#Geographical Indications of Goods

[ujaglobaladvisory]

Geographical Indications (GIs) contribute significantly to intellectual property (IP) law and hold great importance for many countries. Typically, a GI includes the name of a specific place that defines the origin of certain goods.

The protection of GIs can be seen as joint exclusive rights granted to producers in a geographical area eligible for protection. These rights aim to safeguard their interests and help combat unfair competition. Additionally, GIs enhance the value of products and reduce the potential for “consumer deception.”

Evolution of Geographical Indications Laws In India

Before 1999, there was no law in India to protect Geographical Indications. Therefore, the Geographical Indications of Goods (Registration and Protection) Act, 1999 was enacted and came into effect on September 15, 2003. Several rules and amendments followed:

The Geographical Indications of Goods (Registration and Protection) Rules, 2002 The Geographical Indications of Goods (Registration and Protection) (Amendment) Rules, 2020

GI laws are very important for producers and consumers, and it is a law that provides protection to all products of GI. Also, as there is constant evolvement with the aspects of GI, there is a need to have even more rigid provisions under the legislation that can protect any infringement of a GI product. There are still some sellers that fraudulently sell imitated goods for profit.

To know more blog insights, check the link in bio- https://uja.in/blog/legal-chronicle/an-overview-of-geographical-indications-in-india/

Let us know what do you think about this?

[himbosandhardwear]

Steve is rifling through Eddie's collection of magazines, while he's waiting on Eddie and Wayne to get done fixing the dryer(Wayne's fixing, Eddie's getting in the way it sounds like), when he realizes how insane the assortment is; Heavy Metal, Car and Driver, Rolling Stone, National Geographic, OMNI, MAD, even a copy of Good Housekeeping. It's all so Eddie though, to have so many varying interests. He's a little jealous, if he's being honest with himself.

"You have a lot of stuff," he comments when Eddie comes back, closing the copy of Rolling Stone.

"Oh, yeah, sorry, let me just..." He starts kicking a pile of clothes under the bed.

Steve huffs a laugh. "No, I meant you have a lot of interests." He waves the magazine. "Hobbies and stuff."

Eddie nods, continues to shove piles of stuff under the bed anyway. "I guess, yeah. I tend to jump from thing to thing though. Last night it was painting miniatures, tonight it could be writing a song. I don't really get a say in which one. Oh, nice, I've been looking for this," he says, holding up a random T-shirt.

He watches Eddie get distracted by the new discovery and leave the rest of the pile where it's at, smiling to himself as Eddie goes on a tangent about merch vendors at concerts being the real enemy of the people.

"How do you know what you like?" Steve inadvertently blurts out during a gap in Eddie's tale.

He turns toward Steve. "What do you mean?"

What does he mean? "I guess... It's just, I like cars and sports and girls. That's, like, kind of it. And since I started being friends with Henderson and Robin and you I've figured out that's, like, the most basic shit a guy could be into. Level One Dude Interests. So, I guess I just want to know how you find other things? And how will I know if I'm interested?"

"Hmm." He frowns softly. "I've never had to think about it before. I kinda just...fall into things. I like it or I don't."

"Okay, but what's it feel like?"

Eddie puts the shirt down, forgotten again in a moment, and sits. "What does it feel like when you think about cars and sports and girls?"

Steve really thinks about it. Nothing is as consuming as when he was younger, but he does remember a vague sense of excitement, a feeling of connection with the people he surrounded himself with, who shared his interests. But he hasn't felt that in a while. Maybe he wasn't as into those things as he thought, was only into the connection.

"You're having very deep thoughts over there," Eddie points out with a grin.

"Shut up." He grins back. "I think maybe I don't actually know what it feels like to like something because I like it, not just because everyone else likes it. You know what I mean?"

"Well, yes but no." He waves both hands to indicate his person and also the chaos of the room around them.

"See? This is why I'm asking you. If anyone can help me figure out what I like it's you."

Eddie slaps both hands together and rubs. "A project! Excellent idea!"

Wasn't his idea but sure.

"First we have to get you exposure to new things. Movies, TV, music, culture. Then we'll rate how you feel about each demographic. Your music taste is already improving so that's good. Movies, I'm thinking 12 Angry Men to start. Food? Authentic Mexican. We're gonna get you excited about shit!" He seems excited enough for the both of them, which is great. "Excitement is key! You want enthusiasm, yearning even. Your interests should consume your every waking thought. When I'm consuming a new hobby, I'm focused like a shark, I'm obsessed. I go to bed thinking about it and wake up thinking about it. Excited to get back to whatever it is. I wanna talk about it, share it with other people. Complete and total immersion. You wanna marry that interest. You know what I mean?"

Steve blinks at him, stunned into silence. Eddie's just described how Steve feels about him...

Oh.

Oh.

[gigoodsworld]

Celebrate Basant Panchami with joy and enthusiasm. Use the Bobli Veena to add a unique and melodious touch to your celebration!

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Ghosts

Astral projection - The process of separating the astral body, the body’s spirit or consciousness, from the physical body. It’s an out-of-body experience. Deriving from the Latin astralis, astral projection can also be called astral travel, because it’s believed the spirit traverses the entire universe. Spiritualists use astral projection to communicate with those beyond the earthly realm.

Bogey - another word for evil spirit. The word probably traces back to the Middle English bugge, “frightening specter”.

Boggart - Related to bogey and bugge, boggarts can haunt domestic or geographic areas. Boggarts are always mean.

Channeling - In spiritualism, it is communicating with the paranormal in a state of trance or meditation. Spiritualists describe the action as “plugging into a switchboard” or a “grid frequency” to receive information from the ‘other side.’

Clairvoyance - Any ability to perceive psychic phenomena. In spiritualism, clair (“clear”) can be prefixed before any of the other four ‘normal’ senses, resulting in terminology that applies to a medium’s super-sensitive perception of a spirit: clairaudience is “clear hearing,” clairsentience “clear feeling,” clairalience “clear smelling,” and clairgustance “clear tasting.”

Cold spots - In the paranormal world, cold spots are indications of spirit activity. They aren’t sensed by everyone; the ones that do feel the chill are said to be more sensitive to the preternatural.

Doppelgänger - In the ghostly realm, a doppelgänger is an exceptional spirit, possessing the unique ability to appear in more than one place at once. This talent is reflected in its German name, which means “double goer” or “double walker.” Usually, a person’s doppelgänger appears as a sign of something bad to come, or as an omen of the viewer’s impending death. The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley is said to have seen his doppelgänger a week before he drowned.

Ectoplasm - Adopting a biological term originating in the late 1800s, spiritualists define ectoplasm as a cloudy mist, “usually a milky white vaporous color,” that halos before an apparition appears. From Greek ecto (“outside”) and plasma (“something developed or created”), this mystical mist is like a protective skin through which the specter shimmers into view.

Eidolon - In Ancient Greece, eidolons were spirits of the dead who possessed the living. Not always menacing, they would inhabit a living individual to convey a message, carry out an action for one of the gods, or tie up loose ends leftover after they died.

Kobold - Meaning “hut goblins,” kobolds can be kind or conniving depending on their mood. They’re also entirely changeable in appearance, with the option to materialize in human, animal, or object form.

Lemures - (also called larvae) The unequivocally bad ghosts of Ancient Rome, whose violent tempers and deeds in life mean eternal punishment to roam the limbo between worlds. To keep lemures at bay, Romans would fling spit-soaked black beans into the night shouting, “Be gone, you specters of the house!”

Manes - Romans believed people’s souls were demons, which were categorized in the afterlife. Good souls were called lares, bad souls lemures, and the in-betweeners were the manes. These are “the thin or unsubstantial” souls.

Necromancy - Whether you converse with spirits the old-fashioned way or by exchanging telepathic thought-waves, communicating with the deceased is an example of necromancy. The word traces back to the Ancient Greek nekromanteia, where nekros meant “dead body” and manteia “divination” or “oracle.” In effect, a necromancer is divining or discovering information from the deceased about the past, the future, or the world beyond.

Poltergeist - In German, poltergeist means “noisy ghost,” the ‘noise” in question produced by the sounds objects make when hurled and smashed against walls, ceilings, other objects, and screaming human beings.

Psychokinesis - Another paranormal power is psychokinesis or telekinesis, where objects are moved without physical contact with them. In Greek, kinesis means “movement” or “motion.” The psycho– prefix highlights the “mental,” “spirit,” or “unconscious” force behind the movement (movement with the mind), while tele- references the “distance” between the mover and the thing moved (movement without being close to or touching the object).

Revenant - One that returns after death or a long absence.

Vortex - Just as a natural vortex is a whirling mass of water, fire, or air, a paranormal vortex is a spinning swirl. But it’s composed of supernatural elements, which can apparently only be captured in photographs—they appear as refractions or corkscrews of light.

Wraith - In Scottish lore, doppelgängers or fetches were called wraiths. The wraith can be a water spirit portending a sailor’s death at sea, or a more general prophesy of demise, taking shape in the exhalation of a dying person’s breath.

Sources: 1 2 3 ⚜ More: Notes & References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

[shukraastro]

Are Rahu/Ketu doomed indicators for marriage?

A frequent question I am getting especially in dm's when readers ask me I have Rahu/Ketu aspecting or influencing my 7th house will my marriage be doomed now? Will my spouse be have addiction or cheat on me? Will I suffer in my marriage? -No.

Not neccessarily. You gotta understand that Rahu and Ketu represent a dragon/serpent together. What does a serpent symbolize? Taboos and unconventional things, things which are out of the norm or which are not usual for ones own culture, religion and community. And this is what these two are expecting from you if they are involved in your 7th house matters.

These two shadow planets have very exotic expactations no matter in which house they are placed in. If they're placed in your 7th house or with the 7th Lord or aspecting the 7th house/7th Lord then their exotic expactations are directed at your partner choice and marriage. If you give them what they are seeking they will give very great results, they will ahower you with their blessings. But if you don't give them what they're expecting from you they will do their work to break your marriage. Because to them you married a wrong person. If they have a say in your house of marriage/partnerships and you don't listen to them they will act in their malefic ways. They will cause your spouse to have addictions, cheat, abuse you, beat you and divorce you if you go and pick a spouse/partner who is very ordinary for your culture/religion/community. And believe me, going on long distance travels with such a partner can only help for a couple of days and once you step on the ground of your homeland the spouse/partners behaviour will switch back to its toxic ways again.

You have to pick a spouse/partner who is culturally/religiously/geographically/lingually very different from you. You have no other choice, your birth chart is conditioned that way, it is destined to be that way. And if you against it, Rahu/Ketu will do anything to break it eventually in order to redirect you towards the actual person you're meant to end up with.

And I have seen many married couples with Rahu/Ketu influence on the 7th house who are culturally/religiously/geographically/lingually tottaly different from another and had to work through so many barriers but they love each other so much that they value each other a lot and the marriage is based on mutual respect and understanding. Despite all the language/culture/religion differences they understand each other so well. And this is the blessing of Rahu/Ketu.

So if you pick the type of spouse/partner which matches the conditions of Rahu/Ketu then you wont get to experience the malefic effects of Rahu/Ketu.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Hopefully this was helpful.

Have a good day. 🪐

[casscainmainly]

Thinking about Cass being shunted off to Hong Kong and having all sorts of feelings about it again.

I think Gates of Gotham is the only series (besides bits of Red Robin) to even touch on how Cass reacts to it.

Gates of Gotham #1

When Dick tells her he didn't know she was back, Cass responds "I'm not". This is mostly referring to the fact she's back for a mission, but it also sheds light on how she's feeling. She doesn't belong in Gotham anymore, not the way she used to. In Red Robin #17, we see she was fighting without a Bat symbol, until Tim gives it back. Bruce sending her to Hong Kong wasn't just a geographical distancing, but an ideological one as well (whether he intended it or not). Cass understood him sending her away as a rebuke of her right to the Bat mantle.

Gates of Gotham #2

How does Cass feel about being 'relegated to Hong Kong'? She sidesteps Damian's comment here (mostly 'cause she knows not to engage), but her silence indicates it's not an easy answer. I wonder if there is some resentment/negative feelings towards Bruce.

Gates of Gotham #4

This exchange is so interesting if you look at it through Cass' perspective. Dick is grappling with his insecurities about not being a good enough Batman, and says "if you don't belong [in Gotham], she'll never keep you." Dick and Cass both don't come from Gotham - his comment unintentionally reflects on Cass' ability to be Batman as well. And given that Cass just returned from Hong Kong, it makes her feel even more like an outsider.

So her response - "you're[...] wrong.[...] It's not about the city. It's about how you choose to see the world. Everything else is just an excuse" - is not only addressing Dick's problems, but also her own. Her whole story is about choice and agency, and here she's making it clear: upholding the Bat mantle is their choice. No one can take it from them, not the opinions of Gotham citizens, not their own insecurities, not even Bruce himself.

Gates of Gotham #5

Cass asserts her desire to stay in Gotham (a decision tragically followed by the New 52, but I'll ignore that for now). Where Dick's arc ends with him telling Bruce he can be Batman, Cass doesn't interact with Bruce at all - her right to the Bat mantle no longer requires a Bruce stamp of approval. It shows the difference in Dick and Cass' approaches to Batman (Cass' loyalty is to the symbol, Dick's loyalty is to the man), but also highlights Cass' growth. She chooses to stay in Gotham because she wants to, not because of anyone else.

I'm not actually sure if her feelings on going to HK are elaborated elsewhere, so if anyone has more info please let me know!!! But I think it's very interesting that her first entry into Gotham is in defiance of David Cain, and her re-entry into Gotham is, in this interpretation, in defiance of Bruce.

[rei-ismyname]

Krakoan Diaspora floods the labour market

Okay everybody shut up, Astonishing X-Men Infinity Comic #13 said something interesting.

Fuck Mr Toppi. Get him, Chris.

This situation is a newly introduced C plot that I have a feeling will connect to the A plot soon. This guy on the right is Nick. He's a construction worker of some kind who is behind on child support and is getting fired right now. It's painful to watch this guy lick boot as this capitalist pig blatantly tells him his labour isn't cheap enough due to an influx of exploitable geographically external workers. It's an old lie, easily believed.

I see you Marvel, making these workers dark skinned to cover your bases. We find out Nick's a good worker, has never taken a sick day, defends those stealing his labour, and either didn't join a union or did but is really sorry about it. It's not 100% clear. Either way none of that shit matters because there's cheaper labour available.

The company doesn't see you as a person

It's implied to be an industry-wide thing, at least locally - mutant work crews are utilising their hyperspecific powers in concert to finish jobs way quicker than any human possibly could. It's implied that they don't own their own labour and are being exploited - the mutant workers are drastically increasing profits, they're 'fast' but they're being paid the same hourly rate, they're 'cheap.'

The parasite class, like Murray here, are making fat stacks by employing mutants to finish jobs quicker. The mutants get paid the same as less efficient workers and not sharing the increased profits their labour generates. The labour supply and dividends are so high, either from increased profit per worker or high numbers of mutant workers (likely both,) that they're cutting human workers altogether.

'Thousands of desperate mutants to exploit, Nick'

The parasite class are also employing a favourite tactic - keeping focus off their greed (and probable illegal practices) by scapegoating the migrant mutant workers. Instead of slaying this man and redistributing stolen wealth, Nick's anger is directed at his working class brother. Nick really should have joined that union, or should consult it if he's a member. Striking is ineffective when your labor is no longer required, but these mutant workers have collective bargaining power. Ideally, they'd be class conscious and strike in solidarity with their human brothers, but I don't think this is that kind of story.

Never forget Murray is the enemy

Skin here is an exploited mutant worker. There's no indication he's scabbing, just existing in the same labour market as Nick. He's being paid far less than his labour produces, and blamed for Murray being a greedy fuck. Both workers need money to live under capitalism yet they're set at odds with each other. Mutant workers could be migrants or automation - the parasites do not care about anything except the numbers going up, and they use any available resource for that. Oppression is no guarantee of intersectional solidarity, sadly.

This relaunch of the Infinity Comics has had a very consistent theme - radicalisation of the vulnerable by the predatory. I'll continue to cover this arc as the issues drop as it's an interesting and relevant choice of focus. I hope that conflict leads to understanding and solidarity, but I doubt it. The true big bad here is capitalism, but the villain is Murray, not Nick. I'm wary that Nick is dark skinned to sidestep angry white guy shouting 'they took our jobs,' but another theme of this run has been people slipping through the cracks.

People who are suffering or who have been wronged facing violence and imprisonment when they need support. Folks ground down by a rigged system lashing out at the dehumanised other. It's certainly true to life, but Murray the capitalist is safe in this narrative, as in life. It's possible he'll be secretly a supervillain, demon, gangster etc and become an acceptable villain to topple - but as long as he's just a banal greedy fuck - a very legal thing to be, he'll prosper while the workers suffer and fight each other. Your boss and the company are nobody's friends. They are very good at wearing the shell of a person to exploit loyalty, but they get fat off your labor and will discard as soon as it's profitable.

A Mr Toppi is mentioned in the story as presumably the owner. You'll notice that he's not working, performing no labour yet owns a very profitable business. Mr Toppi has capital. Know your rights and build solidarity with other workers because they're the same as you. I know this is cliché but there's so many more of us than there are of them. The individual is replaceable but the working class is not. Also, don't scab.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Monica Potts at TNR (05.21.2025):

Rural hospitals are in crisis. “More than 700 rural hospitals—one-third of all rural hospitals in the country—are at risk of closing because of the serious financial problems they are experiencing,” according to an April report from the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform. “Over 300 of these rural hospitals are at immediate risk of closing because of the severity of their financial problems.” And this doesn’t even account for what might happen if Republicans in Congress pass a budget bill that would cut $625 billion from Medicaid to cover tax cuts to the rich. Those cuts not only threaten health care coverage for millions of vulnerable Americans but also would endangermany rural hospitals, which are more likely than urban hospitals to rely on government health care spending to stay in business. Severe cuts to Medicaid could force many struggling rural hospitals to close, further diminishing work opportunities in areas where good, steady jobs are already scarce. Rural hospitals are of course critical for patient care—often there’s only one serving a geographically broad swath of territory—but they’re also a major employer in their communities. They employ hundreds or even thousands of people, including nurses, administrative aids, filing clerks, nurses, nursing assistants, and doctors. If Medicaid cuts force rural hospitals to close, as experts suspect they could, rural America could face an unemployment crisis.

Nationwide, hospitals employ about 4 percent of the U.S. workforce, making them America’s sixth-largest employer. It’s harder to tease out exactly how much of the rural workforce they employ, but by some estimates the health care sector accounts for about 14 percent of employment in those areas; there are many rural counties where hospitals are the largest or second-largest employer. (The stereotype of the rural American farmer is a bit outdated, as most agricultural work disappeared decades ago. By 2016, the biggest employment sectors for rural counties were educational services, health care, and social assistance.)

More than a third of hospitals in the U.S. are classified as rural, and they’re more likely to be operating in the red than their urban counterparts. The reasons are tied to the fortunes of rural communities more generally. The hospitals serve smaller populations and so have fewer patients. On top of that, many rural counties are shrinking in population, and the people who remain tend to be older and poorer than the country as a whole. These smaller hospitals have less power than bigger chains when negotiating reimbursement rates with insurance companies, making the government’s health care programs a more important component of their funding. They’re also serving populations that are more likely to be in poor health, and at the same time facing shortages of primary care physicians. Those problems led 136 rural hospitals, or about 3 percent, to close between 2010 and 2021. Almost three-fourths of those were in states that hadn’t expanded Medicaid through the Affordable Care Act, or had expanded it only within the previous year, hinting at how big a role the program plays in keeping those hospitals open. Not all rural hospitals are in crisis, though: Those in states that did expand Medicaid under the ACA are doing better. (However, the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform study found that 190 of the rural hospitals facing risk of immediate closure are in states that expanded Medicaid.) If the past is any indication, the magnitude of the proposed new cuts could severely impact states and the hospitals that rely on those programs.

The GOP’s Medicaid cuts could have disastrous impacts to rural hospitals (and jobs).

[kabr0ztrousers]

Being a polite and charming lady at the useless desk jobs on chitinid earth and she gets a notification that she is being given an ambassador role. She thinks “finally something useful I can do!” but surprise! The ambassador role? Yeah it is dressing up in a skimpy outfit and being someone's pet. A population of humans, similar to a small country, is being given to a different alien species as a trade agreement. She is given to their emperor as icing on the cake. At this moment she is internally panicking because while Chitinids don't eat intelligent life this species does (she witnesses it). She is at least good at buttering people up. Fear fucking, giving body worship, and giving praise on this one.

Kabr0z Writes episode 131: Ambassadorial Duties

Find the rest of the Kabr0z Writes anthology here!

There's an AO3!

CWs: Minor gore; dubcon; sex with an audience; size difference; oral sex;

#####################################

You'd only received a memo from central governance once before. Just after the Chitinids won the war, to inform you of your new position at a former law firm. It's not like your life was awful now, you didn't need to worry about rent, or losing your job. Quarterly reviews were still a thing, but only to preserve the "authentic" Human culture for academic study. In reality they were just you and your manager discussing metrics that didn't matter, setting meaningless goals, then filling out a meaningless spreadsheet. Considering you worked data entry for a slightly scummy ad agency before the sixty minute war, this was almost a welcome change. Still the same drudgery, but minus the precarity of potentially being automated out of a job. It could have been a lot worse, but what's the point of belonging to a sprawling star empire if you live out your days on Earth?

So you put in an application to move offworld. You had enough presence of mind to request not to be put into agricultural work, knowing precisely the role human women played on a Chitinid farm. Maybe some people were into that, you'd heard of one guy who ended up on reality TV doing it, but being a dairy cow wasn't entirely your speed. Months passed, and you heard nothing. Just the usual humdrum of emails, reheated nutrient blocks, and omnipresent gunship patrols. Then it arrived.

An item in your "in" tray. Not an email, an honest to god letter, sealed with a crimson ribbon and a blob of wax. It felt good in your hand. The paper was thick and weighty, the ribbon was smooth and felt like it might be actual silk. You cracked the seal and read the neatly typed message. You'd been appointed as part of a diplomatic attaché, to travel to the capital of a nearby pre-FTL civilization and extoll to them the benefits of joining the Chitinids. You'd be picked up from a spaceport in what used to be Heathrow in a week. No need to pack, you weren't being allowed to bring any personal effects with you. Not that you really cared about the collection of tat you'd accumulated with your government mandated paycheck. You were just excited to finally be leaving the ball of dirt you'd lived on.

Before you knew it, you were in orbit. Shuttled up to an interchange station from Heathrow, then moved onto a pleasure yacht escorted by corvettes. A sleek, glimmering civilian craft flanked on all sides by menacing, spiky warships, bristling with armaments. A human attendant issued you all with clothing appropriate for your postings, as well as datapads containing assignment dossiers. You and about twelve others were to be sent to another world. The geographic brief indicated the planet was warmer than Earth by a few degrees, and more arid. Which explained the clothes. Flowing linens dyed in purples and reds, edged with gold. You dressed in your quarters, getting out of the governance-approved pantsuit and into your new robes. You looked resplendent in the robes, long and flowing, multi-layered and decadent. You knew you were a walking propaganda piece, tailored to show wealth and opulence, but damn if you didn't almost believe it yourself.

A chattering came across the intercom. A gentle knock came at your door a moment later "Jumping to Witchspace in five minutes, you might want to hold onto something if it's your first time"

Witchspace. You'd read about the altered reality used by Chitinids to accelerate faster than light, crossing lightyears in hours. It didn't bother them, but it was... Interesting for humans. You sat on your bed, expecting the worst. Rhythmic chattering crackled across the speakers. A countdown. You braced yourself, clinging to the mattress. You felt the jump. It was like being turned upside down and punched in the gut, except without the pain. A queasy feeling, like you'd drank far too much the night before and woke up still drunk, unable to tell if you're going to spend the morning vomiting or not.

Then it passed. A feeling like a headache in reverse came over you as the ship's normality fields kicked in, shrouding the vessel in a thin film of realspace, coasting through unreality at several thousand times the speed of light. It defied everything Human physics thought it knew about, well, physics, but it worked. The secrets to the drives were closely guarded to prevent any unauthorized FTL travel, but no information seal is perfect, and everyone knew it was only a matter of time. Maybe that's why there aren't any teachers any more, just legions of office drones, cattle, and pets.

You shuddered at the thought. Pets. In a way that's what you're going to be. Except instead of a Chitinid master, you'd be putting on airs for whatever the native population of this new world would be. You checked your dossier again. The planet was called Suum, apparently they'd had their own Alexander the Great a decade or so ago, but instead of dying of disease, he'd had chance to consolidate power and groom an heir who finished the work of world conquest. Now his successor was on the throne, a powerful god-king whom you would be personal attache to. For now, you stretched out on your bed, trying to catch what sleep you could before your new life.

You slept fitfully. The humming engine and the strange sensations of Witchspace travel, combined with the uncertainty of your future kept you tossing and turning. Even after you'd shed your new clothing, you couldn't sleep properly. You were already awake when a chattered phrase came over the intercom again, you'd guessed what it meant before the knock came at your door. Imminently dropping back to realspace. You dressed and went to the viewing gantry. A dozen of you, all dressed similarly. One moment you were gazing out as the light purple of Witchspace, the next the gate was behind you, you jolted back into reality like jumping into a swimming pool. Your bubble of normal causality merging with the stock-standard three dimensions you were accustomed to.

The planet lurked below you. A dustball, tan brown instead of green, a single huge continent rather than several, a great ocean covering well over half the surface of the world. The usher from before led your group to a shuttle, a shining golden needle-shaped vessel that you all filed into, sitting down and strapping yourselves in. For how sleek the exterior of the ship was, inside it was little more than a dropship, exactly large enough for you all to cram inside. The usher waved you off as you left the hangar, going into orbit before the shuddering re-entry. A moment later the vessel landed, the door opened and you filed out.

The Chitinids have been busy here. The spaceport wasn't as sophisticated as Heathrow, but it looked sufficient for the needle you were riding. Four armed Chitinids flanked your group, escorting you from the ship through the town. The market was in full swing, and you caught your first glimpse of the aliens who called this place home. They were pretty universally tall, and heavily muscled. Greyish skin, the colour of light stone, and two sets of arms. They bartered and shouted over the crowd, though what they were bargaining for sent a shiver up your spine.

Body parts. Human limbs mainly, though you're sure you'd seen a heart changing hands. You blanched, you'd not considered the possibility of becoming lunch for your hosts.

Stills the guards marched you on, through the city, into a palace where the lead gave a chattering speech to the assembled aliens. The largest, a hulking figure twice the size of the others, looked unimpressed, but kept a polite silence while the Chitinid spoke. Once the formalities were dealt with you were pointed to your assignments, though you didn't need to be directed. You could see which one of them fit the description you'd got from the dossier. Yours was the big one.

He displayed you like a prize. You didn't speak the local language, and you weren't sure if any of them spoke yours. You doubted it. At least none of them looked like they were eying you up for the main course. You avoided meat at dinner time, though there wasn't much else on the menu until someone noticed and gave you a chunk of coarse bread.

At last, night started to fall. The men took seats as more people entered the room. You noticed they were all dressed like you, flowing silks in purples and reds, edged with gold. They carried ewers, settling behind courtiers and starting to oil and massage their muscular shoulders. You looked around a moment before another servant gave you a similar jug. Taking some of the strong-smelling oil on your hands, you began to rub at the emperor's shoulders.

Your mind raced with questions: do these people really eat humans? Why are the Chitinids looking to convince them to join rather than just swooping in with gunships like on Earth? Were you really just to be a concubine?

The emperor answered your last question for you. He twisted in his seat, grabbing you and pulling you into his lap. The instruction was clear, whether or not you could understand the words. You pulled down his waistband, revealing his cock. He wasn't hard yet, but it was already as long and as thick as your forearm. You looked up at him a moment, before he pushed you back down with a grunt. Another courtier called out something, drawing a laugh from the huge one with his hand on your back. Your oily hands slid over the skin of his cock, feeling it harden in your grasp.

You took your time, hoping he wasn't going to try and stuff this monster inside you. Every stroke, every twist of your wrist caused it to thicken and throb. He was still holding you down, leaning you over one of his legs as you worked over it. You glanced around, the other concubines were doing similar with the others. The formalities of holding imperial court gone, replaced by the brewings of an orgy. Seeing everyone else doing the same thing made you a little bolder. You still didn't want to try and negotiate putting that thing up you, but the self-consciousness was gone.

You relaxed your shoulders, getting into a stride of jacking him off, feeling the length of him, finding the parts that made him groan when you played with them. For an alien species from across the stars, he worked a lot like the human men you'd been with. His tip seemed very sensitive, and he definitely liked it when you played with the ridge where it joined his shaft. Your other hand drew down to the base of it, cupping his balls. You smiled, of course he had four of those too. You rolled them around, listening to his deep breathing as you edged him.

You had an idea, rolling yourself over his leg so you knelt between them. Here you could see all of him, towering over you. You held onto his cock while you kissed his balls, licking and sucking the soft skin, slick with the oils you'd applied to him.

He was groaning now, restless in his seat. You could feel dozens of pairs of eyes on you as you went, jacking him off with your face nestled at the base of his cock. Maybe this was some great social faux pas? Oh well, you're here to do some cultural exchange, and you've never had a man complain about this back on Earth.

You could feel his balls tightening, He was trying to control his hips bucking. The cock in your hands was twitching and a thin stream of precum was flowing over your hands.

You knew just how to finish him. You straightened up. The huge cock pointed at you, curving towards you. The tip was already right where you wanted it. You opened your mouth and took the end of his cock inside you, filling your mouth with just the end, forcing your jaw open wide to accommodate it. You leant over him, baring your tits and rubbing them against either side of his cock while he leaked in your mouth. Your tongue flicked against the underside of his head. He grabbed the back of your head, holding you in place as he grunted, pushing you to the edge of your gag reflex.

You grabbed his balls, holding onto them as you felt them clench. Thick cum filled your mouth, leaking out of the sides of your mouth as you struggled to swallow it all. more and more pumped into you, you gave up trying to gulp it down, instead feeling it flow out of you.

He softened in your mouth and let go, letting you pull back from him and wipe your face. A servant brought you a goblet of something smelling like wine. The other members of the emperor's court were pointing at you, instructing their concubines.

You might not understand the lingo yet, but you'd waited enough tables in your life to understand "I'll have what he's having"

###########################################

At long last! The story that's been 3 sessions of writing, rewriting, editing, re-editing, I'm not refactoring it again so have fun with it, take it as it is and I wash my damn hands of it.

[shithowdy]

New Vegas Divide and Big MT Locations

A lot of discussions I find on the matter tend to ultimately be met with the answer of, "It's a fake place somewhere in Death Valley, it doesn't matter exactly where". I can understand not needing this information to enjoy the story, but unfortunately, I'm roleplaying a prequel set in 2276 so I want some goddamn specifics 💅

SO. My own speculation on The Divide's more precise location below the cut. Apologies if anyone has supplied this theory before, I got a little tired of browsing reddit threads full of incurious wiki-thumpers.

(tl;dr it's a developed Fort Irwin)

The Divide and the named places in it obviously don't correlate as directly with real locations like the rest of the game, but this makes sense. In a differing timeline where the nuclear arms race seems to have only shifted in players, not ethics, it's easy to imagine that the area surrounding desert military operations and nuclear development sites would grow in importance (I similarly have mentioned Los Alamos being a much bigger city in our RP for the same reason). The Mojave was a hub for nuclear R&D and even today houses one of our warheads, of course it would boom (pun unavoidable). So the first thing I did was ignore cities, even "Ashton". A location named Ashton does exist further north beyond the Nevada border, but nothing about it geographically matches what we interact with in game.

Instead, I thought about the geography itself. What we know about the Divide is that the detonations there made CA-127 unusable, forcing NCR supply chains trying to reach Hoover Dam to enter via the 15 and Mojave Outpost.

We also know it was east of established NCR territory, west of the main NV game map, and north of the 15.

This means its radius is limited to something like this.

Looking at the overlay, and knowing that the "default story" courier had been for some time delivering supplies between the established NCR and Ashton/Hopeville, their route taking them from The Hub (formerly Lancaster), the industrial and trade center of New California, and this new city makes the most sense.

(As an aside, I have to say that I'm very sorry to classic players upset about the map retcon, because that damn geography doesn't even match what the text implies. The Necropolis is Barstow, not Bakersfield?? Anyway.)

Further evidence that the courier's route brought them from the Hub is a note by a merchant from there who appears to have found their old route after the bombs...

... and Nash explaining that the Courier was initially hired at The Hub in the first place, indicating an established presence there.

So we have the general radius. How do we get more specific? What I think a lot of people ignore when trying to pinpoint the area are the quakes set off by the subterranean bombs and the effect they had on the landscape: gaping geological scars that run East-West, indicating a sensitive fault line at this angle.

The immediately clear answer to this was the Ridgecrest fault.

Okay, so we have a good candidate for a fault line. What sits below it? In our timeline, the remote Fort Irwin and its surrounding military desert combat training sites (complete with simulated villages), and the Goldstone site satellite complex. If you were going to use existing infrastructure as building blocks for new and grander development in this region, the roads, electricity, water treatment, and radio towers here would be the ideal choice. Let's see if it lines up.

You know what? I'll take it. A circular central interchange that branches out through mountainous areas situated just below the Ridgecrest fault. So where does that place Big MT? We know it's south of Hopeville, but it can't interfere with I-15. This necessitates an area of (currently) high elevation with caves below surrounded by darker soil, canyon networks, but an otherwise flat landscape somewhere just south of the Divide radius.

Wouldn't you know, there just happens to be a lone mountain that sits atop an opal mine, which in a different timeline could have very easily been converted into a different excavation project. Opal Mountain, or the Black Mountain Wilderness (unrelated), is a perfect match.

So! This is obviously pure speculation based on me having the specific flavor of autism that brews when one grows up having their own brain fried by 120f weather and residual nuclear fallout. I did this for the purpose of RP, but if anyone finds it useful, yippee etc.

[serpentface]

VEILING IN WARDI CULTURE: AN OVERVIEW

Left: Noblewoman wearing the angarinye veil standard for women in public spaces. Right: Inwenii priest wearing the amengawe veil while presiding over a funeral.

The Wardi practice of veiling is most prominent in being a standard element of everyday women's clothing. Feminine veiling has no particular religious dimensions and has little direct connection to modesty standards (which, for women, center around covering the buttocks/genitalia/hips/thighs/legs). It is rather seen as an aspect of basic dignity in feminine presentation, indicating in public spaces that a woman is (considered) an adult, in good standing, and exists within the protection of a household. Its core underlying function is socially distinguishing women considered of respectable status from women of irreputable status (predominantly sex workers, as well as unclaimed bastards and some people charged as criminals).

There is no Wardi word that describes every type of head covering that the English 'veil' encompasses, and there are separate names for different types of veil. The veil garment worn by women is referred to as ‘angarinye’ and appears to be simply derived from a contraction of ‘sun (cloak/covering)’. The Odonii veil is called 'angarinye hete' (functionally 'mane veil'), while most veils worn by male priests are referred to as amengawe (derived from 'covering (of the) blessed').

Most veils are long rectangular drapes worn over the head and down the shoulders and back, often secured across the chest with decorative brooches. For commoner class women, it is very often just a basic cloak repurposed into veil form. Wealthier commoners and nobility will often wear shorter angarinye specifically tailored for the purpose (while still usually being a basic rectangular bolt of fabric), and/or ones that have been colorfully woven/embroidered, expensively dyed or made from valuable textiles, such as imports of silk. It is usually worn secured with a headband, though wearing it draped unsupported over the head goes in and out of fashion, effectively as a class-indicator of leisure, (ie you aren’t performing labor that will make it difficult to keep it in place). Headbands tend to win out anyway, given they themselves can function as a status indicator via decoration or as a base for additional jewelry.

Veils existing as an element of feminine dress is a commonality across most linguistically related/geographically connected peoples south of the Viper seaway (all Wardi, Cholemdinae, and 'North Wardi' peoples, most Wogan peoples, and some Ubiyans), usually serving as an indicator of adult womanhood, married status, and/or exalted social status. The Wardi practice of veiling appears to have originated as a visual signifier that an adult woman is married, then restricted as a status indicator for married women of aristocratic status (emerging among Ephenni royalty and nobility and adopted among many other proto-Wardi monarchies and chiefdoms), then broadened again across class lines as an indicator of adulthood while retaining connotations of respectable status.

In the present day, Wardi women become socially expected to wear veils in public spaces upon menarche (though may start earlier depending on the extent of pubescence prior to menstruation, largely to prevent the girl from being confused for an adult woman neglecting the practice). Akoshos are expected to veil as well (and to strictly conform to feminine clothing in general), and will instead usually start upon adulthood at 16. Prepubescent girls are under no expectation to wear veils in public whatsoever, though it has become fairly commonplace to dress young girls in them for solemn formal occasions such as funerals, and sometimes just as cold weather wear. These expectations are a matter of strong social norms, but have no levels of legal enforcement. The only laws surrounding veiling focus on Preventing women of ostracized social status from doing so.

Beyond being a marker of respectability, it ultimately serves to communicate that a woman is of marriageable age while also securely within a household (either that of her father or husband) and sexually unavailable, and signals piety and respect to the father or husband. It’s also considered a layer of protection from the evil eye and other forms of spiritual harm, both in physically reducing the body's visibility and in acting as a metaphysical extension of a household patriarch's guardianship over her body. All this aside, the garment also has purely practical functions as protection from the sun, or as a combination hat/scarf/cloak for cold weather.

The veil plays an important role in marriage ceremonies. A bride will enter the ceremony wearing a veil from her family (traditionally one woven by her mother for this specific purpose, though these are sometimes passed down and reused as heirlooms). The bride will first be visible to attendants under this veil before being led to a private area in which the core marriage rituals are completed. There, the bride's father removes the veil from her head and the groom garbs her with one from his own family (again, traditionally woven by his mother) to symbolically finalize the woman being ceded to her groom's household. After the rest of the formal marriage ties are complete, the bride will be publicly presented again alongside the groom in her new veil and the celebration can commence. This wedding veil is worn for the remainder of the public ceremony, and is usually retained for any extra celebrations over the next several days and for formal occasions thereafter.

Sex workers are outright forbidden from veiling in public as a mark of their position, effectively a psychological enforcement of their stigmatized social status as well as a means of regulating their movements (sex workers are forbidden from entering most temples and other sacred places and from participating in many public rites, making them ultra-visible helps enforce this). Wearing a veil as a sex worker is legally punishable, with the severity depending on whether it is just being used to hide their status in general or to 'trespass' on forbidden ground.

Temporary or permanent prohibitions on veiling are a manner of public humiliation that play a (usually partial) part in many legal punishments for women, particularly in charges for sexual crimes (most commonly adultery, and potentially charges of concealing ‘lost virginity’ and especially pregnancies prior to a first marriage). Women who lose their citizen status as a criminal punishment (which is usually a form of exile) are typically forbidden from veiling for life.

Other women not under male guardianship (usually as a matter of being orphans, unclaimed bastards, etc) are also not supposed to wear a veil, but are much less likely to experience strict enforcement of this rule, as it is semi-regulated by social contract but does not have any explicit place in law. Most will choose to wear it anyway to avoid disrespect/harassment due to resembling a sex worker (or otherwise being presumed sexually available, promiscuous, or criminal in nature), and often do so simply as a means of expressing their sense of dignity and self worth.

As with many things, Odonii are a partial exception to this tendency. They have the same overall legal freedoms as adult men (they are not legally under their father’s household jurisdiction and will not be married), which therefore makes them fit the description of ‘women not under male guardianship’. They do, however, wear veils as a standard element of regalia (worn in a distinctive manner, with two corners secured down the chest to form an overall ‘mane’ shape) and are fully expected to veil even in lay clothing, as an exception to their otherwise masculinized dress performance (they are women of extremely high status, why wouldn’t they?).

Wearing an angarinye-style veil is a matter of feminine presentation and will be considered crossdressing if performed by men. Some forms of specifically Religious veiling are practiced by men on a culturally standard basis, however. Most male priests will wear veils at least in some contexts, with some wearing it as standard regalia. These are differentiated from the feminine angarinye on a linguistic basis and as a matter of wear style, with male priestly veils typically being loosely wrapped around the head and shoulders (usually being very long rectangular bolts of cloth) and referred to as amengawe. These veils are framed as a display of humbleness in the face of great duty, signify devotion and purity of intent, and are thought to protect the wearer from spiritual harm while undergoing important rites. In most cases, these are either all-black or all-white, with both colors having connotations of spiritual purity.

Only priests wear amengawe by ritual necessity, but it has become very common for lay men to remove their cloaks and wear them as an amengawe-style veil when approaching temple cult icons to pray and leave offerings. This has been generally acknowledged as acceptable, as these men are not transgressing upon priestly duties forbidden to lay followers and are simply displaying their own sense of duty and purity of intent. In recent years, women have been increasingly known to enter temples with veils wrapped amengawe-style for the same purposes. This has provoked considerable intracultural debate and handwringing on whether this is wildly inappropriate or not.

[texas-writes]

Special Girl

Cw: pining, mentions of masturbation, piv sex, protected sex, oral (m&f receiving), fingering

The sound of your front door opening and closing was normal, someone was always on the move, but your interest was piqued when you heard your brother laughing, indicating he probably had a friend over, and you prayed it wasn’t who you thought it was

Your brother’s best friend growing up was Leon Kennedy. He was just a year older than you, and you’d always had a huge crush on him. Actually, crush was a weak word for this.

You were

hand-in-your-panties-like-your-life-depended-on-it obsessed with him.

You were a slut for him and he was none the wiser.

You sat and thought for a moment before making up your mind. Timing it perfectly, you crossed the hall to the bathroom as your brother came up the stairs with his friend, letting you see who it was.

Fuck, it was Leon.

He seemed much more handsome than he was the last time you had seen him. Maybe it was because it was summer, but his skin was tanner and his hair was more blond than usual. He was Adonis in the flesh, everything you could ever want.

You spend a few moments pretending to use the bathroom, flushing the toilet and washing your hands to make it convincing. Then you duck back across the hall and into your room.

It’s begun to get dark and you're laying on your bed wrapped in just a blanket reading National Geographic. You’d gotten accepted to Penn State for anthropology, and you wanted to spend your summer preparing for when school started up. Your walls were covered in clippings from previous issues, the city of Petra, the carved churches of Lalibela, ancient statues, any picture that interested you honestly. You loved to look around your room at them all while you thought.

You’re pondering what all you’re going to take to your dorm when you hear the garage door rumble open. Your father was home, which meant it was almost dinner time.

A groan escapes your lips as you roll off the bed and shuffle to your closet to find clothes. You clutch your blanket around your shoulders like a cloak as you dig around, pulling out an oversized sweatshirt and a pair of basketball shorts. Not exactly the best dinner outfit, but decent. You knew if you looked too nice your brother would pick on you for being a try-hard later.

When you go downstairs to help your mother set the table, you're more than surprised to see Leon doing it already.

“Oh Leon, you didn’t have to do that,” you say, reaching out a hand for the remaining silverware.

“Oh, hello,” he mumbles. “Your mom said I could stay for dinner, so it’s the least I can do.”

“Honey, you can get the plates. You know, Leon goes to Penn State too? Glad to know I’ll have someone to look out for you.”

Your cheeks turn pink at your mother’s words, and you're grateful that your back is turned. Look out for you.

“So uh, how do you like it?”

“S’alright, I guess. Better than being sent to Harvard, like my old man wanted. He wanted me to be a lawyer.”

“That’s good. Are you going for criminology like you wanted?”

“Yeah. I’m really glad to have done it. It was nice, standing up to him for once.”

“Yeah…”

After dinner’s been served and you’re just sitting there, poking at your plate, halfheartedly pretending to listen to your brother ramble about the upcoming soccer season, you can finally say you’re bored. Your father replies to whatever it was David had just said when you feel a foot brush against yours.

At first, you thought it was an accident, but when it happens again, you look up, meeting Leon’s eyes as he chews before looking back down at your plate. A few moments pass without another brush, so you cautiously stretch your leg out and bump your foot against his. Leon doesn't react to your touch, he just keeps eating.

Maybe it was an honest mistake. You mentally berate yourself for thinking he would touch you on purpose. You jump slightly when you feel his foot on your calf, gently stroking it.

“You alright, y/n,” Leon questions, looking as innocent as possible while he torments you, unbeknownst to your family.

“Yeah, just a chill, that’s all.”

“Oh, okay,” he shrugs, turning his attention back to David and your father.

Your cheeks burn and you take a couple more feeble bites before asking to be excused.

You laid awake that night, wondering what the fuck that was all about. God, you really needed to piss.

You rolled out of bed and pulled on your fluffy robe before heading to the bathroom.

When you step out of the bathroom, you bump into someone.

“Sorry David, didn’t see you.”

“And where are you going, pretty girl?”

Fuck. Nobody told you Leon was spending the night.

“J-just back to bed.”

“Why d’ya sound so nervous, hm,” he questions, backing you into the bathroom and closing the door.

“You scared me, that’s all.” Your robe was riding up and the counter was so, so cold against your bare ass.

“Just like you were chilly at dinner, right,” he questions, you can hear the grin in his voice as he lowers his head beside your ear, lifting your chin with his finger.

“Leon…”

“What, baby? Say the word and I’ll stop.”

“Please, don’t,” you whisper

He leans away and takes a step back.

“No, wait- that’s not what I meant, Leon please.”

“Ah, so you do want me then?”

You nod.

“That isn’t enough, sweetheart I want you to say it.”

“Leon, that’s not fair, please. Need you.”

He chuckles to himself and returns to his original position, lips brushing against your neck as he speaks.

“You need me, hm?”

You nod again, slightly aware of how pathetic you’re being, but too caught up in Leon’s affection to care.

“What does my pretty girl want, hm? How bad do you need me,” he whispers, brushing his fingers up your thigh and under your robe.

“Nothing on under there. Was that intentional or did I just catch you at a good time?”

“I never wear anything to bed,” you murmur, bringing your hand up to rest in his hair, giving it a slight tug as his lips abuse the tender flesh of your shoulder, teeth grazing against your collarbone as he groans.

“Go wait for me in your room. I’m gonna make sure we won’t be bothered.”

You nod softly and poke your head out of the bathroom, making sure no one's watching as you scurry across the hall into your room while Leon hangs back.

After what felt like eternity, Leon comes into your room, easing the door shut behind him and sliding the lock into place. Your nerves are absolutely shot, and you shiver as you watch Leon come towards you, the way his tight shirt hugged his broad shoulders and slim waist, accentuating his silhouette.

“Is everyone asleep,” you question, pushing yourself up in the bed, tugging your robe tighter around yourself.

“Yeah,” he hums, sliding into your bed beside you, taking a swatch of your pink satin sheets between his fingers and feeling it. “Nice sheets, I see why you sleep naked.”

You giggle and rest your head on his shoulder. You had been awkward around Leon for as long as you could remember, In middle school, watching him from across the cafeteria as he flipped through an X-Men comic and filled out the mail-in sheet on the back, or in high school when he shrugged at every girl that tried to ask him out and you had been so sure he’d give you the same answer, so you’d never bothered.

Despite being dismissive most of the time, he was there when it mattered, like your junior year, when you had snuck out and gone to a local college party and gotten absolutely smashed. Leon had been there too and followed you around all night, shielding you from grabbing hands and switching your drinks out for water as the night wore on before driving you home and helping you sneak back into your window. Or when he’d come hiking with your family and you’d gotten water intoxication and he’d carried you back to the car to cool you off and taken you to get some extra salty fries while your family finished their hike.

But things were different now, you were both adults, and you knew that he wanted you as he tilted your chin up and pressed his lips to yours softly while his free hand went up to caress your cheek. His hands were calloused from his frequent visits to the gym, but they felt so good as they roamed your features, tracing the curve of your lips. The bridge of your nose, the arch of your brow. You wanted nothing more than to feel his hands all over your body.

“Leon,” you whine, tugging at the hem of his shirt, trying to get him to take it off. He finally takes the hint and pulls his shirt off and drops it on the floor. You yelp as he wraps his arms around your waist and pulls you into his lap.

“Shh, we still gotta be quiet, baby. Can’t get caught can we, then I can’t come visit anymore, hm?”

“Sorry, I just wasn’t expecting it,” you whisper, leaning in and kissing along his jaw.

“Mh, feels good,” he mumbles, exposing his neck to you as you trail kisses all across his throat, grazing your teeth along his Adam’s apple, making his breath hitch.

When you pull away your robe is barely covering enough of you to be considered decent. Leon looks up to meet your eyes, groaning when you untie your robe and let it slide down your shoulders, exposing your shoulders and the tops of your breasts. He allows his gaze to drop back to the soft plain of your tummy, the curve of your hips and the way the blanket wrapped around your hips pools between your legs just enough to cover the one thing he needs the most.

You can feel him, straining against his shorts as you cautiously lower yourself to brush your pussy along his sensitive bulge.

“You should take these off Lee,” you hum, tugging at the waistband of his shorts.

He nods and lifts his hips, allowing you to pull them down so he can kick them off. He groans as his cock springs free from the confines of his pants, standing at attention, so close to your entrance he can feel the warmth coming from you.

You shrug your robe the rest of the way off and drop it down with Leon’s clothes, moving from his lap, kneeling beside him and resting your head on his thigh and kissing it softly once before licking along the underside of his cock, making him grip at the sheets.

You tease him relentlessly, kissing and licking at the tip of his cock, your warm breath fanning against his skin. He lets out a deep groan when you finally take him in, tongue swirling around him as you take him deeper into your mouth. Tears prick the corners of your eyes as he tangles his fingers into your hair and guides you to take him into your throat.

“You’re such a good girl,” he whispers. “You’re taking me so well, fuck,” he moans bringing his other hand to caress your cheek.

Leon studies the way your body moves as you pleasure him, the arch of your back, the curve of your ass, the way you look up at him as you moan around him.

“M’gonna cum, fuck. You gonna let me cum in your mouth?”

You nod weakly as you take Leon deeper into your throat, pressing your nose against his tummy as he finishes. You lap at his tip, making sure you don't miss anything as you pull away, swallowing thickly and gasping softly as Leon pushes your hair out of your face and smoothing it down.

“You did so good for me,” he praises, stroking your cheek and motioning for you to lay back. “Let me return the favor, hm?”

“Please,” you whine, laying back on your bed, watching intently as Leon takes his place between your legs, right where you’ve always wanted him, tips of his fingers lazily trailing along your thigh while he looks up at you.

He teases your entrance before easing two of his fingers into you, making you whimper.

“I don’t normally do this, but you’re my special girl,” he whispers, ducking his head between your thighs and throwing one of your legs over his shoulder. “But you have to be quiet, okay?”

“I’m your special girl,” you question, a warm blush spreading across your cheeks as he rests his head on your thigh, his hair tickling the tender flesh there.

“Always have been. Why do you think I look after you like I do? You promise you’re gonna be quiet?”

You nod and give him a gentle smile, laying back into the pillows and running your fingers through his silky hair. He curls his fingers into you, testing the honesty of your statement, pleased when you only let out a soft whimper and lock your ankles around his shoulders.

Leon takes your encouragement and buries his face between your thighs, tongue lathing against you as his fingers continue their steady rhythm inside you. Your soft moans and the way you tug at his hair are more than enough to drive him insane, urging him to focus his attention on your clit to draw more out of you, his fingers lazily curling into your sweet spot as he grinds his hips into the mattress, looking for a little relief of his own.

“Leon, ah- ‘m so close.”

You can feel him grin against you as he nudges his nose against your clit before taking it back between his lips, making you shove your fist in your mouth as he draws an orgasam out of you. He chuckles and just keeps eating you, not caring about the way your legs shake around him, or your heels digging into his back, or the way you’re dangerously close to ripping out a chunk of his sandy blond hair. No, all he cares about are those cute little noises you’re making, accented only by the occasional whine when he brushes his fingers against that spot inside you.

Finally he pulls away, tongue darting out to lick his lips as he crawls his way up to you, his fingers still buried to the hilt in your dripping cunt.

“How was that? Hm? Anyone ever done that for you before?”

You shake your head and he grins, leaning down to press a sloppy kiss to your lips. You can taste yourself and it’s one of the hottest things you think you’ve ever experienced.

“You think you’re ready for me, baby?”

“Yeah… I can take it.”

“We’ll see,” he teases, pulling his fingers out of you, making you whine at the sudden emptiness, and brings them to his mouth, sucking all of you off of them. “You know baby, you’re just so damn good, don’t want to waste it.”

You reach up and wrap an arm around his neck, pulling him down into a kiss, teasing your tongue against his lip, smiling against him when he allows the intrusion. He pulls away and you reach for him, but he doesn’t yield to your grabbing hands, reminding you that he’s just been a willing participant in your arms until now.

“You have a condom?”

“I’m on birth control.” That’s what guys really wanted to hear, right?

“Not good enough.” Oh. He actually wanted one.

“Top drawer of the nightstand, not sure they’ll fit though.”

“You flatter me. Ah, here.” He rifles through the drawer until he finds one, tearing the little foil packet open with his teeth, hissing softly as he rolls it on.

He’s back on top of you as soon as he’s got it in place, grinding his hips against yours and pulling your legs around his waist.

“See, now you can keep those pretty legs of yours around me as long as you want and we don’t have to worry.”

You giggle and reach between your bodies, taking him into your hand and giving him a couple of strokes before lining him up with your entrance. He eases himself into you until he bottoms out, using one hand to lace his fingers with yours while the other grips at your headboard.

“Fuck, baby, you feel so good. Didn’t know what I was missing until now.”

He starts out with a slow pace, taking the time to pull almost completely out of you before sliding back in, relishing in the way you push your hips up to meet his. Taking it slow was almost unbearable, but you were his special girl after all, and he wanted you to know he’d look after you however you wanted, even if it meant torturing himself to get you used to him.

After a small eternity you tell him to speed up and he doesn't need to be told twice. His thrusts become short and deep, the sound of your bodies meeting filling the stuffy silence of your room as he keeps his lips on yours swallowing down the moans that tumble from your lips. He takes his hand from yours to knead at your breast, enjoying the way they bounce every time his hips slam into yours. He knows you’re close by the way you tighten around him, so he opts to lean back and grab your hips, digging his fingertips into the supple flesh there, setting a punishing pace as his own hips stutter and he lets out a whine as he cums, lazily thrusting to carry you through before pulling out and falling beside you, pulling the condom off and knotting it, dropping it into the trash can beside your bed.

“So,” he questions, propping himself up on his elbow. “How was that?”

You’re still laying there trying to catch your breath, so you just let out a choked sound of agreeance.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just-”

“Just what?”

“A lot of things. Good things. But-”

“Start small then.”

“None of my other boyfriends would kiss me after I sucked them off.”

“Boyfriend?”

“Sorry,” you laugh nervously, sure you’d already screwed it up.

“Don’t be. I’m not opposed to it. In fact I’d quite like to be your boyfriend, but what else.”

“And then you ate me out, and-”

“Go on.”

“I’ve never cum like that in my life.”

“Those other guys were missing out then,” he replies, wrapping his arms around you, pressing a kiss to the back of your head.

That’s what you always liked about Leon. No matter how much you could try to stroke his ego, he always took it humbly. You wiggle yourself around to face him and press a kiss to the tip of his freckled nose

“Hey, baby, I don’t want to just run out on you and ruin a good thing, but I gotta go back soon,” he whispers, resting his forehead against yours before slipping out of your bed and getting dressed. You watch with a twinge in your chest as he makes his way towards the door.

“I understand. Are you gonna come see me again?”

“You know it baby,” he grins, opening the door and slipping out before easing it shut behind him.

[gigoodsworld]

December 21st, The World Saree Day, a vibrant homage to the iconic six-yard drape! This day transcends borders and generations, honoring the saree's enduring elegance and rich cultural tapestry. From the shimmering Kanjeevarams of the south to the delicate Phulkari of the north, each weave whispers a story of tradition, artistry, and resilience.

[smoulderingocean]

When it comes to Nick's education, even if it hadn't been prevented by his family circumstances and childhood trauma, it still would have been interrupted by the Sons of Jacob. He was a teenager when recruited by the SoJ in 2012. Based on his flashback content, having previously been employed in the steel works, Nick would have had to been 18 or 19 (based on all our extensive calculations, 19 is the most likely). The attack on Congress occurred in 2014 and things all fell apart then. In a traditional 4 year degree, clearly the kind of education June meant when asking Nick about what he studied in school, Nick would have finished in 2015 or 2016 would have been interrupted by the takeover.

In any case, a degree is just a piece of paper. It doesn't make someone intelligent, curious, or thoughtful. It doesn't mean they're incapable of intellectual discussions. Nick is well-read, with the first book we see him reading being "Love in the Time of Cholera", which is not exactly the lightest read out there. While the books in his apartment were all likely Gilead safe (I distinctly remember him having a lot of National Geographic magazines) or fished out of the bin and not to his direct tastes, it indicates that Nick at least filled his time by expanding his mind. I don't think that Nick being someone who enjoys reading is merely created by Gilead being the most boring place on earth, I think it's something that had to have existed at least a little Before. As an impoverished kid and one in a bad family life, Nick likely sought out the library as a place of refuge. And that in and of itself is a worthy trait and one that June would find appealing.

Nick and June really aren't so different that they couldn't work in another life. You don't need the same level of education as someone to work well with them as a partner. All sorts of commonalities make for a good relationship, education isn't a mandatory one. For example both of them come from complicated family lives, which is something that can be a powerful common experience and bonding area.

And yeah, the idea that in another world, in a different life, that they'd meet and fall in love and choose each other isn't that far-fetched. I think they'd still be soulmates wherever they found each other.

[gemsofgreece]

Do greeks consider themselves as eastern european/balkan or do you hate that ? In france, the greek diaspora consider itself eastern euro and feels a bond with other balkaners, unlike the italians and french e.g, BUT on the english speaking internet it is the whole opposite, you seemed to be offended being called something else than southern european. I remember having an argument on reddit where i was saying that greece is EE because commie times arent a good indicators as it was 30 years ago for only 45 years while the old latin west greek east (catholic vs orthodox, rome vs constantinople) division was better as it lasted 2000 years, on top of being ottoman for 4 centuries which was the OG meaning of balkans and that in southEAST europe there is EAST. But all of the greeks said that they were 100% south europe only like the pigs and not e.g montenegro and that they were actually closer to WE.

The average greek and your thoughts on this ?

I can't speak for the average Greek because there's a joke saying "in the room there are three Greeks and seven opinions", you know...

Balkans and East Europe are not synonyms. The Balkans are a small part in the south of East Europe. Greeks are Balkaners to the core but the more you reach into the north fringes of the Balkans and farther towards North East Europe, the similarities start falling apart. In this sense, Greece is indeed more South Europe than East Europe because Greece has similarities with pretty much all South European countries, even Portugal, and it has fewer similarities with, say, the Baltic countries or Poland or Hungary. Personally, I think the region of noticeable similarities to Greece end somewhere across Croatia and Romania. In the East the similarities may extend farther in the countries where Orthodoxy is the prevalent religion so well into Southwest Russia and then towards Caucasus. Anyway my point is, a Greek will likely get more easily along with a Catholic Spanish or a Portuguese person than with a Catholic Slovenian or Hungarian person who are far closer geographically. Therefore, Greece is indeed more South Europe than East Europe.

The Greek people you noticed who did not get along with French or Italians, that's probably incidental. Typically Greeks get along with both South Europeans and other Balkaners, with the southern Greeks and islanders gravitating towards the former and northern Greeks gravitating towards the latter. Perhaps those Greeks were Northern Greeks. Perhaps they also bonded with other Balkaners on the basis of both being immigrants, as opposed to the local French.

Greece is Southeast and Balkan Europe, therefore it is East Europe by definition. The problem is that a) nowadays Greeks have very poor knowledge of history and b) there is this unfortunate stereotype permeating across the continent that tRuE Europe = Northwest Europe and that the east is backwards and underdeveloped. And because Greece is ALSO a honorary member of West Europe, Greeks have latched on this “convenient” opportunity to at least verbally distance themselves from East Europe, losing parts of their identity and their understanding of it in the process.

Now you may ask “what the hell is a honorary member of West Europe”. Well, Greece. Because of this whole “cradle of western civilisation” thing, the West honorarily accepts Greece as part of Western Europe. I don’t know if people realise that while it’s good when someone tells you “I want you to be part of us out of honour”, it’s extremely problematic in its essence because it screams the inherent superiority syndrome of West Europe. “We have picked up your entire culture so we allow you to be considered West Europe.” Well, thanks, but no thanks, folks.

Take a look at that:

See? It was not just angry Reddit Greeks. This is technically the "official" international stance on the matter.

There are in fact even foreign people who don't think Greece is part of the Balkans at all, which is insane because why would you even call it Balkan "peninsula" if not for Greece being in it??????? I repeat, Greece is 100% a Balkan country. Not only that but Greeks are one of the four Palaeo-Balkan peoples (Greeks - Thracians - Illyrians - Dacians).

And here’s where I am going to add one more layer to your mail, the biggest misconception about the Greeks, the one that the foreigners are just as guilty of, if not even more; you said, Greeks are more Eastern Europeans because of East Rome / Byzantine Empire and Ottomans. Well, that’s only part of it. There is simply no part of Greek history that is not eastern because the Ancient Greek was an eastern civilisation! One of the major ancient civilisations springing from the culture hub of the Near East and its periphery. Greeks interacted for centuries with Egyptians, Persians, Hittites, Phoenicians etc before they finally interacted with westerners, the Romans, and to whom they culturally gave more than they took. But even that was forgotten in the Middle Ages in the west (but not in the eastern - of course - Roman / Byzantine Empire). The Ancient Greek heritage was only re-discovered in West Europe during the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and that’s when West Europeans “remembered” suddenly that they are cultural children of the Ancient Greeks (well they aren’t, at least not organically) and therefore they now have to suffer modern Greece being acknowledged as part of the west because they don’t want to spell out that “Western Civilization” is just the formation of several western contemporary societies using elements from the foundations of an ancient Eastern Civilization. Westerners would love to think West sprang from a parthenogenesis but in truth the West sprang from the East.

So, yes, the Greeks started as Easterners, kept being Easterners and they are still Easterners. This however does not mean that they have all that many similarities to Eastern Europeans who expand on the north. Greeks have more connections to the south, the southwest and to the true east. They are technically less now though compared to all past periods of Greece because it is only after the independence and the formation of the modern state that Greeks became so west-oriented. The reason for this was their urgent need to distance themselves as much as possible from Turkey and find allies and supporters in the west, who would be willing to aid and support in the basis of protecting “the cradle of the West”.

Here I must add that the West has indeed taken a lot from Ancient Greece and respects it way more than the East (due to the recent historical and religious developments there). All I say is it was not organic, it was not the natural evolution of the western culture. And I am not saying Greece should distance itself from the West. No, I do think we should have strong bonds and be companions and co-members and allies but that doesn’t mean we should rewrite history and erase our identity in the name of this alliance. I am fine with Greece being the most west-friendly country of East Europe, which it already is. I just wished Greeks celebrated more their Eastern identity, rekindled their relations to any potential alienated eastern friends and did not fall victims into one of the biggest historical propagandas and misconceptions there are: Ancient Greeks = Western and powerful versus Byzantine and Modern Greeks = Eastern therefore useless and different people.

To end this far too long ongoing discourse, Greeks are all the following:

Europeans

South Europeans

Balkaners

Mediterraneans

(not applying to everybody) descended from Anatolians - Greek Asians - from Asia Minor

East Europeans

currently so politically and financially western allied and so influential to the west that they are essentially perceived to function more like West Europeans than East Europeans, without however being true Western Europeans

[cnestus]

i recently solved a fun little bug mystery at work and i thought it might be interesting to write up a step-by-step narrative of how i did so, as a sort of example of the kinds of things i get to do for my job. this is a stupidly long post because i have no editorial self-control so i'm putting the rest under a cut.

the above insect is a bark beetle, one of a series of 6 specimens i found in a drawer at work. they did not have species labels on them, and the collection labels indicated that they were collected in 1997 from "Chinese Cedrus used for artifical christmas trees." the infested wood had been intercepted and the beetles collected and pinned, but whoever was working in the lab at the time wasn't able to suss out the species, which is extremely reasonable because even IDing american bark beetles to species can be a massive pain in the ass, let alone ones from asia.

the beetles were clearly in the genus Phloeosinus based on the shape of the antennae and the large spines on the elytral declivity (the ass area), and whoever pinned them at least got them that far themselves, but determining the actual species was going to be a lot harder. even american beetles in this genus can be devilishly hard to confidently ID to species since they often look alike and also are quite morphologically variable in ways the bleed into each other. they are pretty cool though and those ass spines are usually critical in species-level identification

btw since i'm going to be writing out this word a lot in this post, it's pronounced roughly as "flea-o-sign-us" if you're curious.

determining bark beetle species is often made much easier by knowing what tree the beetle came out of since most bark beetles (but not ambrosia beetles, which are also scolytid/scolytine beetles but a whole other can of worms grubs) are highly host-specific, usually being adapted to only a certain tree species or genus or small group of related genera.

so Cedrus is the genus for eurasian cedar trees, and there is one species of Cedrus native to china, Cedrus deodara, but that seems like an odd choice of plant to harvest and send to america for artificial christmas tree trunks. most actual Cedrus species are from the mediterranean area. however there are also some chinese trees in the cypress family Cupressaceae (+Taxodiaceae) that are called cedars, and in fact most species of Phloeosinus are exclusively found in trees in this family. one likely species is Cunninghamia lanceolata, traditionally called "chinese fir" despite not being a fir but also more recently marketed as "chinese cedar" because that's how common names for species go.

oh and there is also the tree Toona sinensis in the family Meliaceae that's ALSO sometimes called "chinese cedar" for some reason but more importantly also called "beef and onion plant" lmao, but that was an even worse candidate for an artificial christmas tree trunk and also not a known host for the beetles. easily discounted but i had a laugh.

so my first angle of attack was to assume that the collection labels were correct and the beetles were in fact from a Cedrus tree. i was able to find a list of about a half dozen Phloeosinus species known to attack Cedrus cedars, but none of them were native to china. this would most likely mean that one of the mediterranean species had been transplanted to china for cultivation, which is entirely plausible. after digging though a bunch of literature i wasn't able to find a good key for Phloeosinus species in the entire area i wanted, but found a couple regional keys covering geographic ranges that when combined covered about what i wanted. for non-biologists, this is what a species key looks like:

sort of a choose your own adventure kind of thing but for determining a creature's true identity. anyway none of the results i got from these keys led to species who's descriptions matched the one that i had. i should also mention that my specimens had a rather distinctive feature unlike any other Phloeosinus species i'd ever seen before, which was an elytral vestiture consisting of these really funky little black explanate scales:

most Phloeosinus species have some kind of vestiture on their elytra but all the ones i'm familiar with have the hairs and scales light-colored and never shaped anything like this, so i figured that the description of the correct species would surely mention these scales.

so anyway dissatisfied with this avenue, i decided that the next most likely option is that whoever made the labels for the specimens was told that they had come from "chinese cedar" by the importer and had just assumed that meant Cedrus but it was actually one of the cypress family cedars. again most of the described species do in fact use Cupressaceae as hosts.

so next i found this UN report with a (hopefully) comprehensive list of all non-EU bark and ambrosia beetle species that attacked conifer trees. i culled from that a list of Phloeosinus species listed as coming from "asia." since that was too broad of an area, i then looked up all of these species in the species catalogues listed in the report, mostly Alonso-Zarazag et al (2007), though some were also listed in Wood and Bright (1992) or Bright and Skidmore (2002), which i happen to have physical copes of. from these i could narrow the list down to just species found in china.

now things became difficult because there are no keys to chinese Phloeosinus, or at least none in english. also even just written descriptions of many of these species were impossible to find because they were all written like 60-100 years ago and usually in chinese or german or french and had never been translated or uploaded anywhere online. likewise almost none of them had research-grade (or any) photos anywhere online.

so after hours of fruitless digging, the best i could come up with was a guide to scolytine beetles of korea (PDF link), which contained a key with a handful of the species on my list and did include english descriptions of these. now one of the species in the guide, P. perlatus, IS DESCRIBED as having dark scales, and my specimens did seem to land on that species when i ran them through the key. that's promising! and the hosts were on my list of possible non-Cedrus chinese cedars! also promising! buuuut something just didn't sit right with me. parts of the species description in that paper just didn't seem to quite match my specimens, like for example the size was a little off, described as being 2.4-3.4mm long, while all of mine were in the 3.3-3.6 range. plus the photos of the species, while distressingly low-resolution, just didn't look like mine.

okay so that was dissatisfying. i'd managed to whittle down my list of suspects a good deal from what little scraps of information i could find about them through my sleuthing, either the wrong hosts or the ones that did have english descriptions available online like in that korean guide didn't fit, but i was still left with several possible candidates and no way to narrow it down further, of course this all assuming that the beetles i had on my hands even were a species that had been scientifically described and named. bark beetles are a huge group of critters and many are quite understudied, especially in asia, and a bunch of new species are described every year!

i was about ready to just give up, but then by coincidence i had a reason to email a couple of high-level bark beetle researchers about a different beetle mystery i was also working on, which was in a group that they were the authorities on. on a whim, i mentioned my Phloeosinus conundrum to them to see if they had any ideas and they recommended i contact Dr. Roger Beaver. yeah, i know right? fucking kickass name i'm so jealous. sidenote: it's so funny how many bark beetle researchers have extremely appropriate names, like two of the biggest names in the field are Steve Wood and Dave Wood. no relation.

so anyway i contacted Dr Beaver, who had done some research on east asian Phloeosinus in the past and he was kind enough to send me an unpublished provisional key to chinese species that he had written up a few years ago. using that key, i ended up at "P. pertuberculatus (?=sinensis)" which means that there was some suspicion that P. pertuberculatus and P. sinensis were the same species, just described and named independently by two different entomologists (Hans Eggers and Karl Eduard Schedl respectively), as often happened, especially in the glory days of insane 18th-20th century european entomologists describing literally thousands of new species during their careers.

now these two species WERE both on my final list of suspects of chinese Phloeosinus species that hadn't otherwise been eliminated for one reason or another, and both had Cunninghamia "cedar" trees as known hosts. Dr Beaver was then kind enough to scan and send me the original descriptions of these two species:

which i was able to use google translate on:

not the nicest translation but still an admirable attempt on google's part to deal with all the entomological jargon, and most importantly the description of the elytral scales on P. sinensis definitely seems to match my specimens more than the pertuberculatus. plus i found a paper on taiwanese bark beetles (PDF) coauthored by Dr Beaver that had a (also distressingly low-resolution) photo of pertuberculatus that didn't seem to match my specimens:

aaand finally: i'd been trying for days to access the webpage of a chinese museum that popped up as the only notable result on a google image search for P. sinensis but every time the website would time out and the cached version of the image was too small to make out any details on, but it finally occurred to me this evening that the reason was probably because my work computer or work wifi was just automatically blocking chinese websites because of america's insane paranoia about chinese spying, and sure enough i opened it up on my home computer and it fucking worked!

that's a pretty fucking bang-on match for my specimens! the scales look right, the color is right, the size is right, the ass bumps are right, the host is right, the geography is right, and the translated description otherwise seems to match! here's mine again so you don't have to scroll all the way up:

so i'm calling this 26-year mystery solved! not all of the bug puzzles i've worked on have had as meandering of a path to their conclusion as this, but i thought that this one did display a good number of the different methods i use. the biggest thing that was missing was me wandering into my lab's massive library of old dusty entomology journals stretching back over a century and digging out some old article that never got scanned and put online, as often happens, but in this case since the bugs were asian and out library mostly covers north american entomology that wasn't going to be very fruitful.

hopefully this was interesting to... somebody besides myself. if you've read this far and weren't bored to tears then congratulations you probably have the same kind of brain damage as me!