blades & petals

And how so many of them share the same vocabulary, like "Freshmen" and "Sorority" and "FBI"

Hey guys this is my AmeriVerse OC, his name is Tanner Michaels and he is a Senior in a Frat House at Townsville College- Go Tigers!

His girlfriend Amanda has a cheerleading scholarship and is the Vice President of her sorority, and is so good at Hazing Freshies!

Campus Police are always trying to ruin his good time, but he knows he can count on his good friends Hunter and Cooper to secure him some Illegal Marijuana 😉

This year, he's telling his parents Mark and Joanne that he's going skiing with Amanda and her parents- little do they know, he is spending Spring Break in Mexico with his Boys!

But wait- what's that? Crime Scene Investigation Federal Agents Chris Smith and Jack James, here to investigate an Urban, Inner-City Terrorism?

Sorry Tanner, it looks like Hunter and Cooper are going to be Living La Vida Loca without you THIS time. Special Agents Smith and James are sending YOU to Marine Fighter Boot Camp, to become the perfect Spring Break Special Agent!

Will Tanner be able to get his act together in time to Protect and Serve under His Nation's Best And Brightest? Or will he Fail to Protect the Greatest Country On Earth?

This April, watch Agent Spring Break!

At the start of my employment, my boss showed me videos of people stealing, and we both had a chuckle about it. How silly they were! There was a camera overhead, and it’s not to watch the shoppers. See, we can’t actually stop shoplifters. They get away with it maybe nine out of ten times. But we, who are watched and tallied and witnessed? We are always caught.

At first it was hard to hold one hundred dollars bills. An amount I had never seen before. An amount that didn’t exist in my household. It’s normal now. Here is something that is not for me.

“What the hell, I’ll take another,” says the man, pondering our 200 dollar watches. What the hell. Total comes to 580 and not even a flinch in his face. I have been working for 11 hours today and made only 110 dollars. It will go to my rent. Today I work for free, it feels. When I get my check, I will have 35 dollars left for food and saving.

The six hundreds he hands me go into the cash register. For a moment, I imagine having money. Then I put it away, counting out his change.

I know for a fact we sell our products for double what they are worth. That I could be making commission. That they could hand me those 580 dollars and change my life and not even mark the difference in their checkbooks. He’s not the only sale they make today, but I am the reason they made it. He’s not the only one spending 600 dollars, but if I hadn’t spent two hours with him telling me about his life, he wouldn’t have spent any. I go home. I don’t own a watch.

I have watched and rewatched a video on how to make salmon four ways. My shopping list is always the same. Pasta. Rice. Tuna. If I can afford butter it was a good week. I dream of the world I will never walk in, where I can throw the best fish fillet in the cart with a shrug. I hold hundreds in my hand and look up at the camera. I put them under the cash drawer.

I go to work. I scrap together my savings. I eat my bowl of rice slowly. My manager takes a paid week off from work just for his birthday. He owns a yacht. 

i was part of their college program. i moved to the state for it. they legally owned the building i was living in and still charged me rent. i ostensibly was being charged to work for them. it was a 2 bedroom apartment and they placed 6 adult women in it in forced triples.

as many as one in ten disney employees have experienced homelessness while working for the company. despite huge efforts to unionize, strike, or otherwise demand fair treatment; disney has refused to increase employee quality of life.

disney admits publicly that a good portion of their success is because the employees (“cast members”) are dedicated, passionate, and selfless. this is never reflected in pay. even “face” characters (ie those that are princesses etc) make barely above a minimum wage.

at the time that i worked there, i made $8.50 an hour. at one point i was asked to create a human shield around a bag because a bomb dog had alerted to it. for eight fucking dollars an hour.

i now work a very cushy office job. i have bought the salmon and cooked it all four ways.

i go to the store. i am nice to the person behind the counter. she looks up at the camera while she counts out my change. there is nothing fundamentally different about her and i.

Open the “apps” section in your settings (it’s usually at the very bottom), go to photos and scroll until you see “Enhanced Visual Search” and then turn that shit off. Then go to “Privacy and Security”, scroll until you see “Analytics & Improvements”, and turn off “Improve Siri & Dictation” as well.

​I am an artist with hundreds upon hundreds of my artworks in my photo album. I also have plenty of photos with not only my own face, but the faces of my friends and my family. I do not appreciate that being used to train AI without my consent, and I’m pretty sure it’s the same for others too.

Yes, we do have the right to make demands on public behavior. Of course we do. Have you never heard of laws and etiquette? I’m not allowed to grocery shop naked. You can’t rummage through my purse. I can’t have a work meeting in the middle of a movie theatre.

I remember when it was taboo simply to answer your cell phone in public. The person answering would apologize and try to go to a more private area. Then public calls were normalized. Then putting people on speaker. Then listening to music without headphones. Do you know how many times I have hiked up a mountain or driven to the beach, only to be met with someone blaring shitty top 40 music from their portable speaker, because Heaven forbid you go one hour without noise?

It was obnoxious when it was youtube.

It was obnoxious when it was music.

It was obnoxious when it was the radio. 

It was obnoxious when it was dudes wanting to talk to you instead of letting you just read your freaking book.

Do you want to be this guy? Because being obnoxious in shared spaces is how you become this guy.