The wit and wisdom of it

“Fine, fine,” I grumble. “I have a few options for payment: I could give you paper money, cheap gaudy jewelry, chocolate coins, spiders, some pretty seashells-”

“Spiders????” he repeats, baffled.

“Spiders it is, then,” I agree equitably, and with a wave of my hand the bed I’ve been sleeping in for the last week turns into a writhing mass of various spiders.

Worth it.

—

“Stop right there! You’re under arrest for fraud, destruction of property, and-!”

I yawn. “Didn’t ask, don’t care.” A few gestures, and the guards’ swords are all transmuted into spiders, and then they’re too busy to worry about little ol’ me.

—

“You have insulted my honor and humiliated me in front of my children! I demand satisfaction! I demand a wizard’s duel!”

Shrugging, I say, “Sure, okay, whatever. Right here and now okay?”

The pompous wizard-noble blinks. “I- you don’t want to prepare? Get your wizard’s staff or anything?”

“Nah, I’m pretty good with somatic gestures.”

“Well, if you’re sure… here and now then! Have at you!” He slams his staff down on the ground dramatically, a small shockwave of fire radiating out from the impact.

So of course, I turn his staff into spiders.

“AHHHH WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK”

“So if you’re too busy screaming to cast spells, does that mean I win?”

“AUGH ONE OF THEM BIT ME”

“I’m taking that as a yes.”

—

After that, they start coming at me in waves, with cheap wands and staves and swords and bows bought in bulk, hoping to exhaust my magical reserves so they can get close enough to put a magic inhibitor on me.

They did not expect my reserves to be as vast as they were, not did they expect me to be able to transmute the inhibitors themselves into spiders.

“Didn’t you take Magic Basics in wizard college?” I yell at the panicking mages. “Inhibitors aren’t immune to magic until the moment they activate! Serious weak point in the design, tell your magitechnicians to fix that!”

—

So of course they try assassins next.

Poison fails, because I transmute any food and drink I get into spiders and then transmute them back. Pretty easy way to get rid of poison.

So then they try knives in dark alleys. The knives bruise through my full-body spider-silk outfit, but do not penetrate, and they only get one shot before they have bigger problems.

Next is killing me in my sleep. None live to report back that the human-shaped lump under the blankets is actually a mass of highly venomous spiders.

The kingdom throws everything it has at me, and I continue to walk away, heralded by the chittering of spiders and the screams of everyone else.

—

Finally, I stand before the king himself in his overly opulent throne room, and by now he is a broken shell of a man in the face of my unorthodox tactics.

Good.

“What do you want?” he practically sobs. “You’ve singlehandedly redirected the entire crown’s budget for the next three years into replacing every weapon you’ve turned into spiders. Much more and we’ll be invaded by our neighbors! We wouldn’t be able to resist being annexed! So what can I give you to make you stop doing this?!”

I pause and pretend to consider, tapping a finger against my chin thoughtfully. “You know, you sent my brother off to war a few years back. That conflict with the Yughs up north, I believe. He didn’t want to go, so your guards forced him at spearpoint. I haven’t seen him since.”

He seizes on that, as I expected. “Yes, yes, I’ll have him returned right away! Tell me his name and I’ll honorably release him from duty and have him escorted safely home!”

“Oh?” I raise one sardonic eyebrow. “Are you able to bring back the dead now, oh wise and glorious king?”

He pales, and it’s the most satisfying thing I’ve seen in years.

“You have nothing I want,” I growl, letting the anger slip through for the first time in years. “You cannot bring him back, you cannot make up for my loss with all the riches in your kingdom. The only thing I want is to take everything from you, the way you did to me. Your kingdom will bleed out of resources, one of the neighboring countries you’ve been trying to conquer for decades now will take advantage and annex this place, and you will either be executed or forced to work for a living for the first time in your life.”

I glare at him, and he refuses to meet my eyes. “You will lose everything you ever cared about in your life. One spider at a time.”

I transmute his throne and crown into spiders (non-deadly; he doesn’t get to escape my wrath that easily), then turn and walk away, ignoring his screams and sobs.

—

And that’s why, when the Yughs finally annexed the kingdom I grew up in, they preemptively made Transarachnomancy a forbidden magical art. Not sure how they intend to enforce that, mind, but I’m not looking to challenge that. I’ve gotten what I wanted; if some other aspiring mage wants to try and follow in my footsteps, that’s not my problem.

Besides, in terms of magical skill, I’ve always been an outlier anyway. Most mages would be lucky to turn just one knife into a spider at a time; I can turn ten thousand with a few gestures. I doubt anyone will outdo my legacy.

“No. I look in on him every fifteen minutes or tho. It can be like that. Sometimeth the body just says: thleep.”

“I heard he hardly ever sleeps,” said William.

“Maybe he’s taking the opportunity,” said Igor, gently closing the door.”

-live comment from Ele Reading The Truth / haven’t finished the book yet-

He’s taking a nap!! I can’t believe that, he’s taking a -ing nap! Like: oh, what an amazing opportunity to rest for a while, let’s have the folks sorting out everything alone, I’m in vacation. Bye motherfuckers! (Or similar, since he’s always so polite and well educated)

Vimes will be mad when he found out that! “I was worried as sick and you was taking a nap?!”

Vetinari: “I was tired”

One gently squeezes my hand between both of his palms as he says “squish.” I reciprocate. When he looks like he’s feeling sad or lost, I ask if I can squish him, and he will show me where I can squish him. Sometimes it’s almost like a hug, but most of the time, it’s just a hand or an arm I press between my palms. Then he squishes my hand in return, says “squish,” and moves on. He will come ask for squishes now, when he recognizes that he needs them.

Another boy smiles and sticks his chin out at me, and if he’s really excited, he’ll lean his whole body toward me. The first time he finally won a game at circle time, he got so excited he even ran over and bumped chins with me. He now does it when he sees me outside of school too. I stick out my chin to acknowledge him, and he grins and runs over and I lean down for a chin bump.

Yet another child swings my hand really fast. At a time when another child would be seeking a hug, she stands beside me and holds my hand, and swings it back and forth, with a smile if I’m lucky. The look on her face when I initiate the hand swinging is priceless.

Another one bumps his hip against mine when he walks by in the hallway or on the playground, or when he gets up after I’m done working with him. No eye contact, no words, but he goes out of his way to “crash” into me, and I tell him that it’s good to see him. He now loves to crash into me when I’m least expecting it. He doesn’t want anything, really. Just a bump to say “Hi, I appreciate you’re here.” And when he’s upset and we have to take a break, I’ll bump him, ask if he needs to take a walk, and we just go wander for a bit and discuss whatever’s wrong, and he’s practically glued to my side. Then one more bump before we go back into the room to face the problem.

I verbally express affection. A LOT.

My husband… doesn’t. I don’t know why. For the longest time part of me wondered if it meant he loved me less.

At some point I told him about a thing I had done as a kid. Holding hands, three squeezes means ‘I Love You’.

Suddenly he’s telling me I Love You all the time.

Holding my hand, obviously, but also randomly.

taptaptap

on my hand, my shoulder, my butt, my knee, whatever body part is closest to him, with whatever part of him is closest to me

All the time.

More often than I ever verbally said it.

It’s an ingrained signal now, I can tap three times on whatever part of him, and get three taps back in his sleep. Apparently I do the same.

It’s made a huge difference for us.

“If Missouri lawmakers had their way, young people wouldn’t learn anything“

No one is showing kindergarteners pornography.  Knowing that penguins adopt chicks to raise (And Tango Makes Three) for example is very much age appropriate.  Banning it because Republican like to lie about things is both wrong and contrary to the 1St Amendment and basic freedoms. 

Similarly banning children from good touch bad touch lessons on concent doesn’t protect them, it just makes them vulnerable to predation.

A kid knowing that a classmate has same sex parents isn’t hurting that child.  Again, equating that with pornography is nonsense.  Letting a child know that they are okay and other people like them exist is good for them, not harming them.

You don’t have to dodge by a foot. You only have to dodge by an inch.

Not all swords are made the same way. You wouldn’t fight with a katana the same way you would fight with a broadsword.

You don’t need to aim for the heart or the head. Get the vein in wrist, and you could incapacitate that hand.

Small cuts matter. If you’re cut up enough, you’re going to start suffering from blood loss, and that’ll put you at a disadvantage.

The blade isn’t the only thing that matters. There isn’t some set of rules in sword fighting where you can only stick the stabby end into the other person. Hit them in the head with the hilt, and they’ll feel it.

by a foot. You only have

to dodge by an inch.

But also, regarding the not-just-the-stabby-end advice: significant sections of the numerous medieval-and-newer swordfighting manuals now available in translation are devoted to the art of clobbering or otherwise messing up people with the hilt of your sword in numerous inventive ways. Many of these are potentially quite lethal, and mean you won’t have to waste time cleaning your blade.

…Additionally, while thinking in this mode, feeling the need to mention a favorite move of my iaido master, back in the day: the one where you spear your (seated-across-from-you) opponent in the gut with the hilt of your katana as you’re drawing it… then finish the draw and chop your opponent’s head off. The move is called “Mutiny” (don’t ask me what it would’ve been in Japanese; if he ever told us, I can’t remember). But I can’t tell you how many times Shihan made us practice that damn move. There was just something about it that appealed to him.

Anyway, generally speaking: if you’re going to write swordfights, you may not have the time, inclination or money to study the sword yourself, but you can at least read the fecking manuals. They’re easily found. Here’s a link to one of the best-known ones, circa 1459.* These will break you quickly of any idea that medieval-period swordfighting was some kind of inelegant boring bash-clash-bash-clash operation.

…Oh, and re the recommendation about not going for the heart or the head: This is definitely on the money. If I was in a swordfight and was in a rush to get it over with, the femoral artery would be my choice. Wait for your opponent to expose it (or get them to, usually by you stepping back out of range so they have to step forward, exposing any opportunities offered by their leg armor while it’s flexing). When they do, chop deep on the inside of the leg above the knee. Then get out of range again so your opponent doesn’t fall over on top of you. Two minutes or so for them to go profoundly shocky: then five to seven minutes for them to bleed out. But regardless of the timings, since you’ll likely have bisected one or more of their adductor muscles on that side, they definitely won’t be getting up to run after you…

Don’t forget speaking French, which I do with an accent good enough to get complimented by a Paris cabby - who then deflated me by saying, (DD can correct if I misremember): “…l'accent n'est rien sans les mots, et vous faut beaucoup plus de mots…”

“Accent’s nothing without words, and you need a lot more words…” It wasn’t cliché French rudeness, either (which we’ve never experienced, BTW). He meant it kindly, and DD can bear me out on that as well. :->

*****

As for what she describes as “Mutiny”, I’ve pinched it for my Alban books, where it’s called “the Adder’s Strike” and is another of those useful “If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead" moves - though if landed higher, for instance square against the throat, it can be lethal enough.

Of course like “Mutiny” it’s also the opener to a proper killing sequence: an opponent doubled over by that pommel-punch to the solar plexus is now in just the right position for the owner of the sword to take a quick sidestep while completing their draw, and then deliver a “Falcon’s Strike” (vertical downward cut) at the back of the offered neck…

Here’s Fairbairn’s chart instructing WW2 Commandos in what happens after an artery gets opened by one of the fighting daggers he was so fond of. Oddly enough the chart shows the femoral artery (those black lines down the thighs) but doesn’t list them…

And if anyone who’s learned bad habits from watching theatrical swordplay obliges by spinning around without a damn good reason, applying point or edge anywhere from the waist to the back of the knees will show them what a bad idea it can be. Cutting any of the muscles people need to stand up* will definitely reduce their combat effectiveness.

(* That includes the gluteus maximus, site of so many comedy injuries. In real life, a deep swordcut across the arse is as unfunny as an IRL smack in the face with a cast iron frying-pan.)

…Anyway, yeah, the characters in the Middle Kingdoms books are kind of unavoidably sword-savvy. In fact, one of the five primary characters taught himself swordsmithing for reasons that have nothing to do with actually fighting with the sword. (Or, for that matter, using it as a sword at all unless absolutely necessary.) And to teach him what he had to know, I had to learn it first.

Changing a character to the ‘opposite’ cis gender is a very different thing than making them trans or nonbinary. Insisting that people only change characters to trans is also really damn invalidating, because it implies that being trans is interchangable with being cis. Whoopsie doodle!

rule 63 was originally a guy thing, sexual objectification thing. it states ‘for every male character, there’s a female version of that character’, and not because the dudes who were into it cared about having more realistically rendered female heroes in their media. it was made popular on 4chan and porn boards and comics+gaming forums because you could reduce a manly male character into a sexy tits-and-ass pinup. there were related kinks of sissification, but mostly it was about getting to jerk it to a sexy female version of a previously unappealing, macho male character. 

then women got hold of the rule and started going, okay. let’s look at the female version of this male character. let’s talk about being a woman in a man’s world. let’s talk about rorschach’s misogyny, tony stark’s womanizing, batman’s grimness, the fact there’s one girl ninja to every four or five guy ninjas, let’s talk about that in the hypothetical context of these male heroes being women instead. if there’s a girl version for every male character, what does that mean? what’s her story? 

and it became this really amazing lens for female fans to interrogate stories through, to examine the effects of sexism and misogyny and masculinity, to introduce another woman into a story with very few, to identify with fully-rendered heroes of the fan’s own gender. and to interrogate the very nature of gender, which led into the development of genderbends where the character’s gender identity didn’t necessarily match their assigned sex, and from there an increasing interest in, and familiarity with, trans characters, trans people, and trans issues. 

Rule 63s can be transphobic and gender essentialist, no question, just as m/m slash can be misogynistic, but it’s not inherent to the genre.

No one springs into creation with a full grasp on how to tackle the complicated tangle that is personal identity and we need to stop taking away stepping stones and tools that people can use. It does not help anyone and in fact removes safe arenas of thought and expression.

Changing a character to the ‘opposite’ cis gender is a very different thing than making them trans or nonbinary. Insisting that people only change characters to trans is also really damn invalidating, because it implies that being trans is interchangable with being cis. Whoopsie doodle!

rule 63 was originally a guy thing, sexual objectification thing. it states ‘for every male character, there’s a female version of that character’, and not because the dudes who were into it cared about having more realistically rendered female heroes in their media. it was made popular on 4chan and porn boards and comics+gaming forums because you could reduce a manly male character into a sexy tits-and-ass pinup. there were related kinks of sissification, but mostly it was about getting to jerk it to a sexy female version of a previously unappealing, macho male character. 

then women got hold of the rule and started going, okay. let’s look at the female version of this male character. let’s talk about being a woman in a man’s world. let’s talk about rorschach’s misogyny, tony stark’s womanizing, batman’s grimness, the fact there’s one girl ninja to every four or five guy ninjas, let’s talk about that in the hypothetical context of these male heroes being women instead. if there’s a girl version for every male character, what does that mean? what’s her story? 

and it became this really amazing lens for female fans to interrogate stories through, to examine the effects of sexism and misogyny and masculinity, to introduce another woman into a story with very few, to identify with fully-rendered heroes of the fan’s own gender. and to interrogate the very nature of gender, which led into the development of genderbends where the character’s gender identity didn’t necessarily match their assigned sex, and from there an increasing interest in, and familiarity with, trans characters, trans people, and trans issues. 

Rule 63s can be transphobic and gender essentialist, no question, just as m/m slash can be misogynistic, but it’s not inherent to the genre.

No one springs into creation with a full grasp on how to tackle the complicated tangle that is personal identity and we need to stop taking away stepping stones and tools that people can use. It does not help anyone and in fact removes safe arenas of thought and expression.

So there’s a known thing in the study of human psychology/sociology/what-have-you where men are known to, on average, rely entirely on their female romantic partner for emotional support. Bonding with other men is done at a more superficial level involving fun group activities and conversations about general subjects but rarely involves actually leaning on other men or being really honest about emotional problems. Men use alcohol to be able to lower their inhibitions enough to expose themselves emotionally to other men, but if you can’t get emotional support unless you’re drunk, you have a problem.

So men need to have a woman in their lives to have anyone they can share their emotional needs and vulnerabilities with. However, since women are not socialized to fear sharing these things, women’s friendships with other women are heavily based on emotional support. If you can’t lean on her when you’re weak, she’s not your friend. To women, what friendship is is someone who listens to all your problems and keeps you company.

So this disconnect men are suffering from is that they think that only a person who is having sex with you will share their emotions and expect support. That’s what a romantic partner does. But women think that’s what a friend does. So women do it for their romantic partners and their friends and expect a male friend to do it for them the same as a female friend would. This fools the male friend into thinking there must be something romantic there when there is not.

This here is an example of patriarchy hurting everyone. Women have a much healthier approach to emotional support – they don’t die when widowed at nearly the rate that widowers die and they don’t suffer emotionally from divorce nearly as much even though they suffer much more financially, and this is because women don’t put all their emotional needs on one person. Women have a support network of other women. But men are trained to never share their emotions except with their wife or girlfriend, because that isn’t manly. So when she dies or leaves them, they have no one to turn to to help with the grief, causing higher rates of death, depression, alcoholism and general awfulness upon losing a romantic partner. 

So men suffer terribly from being trained in this way. But women suffer in that they can’t reach out to male friends for basic friendship. I am not sure any man can comprehend how heartbreaking it is to realize that a guy you thought was your friend was really just trying to get into your pants. Friendship is real. It’s emotional, it’s important to us. We lean on our friends. Knowing that your friend was secretly seething with resentment when you were opening up to him and sharing your problems because he felt like he shouldn’t have to do that kind of emotional work for anyone not having sex with him, and he felt used by you for that reason, is horrible. And the fact that men can’t share emotional needs with other men means that lots of men who can’t get a girlfriend end up turning into horrible misogynistic people who think the world owes them the love of a woman, like it’s a commodity… because no one will die without sex. Masturbation exists. But people will die or suffer deep emotional trauma from having no one they can lean on emotionally. And men who are suffering deep emotional trauma, and have been trained to channel their personal trauma into rage because they can’t share it, become mass shooters, or rapists, or simply horrible misogynists.

Last week Elon Musk broke European law so badly that the lawyers who will finally put the case to rest have yet to be born.

I'm not exaggerating. Here's the thing: America has terrible data privacy laws. A solid technique for an American website owner in times of financial hardship, such as accidentally buying a loss-leading debt-ridden social media platform to avoid going to gaol, is to take all the data harvested from users and to sell it to third parties for lots of money. It is fun and breezy and lets you pay off at least one lawyer for the month. What a lark.

However, the European Union has an even more fun and breezy law called GDPR.

And the thing is, the EU really, really care about GDPR. Like... they really care. This is not one of those grey area laws like jaywalking where it's basically ignored unless you do it in front of a police officer who is having a midlife crisis because his wife left him and the dishes are piling up and he's down to his third day of wearing the same pants and yesterday a man in the pub laughed at him for getting a football term wrong. This is the sort of law that, if you break it, grey men in grey suits with worryingly little humour will get in touch and unroll terrifyingly long scrolls of legal text and then you are in gaol for the rest of your life. This is a big law. The big one. Big boy law. Do not break.

So, if you're going to be a website owner in times of financial hardship who needs some quick money to cover your many billions of dollars of debt who decides to sell the private data you harvested from the user base, the most important thing you absolutely MUST remember is, you can only use the American data, and never the European.

But.

I mean.

Hypothetically.

If someone were to own an American website in times of financial hardship, such as an accidentally bought loss-leading debt-ridden social media platform to avoid going to gaol... but that someone didn't know the difference between American and European law.

Well then. That person would sell the wrong data.

And if that were to happen, on the scale of a global social media platform, with users ranging from the megalomaniacal Uber Rich to literal world governments...

The ensuing court cases would last for decades, as lawyers began the lawsuits at the richest end of the list, and worked their way down.

***