My Little Scribbles

Sarah is allergic to strawberries. As soon as she puts them in her mouth, her face swells up and she gets hives. It’s non-life-threatening but uncomfortable for her.  

Sally is also allergic to strawberries, and has the same symptoms. 

Sarah informs her friends she is allergic to strawberries so they can stop using them in shared food. Some of them even stop eating strawberries too (or, at least, stop eating them around her), so she is more comfortable. Sarah researches places she can eat out that will take care with her allergy, and chooses restaurants who agree they can accommodate her, or who do not use strawberries in any of their cooking. 

Sally, on the other hand, goes into restaurants specifically advertising only strawberry desserts, orders a dessert, and makes a huge fuss when she gets sick. She takes to social media, the local newspapers, everywhere, to tell people how terrible this restaurant is for not specifically accommodating her personal allergy. She goes back frequently to insult and harass specific staff. Some staff have even quit because of her. Sally says it is her personal right to have her allergy accommodated in every single place she feels like eating! She posts pictures of herself all swollen and ill everywhere and blames the restaurant and the staff for her discomfort. 

Be like Sarah, not like Sally. 

Ha, that’d be a good one!

No, my little Furby brethren (RIP) are up there but not quite.

My most recent one is probably my favourite 🙂‍↔️

Tips for Writing Rich Kids / Nepo Babies!!

(Characters who say “we’re not that rich” while standing in a kitchen with two islands)

⊹ Rich characters are not all the same kind of rich. There’s old money, new money, fake-rich, influencer-rich, political-family rich, celebrity-child rich, “my dad owns half the town” rich, “my family has buildings named after them” rich, and “we are in debt but the house still has a gate” rich. The type matters. Old money is often quieter, colder, more coded. New money may be louder, shinier, more defensive. A trust fund kid and a child of a famous actor are both privileged, but the pressure around them is very different.

⊹ They don’t always know what things cost, and that can be funny or ugly. A rich character might casually suggest ordering food when everyone else is counting money. They might think a “cheap trip” means only one hotel room per person. They might say “just get a new one” about something another character saved months to buy. Don’t make them cartoon evil every time. Sometimes they’re not cruel, just completely untrained in normal consequences.

⊹ Privilege can look like confidence, but it can also look like cluelessness. Some rich kids walk into rooms like every door has already decided to open for them. They email professors casually. They talk to adults like equals. They negotiate without sweating. They assume problems can be solved because, historically, their problems have been solved. That doesn’t mean they’re brave. Sometimes it means they have never had to imagine the floor disappearing. NEVER!

⊹ A rich kid may have everything and still feel like their life was already assigned before they arrived. The right school, the right friends, the right internship, the right partner, the right public image. They may not be allowed to fail privately because every mistake becomes embarrassing for the family. Poor characters often fight for access. Rich characters often fight for selfhood. Different cage, but still a cage.

⋆˙⟡ Write the staff situation carefully. I mean IF there are housekeepers, drivers, nannies, assistants, guards, cooks, gardeners, tutors, PLEASE REMEMBER those people ARE NOT FURNITURE! They know everything. They see the family without performance. A rich child might be closer to the nanny than the parent. A driver might know every secret because rich people forget workers can hear. That dynamic can be warm, exploitative, complicated, loyal, resentful, or all of it at once.

⊹ A nepo baby may be talented and still protected. This is the annoying part, but it’s true. The character might actually be good at acting, music, business, politics, whatever. The point is not “they have no talent.” The point is they got more chances to prove it. More safety when they failed. Better teachers. Better rooms. Better introductions. A more interesting nepo baby knows they are good and still wonders how much of their success belongs to them.

⊹ They may be weirdly lonely. Money can buy privacy, but it can also create distance. People may want access, status, favors, invitations, jobs, proximity. A rich character might never know whether someone likes them or likes the life around them. Their birthday party is full, but somehow nobody knows they hate being alone after everyone leaves.

⊹ Their “normal” is not normal, and you can use that. Maybe they grew up with security cameras, charity galas, boarding school, ski trips, private doctors, family lawyers, summer houses, tutors, and adults who called them “sir” when they were twelve. They may be totally calm in luxury but panic in ordinary situations. They can handle a formal dinner with ambassadors but not a laundromat. That contrast is PURE GOLD!

⊹ Class guilt is not the same as class awareness!! A rich character can feel guilty and still benefit from everything. They can say “I hate rich people” while living off rich people money. They can donate, volunteer, dress down, date someone broke, reject the family business, and still not fully understand what it means to have no safety net. Mens: guilt can be sincere and useless at the same time.

⊹ Their friendships can be transactional without anyone saying it. Who gets invited to the lake house? Who gets introduced to the producer? Who gets their internship through whose father? Who disappears when the family loses money?

⊹ Give them specific habits, not just designer names. They know which fork to use. They pack like hotels will have everything. They don’t check prices on menus. They know how to speak to lawyers. They call adults by first names because they grew up around powerful people. They own luggage that looks more emotionally stable than most characters. Specific behavior sells the class background better than writing “Gucci” every five seconds.

⊹ Let them be funny without making them dumb (Please.) Rich characters can be unintentionally hilarious because their survival skills are so uneven. They might know five languages and not know how to unclog a sink. They might discuss inheritance law calmly but be defeated by public transport. They might say something insane like “we only had the small yacht that summer” and genuinely not hear it. Comedy works best when they are smart in one world and helpless in another.

⊹ Losing money should feel like identity collapse. If the family fortune disappears, it is not just “now they are poor.” It’s shame, secrecy, social exile, changed friendships, sold houses, unpaid staff, parents panicking, old friends pretending not to notice, and the character realizing how much of their personality was built on always having a backup plan.

Also, more often than you might think, they’re not actually promoting bigotry so much as “didn’t consider all the implications of something” or just used words that were polite then but considered offensive now.

Take a moment and ask yourself, a project like this requires a lot of time, money and dedication of resources, why would scientists dedicate that time to something that could just be done by a tree?

The answer is they wouldn't. So that means this claim requires further investigation!

This project is called LIQUID 3, and it's not meant for cities with wide open spaces, it's meant for cities like Belgrade in Serbia. These cities are densely populated and heavily polluted, to the point where pollution actually chokes out current trees and makes creating green spaces difficult.

Liquid 3 was a PhD scientists answer to these problems. The microalgae tank is intended for spaces where you either:

Don't have enough space to plant full trees, or

Don't have enough time to plant trees and wait for them to grow up.

The tank is extremely efficient when you consider the amount of space needed compared to the amount of CO2 turned into oxygen. The tank can operate throughout the winter. And most importantly, it can be quickly set up in areas that desperately need relief from air pollution NOW not in 10 years when trees are done growing. Children currently suffocating on polluted air can't wait for trees to grow, they need to be taken care of now, and Liquid 3 is one of the ways to take care of them. Depending on the species of microalgea used, a number have shown a pretty amazing capacity to pull heavy metals out of the air which is something trees can get choked up by.

The tanks aren't just tanks either! Liquid 3 have solar panels placed on top, they have lighting and mobile phone charging, and they work as public benches. The designers of it want to encourage green spaces where there's room, but where there isn't room or time, Liquid 3 can step in. Realistically, this isn't a replacement for trees. It's replacing boring metal city benches with new, cooler benches that also clean the air (and have at least some heating during the winter).

Not only that, but the microalgea that grows is native to Serbia and all that microalgea has a ton of great uses! It makes for great fertilizer, compost, wastewater treatment, cleaner biofuels and even for helping create new tanks for further air purification. They only require a quick algae divide once a month, and the produced algae can be carted off to where ever it's needed. This makes them effective solutions for areas that can't sustain complex installations.

Trees or nothing is not a solution to the fact thee are lots of places trees can’t go - if you read it here are places that are so polluted the trees can’t thrive - this starts fixing that.

Knee jerk shortsighted reactions are why projects that are actually trying to help fix things especially in places where people are living in sucky environments (and ‘just plant a tree’ isn’t an option) don’t get funding and we get nowhere. If it’s trees or nothing then those places get nothing.

⟢ "I don't like you. I want to be very clear about that before I say the next part."

⟢ "Stop being kind to me. I had a whole system and you're ruining it."

⟢ "I've spent two years perfecting how much I can't stand you. Don't make me start over."

⟢ "You were easier to hate before I knew you."

⟢ "I'm not doing this because I like you. I'm doing this because you'd die without me and that would be inconvenient."

⟢ "Don't read into this. I'd do it for anyone."

⟢ "You looked cold. That's the only reason. Don't make it weird."

⟢ "I hate that you make me laugh. I genuinely hate it."

⟢ "I've been waiting for you to do something awful again so I can go back to hating you properly. You keep not doing it."

⟢ "We're not friends. Whatever this is, it's not that."

⟢ "I noticed you weren't there. I wasn't looking for you. I just noticed."

⟢ "Stop smiling at me like that. You know exactly what you're doing."

⟢ "I trusted you on accident. I'd like it back please."

⟢ "This doesn't mean anything. Tonight doesn't mean anything. Say it back."

⟢ "I came back for the mission. Not for you. Absolutely not for you."

⟢ "You're infuriating and you're the most interesting person I've ever met and I resent both of those things."

⟢ "I've kissed people I like less. That's all I'm saying."

⟢ "Don't die. I'm serious. I will be so angry at you if you die."

⟢ "You're not what I thought you were. I haven't figured out if that's better or worse yet."

⟢ "I don't forgive you. But I think I'm getting there and I hate that most of all."

⟢ "We can be civil. We can be civil and nothing else and that's fine. That's completely fine."

⟢ "I think about arguing with you when I can't sleep. It's very effective. Don't ask why."

⟢ "You make it very hard to despise you and I wish you'd stop."

⟢ "I've been awful to you and you keep showing up anyway. What's wrong with you."

Look at me, writing fluff 🙂‍↔️ thanks for the ask!

🖊️ 🦑

The city moved softly around them. Rain had passed not long before dinner, leaving the pavement dark and glossy beneath the lamps. London looked kinder like this, blurred gold and silver, its sharpness hidden for the night.

“You were very handsome tonight,” Penelope hummed, .

Gordon looked down at her, delighted.

“Was I?”

“Fishing is unattractive.”

“I’m an aquanaut. Fishing is career-adjacent.”

you would receive the supply once a month

the brand/type will vary so you could

This had to happen just after I mostly gave up caffeine? 😭

Barbossa is the most exasperated character in any scene he's in, unless he's winning. then he's the smuggest son of a bitch on screen (he literally returns from the dead smugly eating an apple). but majority of the time, he's 'why am I the only adult here'. man rolls his eyes so much I half-expected him to turn straight to the camera.

when Will asks Elizabeth to marry him while they are fighting Davy Jones' crew, stuck in a maelstrom, and trapped in the final battle, the first word out of her mouth is "Barbossa!". she then continues by asking Barbossa to marry them, but for a split second Will's face goes like 'Barbossa? Barbossa?? I didn't even know he was on the map of this convoluted love quadrangle!'

when they're in Singapore and Sao Feng threatens the spy he found and Will, Elizabeth, and Barbossa all look at each other to confirm that none of them have snuck in a spy they forgot to tell the others about, before shrugging and telling Sao Feng to go ahead and kill him.

Barbossa's eyes just getting wide and wider the more weapons Elizabeth pulls out of her clothes. c'mon man, let a woman have her toys!

rewatching really gives you the full picture of how many people are scheming at any given time and how each person's schemes intersect with the others, even if they're nominally on the same side. everyone also gets So Upset when their scheme is foiled, accidentally or intentionally, by someone else's scheme, as though they themselves aren't scheming at that very moment.

Barbossa's iron balls. I'm sorry, this is the funniest dick joke in the trilogy that defines how many dick jokes Disney can stick in a movie before it stops being PG-13. Jack's reaction really says it all.

When we meet him in Curse, he has everything he ever wanted: wealth, command of his own ship, and immortality. And all it cost him was the things that make life worth living - the ability to savour the simple pleasures, food, touch, and the ability to relate to other people, symbolised by the apples.

How many of us sacrifice time with our families and friends to the workplace so we can afford that new car, latest phone, bigger house?

When Barbossa re-enters the story, recently raised from the dead, and eating his apple, it shows that he is fully engaging in life, liberated from his desire for worldly riches.

Person B: "Huh. We? Us? You and me? Who let that happen."

Person A: "Well it's either us or Person C."