian @captain-aralias @rimeswithpurple @prettygoododds @orange-peony @leithillustration @alexalexinii @blackberrysummerblog @j-nipper-95 @larkral @ic3-que3n @tender-ministrations @forabeatofadrum
I’m working on chapter 9 of Depth of Reason. We’re kicking it off with Penny and Simon out to lunch catching up after the events of chapter 8. I’m putting the snippet under the cut for spoilers so if you aren’t up to date with this fic, proceed with caution.
“Baz and I kissed after everyone left,” I say, grinning despite my best efforts to stay cool.
She squeals so loudly that several people turn and look at us. “Nicks and Slick! Are you serious?”
“Yes,” I say, keeping my voice low in hopes she’ll mimic my volume.
“So are you, like, together now? Are you still his social worker? What about his case?” She reaches her hand across the table and takes my hand in hers. Her enthusiasm mixed with concern is palpable.
“Not his social worker anymore. I put him on Ana’s caseload.” She nods her approval. “And I suppose we’re together? I dunno, we haven’t really labeled it but we have been…spending a lot of time together,” I say carefully, sipping my water and trying hard not to blush. I’ve always had a difficult time talking about my (previously barely existent) sex life with Penny. (Not that we’re having sex yet, but the point still stands.) It’s like talking about sex with your sister. Plus, Penny is far too blunt about everything, and hearing her ask questions with so much frankness and uninterrupted eye contact takes more bravery than facing down a herd of Drama Llamas.
#depth of reason#snowbaz#simon snow#baz pitch#carry on fanfiction#my writing#Idk what a drama llama is#maybe I’ll create some funny lore at a later date
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Something that to me does not get enough focus when talking about Megamind is how very clearly into it Roxanne is the first time they kidnap her.
Like, in all honesty I would probably struggle to ship them as much as I do if not for the fact that whole first scene they have together has the kind of chemistry tailor made to punch my buttons and leave me a mess on the floor.
Roxanne up until this moment, we've seen her professional, we've seen her as an accomplished adult with a high profile job and the associated pressures that accompany it, we've seen her do the awkward soft no of dealing with a "nice guy"
And then we see her struggling with a bag over her head and all of a sudden all that soft no, all that professional poise is burned open by the thrill of getting to flirt sarcastically torment a supervillain who clearly has the power (if not the capability) to turn her into a splatter of red where she's sitting.
Is she scared? No.
Is she leaning into it like it's only two sets of zip ties holding her back? Hell yes.
Girl is living her "I am the manager." dream and she is so into not having to be nice right now.
Sure Megamind deserves love and softness and someone to understand him but come on, you just know Roxanne had at least six months worth of witty repartee just dying to come out while she was dating Bernard.
#i have a type#and that type is disaster drama llama in a big black cape#and the woman gearing up to punch him in the dick#megamind#roxanne ritchi#megarox#its about the CHEMISTRY
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Alright, here we go. My review for The Dabbler's Guide to Witchcraft by Fire Lyte
Final rating: ??/10 - it broke my numbers system.
TL;DR - I like the book. I'm angry at the author. It's great for new practitioners. If you're going to get it, please get it from the Spiral House Shop, get Alex Wrekk's two witchcraft zines to go with it, and go look at/reblog/contribute to the original Dabbler's Week project.
(Also I think this is the longest review I've written yet. I'm sorry.)
This book is very good. I'm mad about that. The author is an excellent writer. I'm mad about that. I want to dislike this book but I can't, and I'm mad about that.
So let's get into the breakdown of why.
First up, a housekeeping thing: "Fire Lyte" is a pen name that I don't believe the author uses anymore, so I will be referring to him as Don Martin, the name he is using on his current projects. I know he's on TikTok, formerly of Inciting a Riot podcast, now of Head on Fire podcast.
Second, some links relevant to the review-which-is-actually-just-a-rant:
The breakdown of things I found that were taken uncredited from Tumblr
I COULD be making this up and reading it in bad faith, but this bit about 'heteronormative marriage' has my alarm bells ringing
Why I hate the title of this book
The original Dabbler's Week project links
Anyway.
I picked this book up specifically because of the title. It's been 3 years since it was published, so it took me a while, but I remember looking at that title when it was first out and thinking "Hey... the timing of this... did this person just wholesale lift the 'Dabbler' idea from Tumblr?"
The answer is: Yes, probably!
(He also summarized the Malachite Dick post from February 2020, but he actually credited Tumblr along with relevant usernames, so that's good and also made me laugh.)
But... yeah. The fact that he's crediting Tumblr from something that specifically happened in February 2020, when the original Dabbler's Week was from late January 2020 and seems to have inspired his whole book? Don, would it have killed you to mention ANYTHING about that project and the people involved?
He's very big on talking about following trails of information, listening to podcasts, listening to the podcasts of people talked about on those podcasts, reading books talked about on those podcast, and so on. But if he doesn't start off by saying "Dabbler's Week was a project issued by asksecularwitch on Tumblr", then how is anyone supposed to follow THAT chain of information, hmm? If his whole advice on finding good witchcraft resources is to follow the chain of people who are sharing information from each other, but he makes no mention of where he got the whole idea for his book, then what?
Side rant: I'm real tired of how Tumblr information is simultaneously treated as too shitty to ever bother reading or mentioning, but good enough to screenshot, repost on other sites, recite word-for-word on tiktok, and apparently write a book about.
ANYWAY. I'm angry about it. I'm gonna be angry about it. Here, please look at these links to the shenanigans that began the original Dabbler's Week, because Don certainly won't tell you about this part.
Anyway.
Some bad things:
I mean, the plagiarism. I keep hesitating to use the word 'plagiarism', because to me that seems like wholesale lifting entire works and slapping your name on them, when all Don did was fail to credit a few Tumblr users he quoted. But then again, if I did that on a research paper in college, it would be called plagiarism, so.
This book is in fact not a great guide for 'dabblers'. The point of Dabbler's Week was that if someone didn't know if they wanted to commit to witchcraft but wanted to fuck around with casting some spells for a week to try it out, there were week-long guides on things someone could do to try that. This book is not for fucking around with magic, it's for people who are already sure that they want to make this a thing in their lives. It handles some heavier topics (e.g. vetting mentors and not getting sucked into a cult) that are very very important for someone who is BEGINNING, but may be too much for someone who just says one day "lol I think I'll cast a spell for fun". A far more accurate title would have been "The Beginner's Guide to Witchcraft", but then he'd lose that punchy and marketable and googleable term 'dabbler'. (Yes, I'm going to be petty about this.)
"Wow Jes, it sounds like you really hated this book."
NO I DIDN'T, AND I'M SO MAD ABOUT THAT!
Some good things:
The author has a writing style that I enjoyed very much. This is a personal preference, but I like when books are either written so that the author is fully invisible (Bree Landwalker's books do this wonderfully), or the author is fully visible, like they're sitting at the table having a conversation with you (Kelly-Ann Maddox's 'Rebel Witch' comes to mind, as does Alex Wrekk's 'Brainscan 33: DIY Witchery'). Don Martin is the table conversation kind. That makes this book very easy to read, while also getting information across in an easily-understood sort of way.
This book fills a very necessary gap in modern witching books. It talks about the online community of witches, and a lot of the pitfalls that have come along with the bonuses of having so much witchcraft available at our social-media connected fingertips.
He gets very in depth with things like cultural appropriation. That's something that you can find in a lot of modern witch books, but Don actually spends the time breaking the concept down and explaining WHY it's harmful, HOW it affects people, and quotes people from the affected minority groups. I have seen the appropriation topic come up in a lot of the witch books I've read, but Don is the one who has covered the topic the best, imo.
He spends time on topics that I myself would have been dismissive of. The example that comes to mind is the chapter 'Can I Make Sh*t Up?' My knee jerk reaction was "Yes, you can make your own spells, you don't need to get someone else's permission. Next question." But Don goes through the full breakdown of yes you can make up your own spells, yes you can make your own correspondences, but no that doesn't mean you can just throw a water soluble crystal in your water bottle because you think it's good for cleansing.
Actually on that topic, he covers a lot of the why not just the what. It's not just 'appropriation is bad', it's 'and here's why'. It's not just 'research your herbs', it's 'here's some examples of things that can and have gone wrong.'
SPELL CANVASES! There are 11 'spell canvases' in this book, and they're pretty much all just kids/teens science experiments (e.g. dissolving an egg shell in vinegar, lighting a tea bag on fire so it flies, and using food dye to color a white flower). He does not give intentions for these spells, but gives a spell technique and then some examples of how you could apply your own purpose/intention to it as needed. It's actually pretty smart, and now I wish there was more stuff like this.
He actually explains what UPG means. Man, 'UPG' is one of those things that I keep seeing as a 'I don't know what that means and I'm to afraid to ask' blog post. When someone pops into the witchy social media circles, we can throw the term 'UPG' around as if everyone knows what it means, and forget to actually explain that it's Unverified Personal Gnosis and what that means. Don's got us covered. Good on you, Don.
The one throwaway line about why you don't have to buy fancy witch things. Tucked away in chapter 12 is this almost nothing-sentence mentioning why you shouldn't be "going broke hoping to buy your way into 'effective' magic" (pg. 161). I have seen, reblogged, probably written posts about 'No you don't need the fancy tools! You can just use whatever! But you CAN buy them if you want, you just don't NEED them.' And we've all seen those around, right? But damn, if Don didn't just get to the heart of it. You can't buy your way into skill. YES, Don, THAT!! THANK YOU.
Alright. I'm running out of words. This isn't a review, it's a rant. Holy shit. Let me shut up with a TL;DR
Almost without doubt, Don liked Tumblr's idea enough to write a book about it, but failed to give credit. But he's an excellent writer and covers a lot of topics that are not often written about in printed books, and to get those blogosphere-ideas onto bookshelves is invaluable. This is a good book for beginners starting out in witchcraft, but not for dabblers who just want to screw around with some spells. Do the pros outweigh the cons? Is it ethical to buy a book when the author gets royalties but the bloggers he got the idea from do not? I don't know. I can't tell you that. You'll have to weigh all this against your own moral compass and decide for yourself. My recommendation is that if you're going to buy it, please buy it from the Spiral House Shop, because if Don Martin's going to get paid for this book, Alex Wrekk should too. Buy Alex's zines. Reblog Sec's posts. Links are up at the top.
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