My character discovered that using his acting skills to look like a dangerous opponent kind of backfires if it gets the full attention of something that is a dangerous opponent.
A friend responded to me with uncharacteristic and intense anger a couple of days ago and I don't know why (yet). While I'm waiting on more information, I've been thinking about other times I've faced intense anger.
I don't remember many. One time, I was exhausted and needed to leave, and a friend said if I left, the friendship was over. I thought we would work it out after getting a chance to rest, but despite several attempts, he stuck to the friendship being over.
Another time, a friend was angry that I couldn't continue in a painful situation. Despite attempts to talk about it, that friendship eventually ended too.
I remember being angry as romantic relationships deteriorated, but I don't remember partners communicating anger and working it through. Or responding well to my attempts to communicate anger and work it through. Which is why I'm not in any of those relationships anymore.
I have a felt sense of quicksand in relationships (of any sort). Like, "oops, this ground has gotten treacherous, time to back up." Looking back, I think that's been when people are angry. But they don't say, "I'm angry at you for X and want things to be different going forward." They emotionally withdraw, and eventually cut things off. Sometimes it's been when I felt safe enough to express a boundary of my own, and found out that wasn't safe after all.
I suppose the most... not positive, exactly, but open experiences of anger were as a bodywork practitioner. If a client got angry, I held space and listened and responded as best I could. But that's a different dynamic than relationships out in the world. I do have the basic tools of active listening and trying to stay grounded.
I'm not feeling super hopeful about the current situation. Do you have stories or resources about successfully working through anger?
After several days in a row of being able to walk more than is now typical for me, and also doing PT, yesterday my ankle hurt enough that I stayed put as much as possible. I took a naproxen around lunchtime, which made no descernible difference.
I'm doing significantly better today, in terms of ankle and other joint pain. I didn't go for a walk, but did go outside to take out trash and spend a few minutes outdoors during daylight, and then started on what has turned out to be a lot of PT exercises. We're back on standard time as of this morning, meaning the sun set in Boston at 4:35 (we're near the eastern edge of this time zone).
This is your check-in post for today. The poll will be open from midnight Universal or Zulu Time (8pm Eastern Time) on Sunday, November 2, to midnight on Monday, November 3 (8pm Eastern Time).
I had to force myself to get up, dressed, and out this morning but I really wanted to get to Old Town to see the Procession of the Matachines. I saw it last year and was surprised to realize it had common roots with Morris dancing. It was just as cool this year and prowling around Old Town paying respects to the ofrendas, browsing a pop-up market, and admiring a wandering cat made for a nice outing.
After getting back home and resting a bit I went dowstairs because there's a block party/twilight market and I ran into the guy who runs the biweekly D&D game at the consumption lounge. He's a great DM and a real sweetheart. I invited him and the friends he was with up for a round of drinks and made a Tom Collins variant with the Earl Grey infused gin and homemade lavender syrup. It was a HIT so I think I can call that drink a success and it was fun to be able to show off the balcony and that VIEW.
The dude (now 21) asked me to make a batch of chicken rice, which I used to make for them as a kid. Every child I've ever fed this to loves it! It's tasty and full of veges that the kids can't see, and the texture is smooth enough for those learning to chew (or who hate chewing). Bonus: it freezes well so you can store it in lunch-sized portions and send it off to childcare.
Cooking. Two variations on a recipe: smitten kitchen's winter squash and spinach pasta bake and the recipe that inspired it, Ottolenghi's pasta and butternut squash cake. On the first day I definitely preferred the smitten kitchen version; on subsequent days I became increasingly convinced by the Ottolenghi. (You see, I had about twice as much of all of the ingredients as I needed, and the spinach definitely needed eating Imminently, and so I thought I'd make them simultaneously so we could do the side-by-side comparison and then freeze some...)
And then this evening I made another round of the wahaca autumn stew with pipián, this time with even wronger chillis but a sensible amount of herbs, and was delighted that it met with my mother's approval.
Eating. SCHWARZBROT with Lizard honey. Curries various courtesy of my father. Salads and lunches various courtesy of my mother. The dark chocolate & raspberry stars that are a Special Seasonal Treat. National Trust lemon drizzle cake. A RASPBERRY.
Exploring. THE NEW SITE FOR ADMIN: THE LRP. And this afternoon we went on an adventure to Anglesey Abbey, where the dahlias were alas gone but we found many many more cyclamen than we knew were there, and several things in the winter garden were at a different stage than I think I'd ever seen them before and were extremely pretty with it.
Issue #3'd ended on Birdie realizing that her friend Wilson was also in danger from the VR game Nightmare Cemetery.
Her brother Pik was in a coma, mentally taken into the game by the " King of Sleep ". The King'd shoved one of his claws through her friend Enid's left eye while she was helping look for Pik.
Wilson had also been helping her - they'd both taken sleeping pills to get around the hard time-limit on their Dreamwaves, expecting to be able to wake each other up.
But she wasn't able to wake him. She was grounded by her worried and frustrated dad, able only to watch videos about other victims of Nightmare Cemetery.
In case the image does not load or someone cannot read it: it is a Bluesky post reading "I firmly believe the Jays would have won had Diefenbaker not cancelled the Avro Arrow."
Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 35 secrets from Secret Submission Post #982. Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ]. Current Secret Submissions Post:here. Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
AO3 Link | Pick Ups (100 words) by Merfilly Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Transformers: Shattered Glass Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Ratchet [Transformers], Ironhide [Transformers] Additional Tags: Drug Abuse, Drabble Summary:
Ironhide walks in on Ratchet
Pick Ups
"Pretty sure the sharp side goes in other mechs," Ironhide drawled after walking in, unannounced, to Ratchet's bay.
The other mech flicked his optics up once, but didn't move much past that as he finished injecting the stim.
"You want me available for your fight, I get to use the syringes how I want," Ratchet growled at him.
"Your own cocktail?"
"Don't trust 'Jack's," Ratchet agreed.
"Unicron smash us all from that!" Ironhide agreed. "I let him juice my frontliners, but won't touch it." He sidled closer. "Got more? Chromia was enthusiastic."
Ratchet chuckled, found another, and handed it over.
i have hidden a golden ticket in one of my posts, and whoever finds it will get to go on a Marvelous Tour of my Whimsical Tower in which I Will Not Kill You and You Will Not Be Killed .
you will Not be chopped up and used for spell components, let me make that clear
This week's bread: brown wheatgerm; 8:1 strong brown/wheatgerm, made up with buttermilk from open pot left over from making rolls; quite tasty but a little dense and heavy.
Friday night supper: grocery order delivered early enough that I had time to make sardegnera with chorizo de navarra.
Today's lunch: seabream fillets rubbed with salt, pepper, ginger paste and lime juice and left in the fridge for a couple of hours, then panfried in butter; served with miniature potatoes roasted in beef dripping, white-braised baby courgettes and red bell pepper, and pak choi stirfried with garlic.