Vorpalgirl

Hello, fam! This is your reminder that if you’ve been waiting to get your hands on the internationally bestselling Weird and Wonderful Holiday Romance Anthology now is your final chance to get the collection as a whole. 

We are available digitally on Amazon, Apple/iTunes, Nook, Kobo, and Mondadori as well as in print through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indie Bound, and The Book Depository. 

Availability will end on May 28th, 2020, so if you want to get your hands on 633 digital pages of varying degrees of fluffy romance and steamy smut for the very, very reasonable price of $4.99 eBook and $17.99 paperback, now’s the time!

As well as featuring 18 unique stories from 18 different authors, the book also includes a list of trigger warnings at the start of each story, as well as a comprehensively laid out heat rating so you can best determine which stories are right for you. Because sharing information is caring, and we want you to enjoy our work.

[ID: an image of the inside of the book depicting the heat rating system implemented by the book to indicate explicit content, ranging from 0-5, with 0 indicating no sex and no graphic content including swearing or violence, and 5 being Extreme Heat, which denotes explicit sex, heavy kinks and graphic depictions of violence and language. No stories in this anthology are rated at level 5. The highest rating is a 4, which is High Heat, and features explicit sex and mild kink, some graphic depictions of violence, and the use of expletive language. I’ll give you one guess as to what I’m classed at :P]

And on behalf of all of us, allow me to just say a huge THANK YOU to all the readers and fans who rallied behind the anthology and got it to the bestselling status not only once but twice! Most of the authors involved came from fanfiction backgrounds, and it means a lot to see our words out there competing among the more lauded traditionalist works. 

And to say thank you, and as one last final hurrah, I’m signing and giving away 10 copies of the soon-to-be rare paperback edition of the anthology which is, as I’ve previously pointed out, an absolute UNIT.

[ID: an image of the anthology on its side, showing how thicc the paperback is. The anthology is surrounded by glitter lights and dancing skeletons because this is my (Joy Demorra) office so of course, it is.]

All you have to do to enter is like and reblog this post, stating a wish to be entered in the giveaway. (Please do this in the main body of your reblog, I can’t see it in the tags) 

You don’t have to be a follower, but I’d really appreciate if you were <3 No giveaway or redistribution blogs, please.

Due to the cost of shipping the giveaway is limited to The United States and Canada, but if you are elsewhere in the world and are willing to pay the cost of shipping, I’ll be more than happy to arrange that!

Thank you again, fam, you’ve made the last 6 months truly fantastic for all of us.

Post reads as follows

I performed an emergency surgery several months ago to treat a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. The patient could have died, but we were able to stabilize her and send her home the same day.

She called my office this week in tears asking why we did not reimplant her pregnancy in her uterus, why did we not offer her this option. Because maybe her baby didn’t have to die.

Pseudoscience is invading my operating room and my relationship with my patients. This poor woman had to have emergency surgery, and then grieved the loss of a pregnancy that was never viable, that could have killed her.

And now she is grieving it again because politicians who lack even the most basic understanding of the physiology of pregnancy are dangling untruths in front of her and calling it fact.

In case anyone reading this is wondering, THIS IS NOT A THING. It is NOT POSSIBLE to reimplant ectopic pregnancies into the uterus. These are NOT viable pregnancies, and all the wishing in the world, the magical thinking, the political grandstanding, will not make it so.

This is the reproductive system in question.

Interesting, right? I’ve been told it looks like a shark.

In viable pregnancies, a fertilized egg (known as a zygote in biology) implants in the wall of the uterus.

As the pregnancy progresses, the zygote grows. Cells undergo mitosis (where the cells replicate) and differentiation (where the cells take on special jobs and become organ systems). At full term, the zygote resembles a baby we know.

The placenta delivers nutrients to the fetus and helps detoxify wastes. From the placenta comes the umbilical cord, which serves a similar purpose. The fetus’ head presses against the cervix, through which it will pass during birth. The part in the circle are the pregnant person’s internal organs! The uterus smooshes them to make room. It’s no wonder they use the restroom so often!

In an ectopic pregnancy, however, the zygote doesn’t implant correctly.

It can implant in a variety of places (including the fallopian tube, pictured) to which it is not suited.

After it implants, it continues to undergo mitosis (which we talked about earlier). Whereas the uterus is equipped to deal with this exponential growth, other parts of the body are not.

As the zygote grows, it puts immense strain on the organ it implanted in. If it continues to grow too long, it can rupture! The zygote will lose blood supply and will quickly die. The pregnant person will begin to bleed internally without proper medical care. Left alone, it can lead to death of the pregnant person.

This diagram is a little complex, but put very simply, because the zygote hasn’t implanted in the right place originally, it cannot be removed and implanted in the correct one. It won’t be able to fuse correctly with the uterus, or to send signals to develop the umbilical cord and placenta we talked about earlier, not to mention that the rupture causes blood to be diverted from the zygote, effectively killing it before it can be implanted.

Not only is it futile, but it’s unsafe for the pregnant person. Ectopic pregnancies cause blood loss, which is exacerbated by further surgical intervention. Exposure to external environments exposes the zygote to infection, and surgical implantation exposes the pregnant person to infection, which could also lead to pregnancy complication or loss.

oh! it’s “nictitating”. No wonder I was a little off, that’s so awkward-looking. tbh maybe it’s just me and my ADHD, but my mind wants to skip over the word  or smush it (something about the length? the awkward pronunciation? the sheer number of vaguely similar letters such as t’s and i’s and n’s??? idk, all of the above prolly) But yeah tldr @glumshoe​  I know what those are! I know they are a thing, and would definitely recognize it by the description. IMO, I think anybody who can picture them could get it from that, but that’s just an assumption on my part.

In other words, it “seems” to at least some historians like we had them for a quite a while before him, we just didn’t have a specific singular noun for the style of food in English, until the Earl of Sandwich came along. In fact, the same article notes that the same or very similar concept was found in numerous cultures around the world: The ancient Jewish sage Hillel the Elder is said to have wrapped meat from the Paschal lamb and bitter herbs in a soft matzah—flat, unleavened bread—during Passover in the manner of a modern wrap made with flatbread.[9] 

I’d also like to point out this, which might go a long way to explaining why it FEELS like we “didn’t invent” the sandwich as we know it, until recent centuries...namely that the format the Earl of Sandwich used (two slices of thicker, leavened bread, with food stuff between it) works a lot better with the kind of bread Europeans eventually took to favoring, while a lot of the world prefers or preferred unleavened flatbread which is WAY easier to use in a similar manner:

Flat breads of only slightly varying kinds have long been used to scoop or wrap small amounts of food en route from platter to mouth throughout Western Asia and northern Africa. From Morocco to Ethiopia to India, bread is baked in flat rounds, contrasting with the European loaf tradition.

(So basically, wraps have always existed probably, since we invented bread lol)

Additionally, the article mentions at some times and places in European history, they literally straight up used stale or low-quality bread slices as an edible plate (apparently called a “trencher”?), which is pretty much an open-faced sandwich if you ask me? And there’s also this assertion: The immediate culinary precursor with a direct connection to the English sandwich was to be found in the Netherlands of the seventeenth century, where the naturalist John Ray observed[11][12] that in the taverns beef hung from the rafters "which they cut into thin slices and eat with bread and butter laying the slices upon the butter"—explanatory specifications that reveal the Dutch belegde broodje, open-faced sandwich, was as yet unfamiliar in England.

Genuinely. I learn the baristas’ names (they’ve all got name tags, it’s not hard), smile, if there’s no queue and they’re not super busy I’ll ask about how they’re doing, compliment the coffees (”Yeeeeah Eliza makes awesome lattes!”), and the only complaint I’ve ever made was: “Hey, er, there’s no caramel syrup in this.” “Oh! I’ll make you a new one.” “Can you just put the syrup in the top?” “That’s not how we make it. It’ll taste different.” “Babe it’s coffee I don’t care.”

If the person on the bar doesn’t have a line of drinks to make, mine starts getting made the second I walk in. If there’s a queue because there’s one person at the counter who hasn’t decided what they want, I get handed my coffee before I even ask for it. They’ve purposefully gone through the cups to get me a ‘winner’. They’ve given me a month’s worth of ‘free coffee’ vouchers, meant for their 100th customer of the year but the 8 people in before me weren’t polite. There was even one specific barista who charged me for small lattes, whilst making me large caramel lattes because she was proving her point that their chain were nicer than a competing chain.

It’s completely by accident; there was, about seventy years ago, a older lady who would sit outside the bookshop and knit while she watched the people go by.  

For a week, Crowley watched the woman, and then finally, he had to know.  He sat down on the bench beside her, offered her one of the pastries he’d brought for breakfast, and asked the question.  “What are you doing?”

The old woman had carefully put the knitting away, took one of the jelly pastries, and answered.  “I’m dyig, my dear.”

Crowley had been stunned.  “Dying like...”

“Dying like, I’m sixty years old and I have cancer that they can’t treat.  So I come out here to this lovely shop, I watch the people who are alive, and I knit for my granddaughter.  She’s just about to turn one, and I won’t live to see her turn two.  So I knit their stories for her.”  After finishing the pastry, she pulled out the blanket that she was working.  “The pink square, there was a skinny young thing that come through, and her jacket was just that shade of pink.  It made me think of something my granddaughter might wear, so it got this square.”  She continued on, pointing to each square and giving the reason behind it.  

The next day, Crowley brought the woman a bright red yarn.  

“Oh, dear, that would be perfect for your hair!”  

The day after, Crowley brought her tan.  

“Do you know, this is exactly the color of the jacket that the shop owner wears.”  Then, “This bench wasn’t always here, did you know that?  I came by one day, and I looked for a place near by, but there wasn’t anything.  I came the next day, and here it was.”

“Miraculous, really.”  

The third day, the woman had a spare pair of needles, and shoved them into Crowley’s hands.  “Here, start a blanket of your own.  If you’re going to sit here and listen to me, least you can do is knit my stories into your own blanket.”

“I don’t know how,” Crowley admitted, but he held the needles like he saw her holding them.  

“Just you watch me, dearie, you’ll get the hang of it.”  

Crowley did.  By the next week, he was well into his blanket, always kept in her bag, of course.

The third week, the lady wasn’t on the bench, although Crowley waited all day.  She wasn’t there the next day, or the next.  A week went by, and Crowley knew she had died.  Only then did it dawn on him that he didn’t even know her name.  

A day later, the bell over Aziraphale’s door jangled, and he heard, “Mr. Crowley?”

“Yeah, that’s me?”

There was a young man, suit and tie, slick and carrying a lumpy brown package.  “Do you have some identification?”

Lawyer.  Crowley dug his wallet out and showed his identification, and then waited while a pile of papers were brought out.  “What’s this, then?”

“There was a codicil to the will of Mrs. Colleen Leyton.  She asked that after her death, this package be delivered to Mr. Anthony Crowley, care of A. Z. Fell & Co. bookshop,” he explained.  After collecting the required signatures, he passed over the lumpy package.  “I’m sorry for your loss, sir.”  

Crowley nodded and took the package into the back room of the shop.  Sitting on his favorite couch, he opened the package.  

His unfinished blanket sat in the wrapper, along with skeins of unused yarn, a photo album, and a thick envelope.  

He opened the envelope, and read the letter.  Dear Anthony, I know that you are not going to accept this, but I don’t truly mind.  You asked me once why I didn’t fight, why I didn’t keep going.  This photo album will answer that.  My husband is gone, my children are either passed away or simply don’t care to come home.  My granddaughter will lilkely never get the blanket that I made her, and that’s all right, too.

You finish yours, young man.  And then you make another.  And another.  For as long as you’re alive, you knit your stories.  That nice shop owner, Mr. Fell, he told me your name.  I hope you don’t mind.  But he thought you wouldn’t think to tell me, and you didn’t.  It’s funny, but I never thought to ask.  You were my friend, Anthony, when I didn’t have any others.  

Knit that into a square.  And then knit one for your friend Mr. Fell.

I’ll see you again someday.

Colleen

Crowley has never opened the photo album.  

But Priscilla Leyton, on her second birthday, received a package from London with a beautiful hand-knit blanket from her grandmother.

And when Crowley gets frustrated, angry, or upset?

mu

SO IT IS KNOWN: THE STRING, “DESCRIPTION”, SHALL APPEAR.

AND THUS: MY “DESCRIPTION” IS NOW “DESCRIPTION”.

Unless the individual being written about is already a celebrity, using their name in the title of the article actually discourages people from reading it. There’s all sorts of psychology to that, but when people see a name they don’t recognize, they tend to assume it’s a media figure they don’t care about, the article is targeted to a niche audience they’re not a part of, or they may even get a jolt of shame from not being “with it” enough to recognize what must be a household name.

I see a lot of screencaps of headlines like “Michigan Girl Scout discovers new way to track butterfly migrations” circulated around with criticism that Maggie McFictional’s contributions are being erased simply because her name isn’t in the headline. The vast majority of the time, her name is listed in the first paragraph, sometimes along with quotes and even a photograph. If she is properly credited (and maintaining privacy/avoiding the spotlight isn’t a concern), this isn’t a problem. Circulating headlines and never reading the articles is the problem.

This also isn’t what the hashtag #SayHerName was created for. Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, and Eric Garner are household names as victims of police violence—they have been talked about often enough that even people who do not purposefully keep up with institutionalized antiblack violence are familiar with their names and stories. But police brutality without accountability against black women rarely if ever enters mainstream consciousness, and their stories do not become “elevated as exemplars of the systematic police brutality that is currently the focal point of mass protest and police reform efforts”. The linked document is where #SayHerName originated, and highlights the purpose of the moment to raise awareness about these killings and violence that mainstream media has passed over and which have failed to garner national attention and spark outrage or demands for justice.