Anthony's Stupid Daily Blog (663): Tue 9th Jan 2024
Up at five in the cunting morning to get a taxi to Newcastle airport. It wasn’t cheap but since this trip is to repair the psychological damage the overtime I did over Christmas then this money was a pittance. My two options coming out of this period of overtime were to either murder someone or go on holiday so if paying £48 for a taxi ride to the airport stopped me from taking an innocent life then I think it was more than worth it (though thinking about it I could have just taken a non-innocent life, ah well too late now). I probably could have gotten a train at half six to the airport but I didn’t want to risk it being cancelled because they’ve been fucking useless over the last few months. I wobbled around the airport for three hours trying to kill time before the flight. Luckily I remembered to download a lot of episodes of Ideas Man the podcast from Ian Boldsworth and Barry Dodds which is just as funny as The Parapod if not more so. I was laughing so hard at one episode in a booth in Burger King that I started to get looks from other diners. As I was making towards the departure lounge for my flight I saw that a lot of other passengers gets had little yellow tags on their rucksacks and that’s when it hit me: “Oh fuck I forgot to get my bag weighed”. I was terrified that the Nazi bitch at the departure lounge was going to see that I didn’t have a yellow tag on and not let me on the flight. Luckily she just checked my passport and waved me straight through. Looking back I think those yellow tags were just for people who didn’t check in online like I did but I was genuinely scared there for a moment. I thought I was going to have to sprint back through the airport to get the back then sprint back to try and catch the plane. To be honest if the plane had already left I could probably rectify the situation by recreating the jetway scene from Dumb and Dumber. I’d probably end up with a broken back but it would be worth it. The flight was alright but some couple brought their kid with them who was a screaming little cunt for almost the entire flight. I genuinely wish that the oracles from the movie Minority Report were real because we could use them to disallow kids onto the plane who they predict are probably going to be a nuisance (I mean they would probably be used to predict if anyones going to try and blow the plane up but they can be used for two things). We landed thirty minutes ahead of schedule and the coach ride to the hotel didn’t take that long either. The hotel I’m staying in now is considerably nicer than the one I stayed in three months ago (unless you like your hotel to have ants crawling all over the floor which I don’t because I’m not an anteater. Maybe that hotel charged you to rent an anteater for the duration of your stay in addition to the fucking Wi-Fi). After I got unpacked I went for a walk around the area and got to enjoy the Sun for a few hours then went to a kiosk across the road from my hotel and booked a day of surfing for tomorrow. I can't believe I put off solo travel for so long because it does me the world of good and I urge everyone to give it a go.
Sheldon: Sheldon came from a long line of crime bosses and was forced to follow in his family's footsteps despite the fact that he actually wanted to be a movie director, so he was home schooled and was never given the chance to choose his own path in life, any time he tried to get out of the mobster lifestyle he would be slapped and yelled at. When he became an adult his parents retired and he became the new boss of the Moonshine mob, but because he was forced into a role he didn't want, he grew bitter and angry at the world and would take it out on the other members of the mob. He always carries around a megaphone not only to make sure his goons hear him loud and clear, but as a constant reminder of how he never got to be a movie director like he always wanted.
Anthony: Anthony was the runt of the litter, so he would always get bullied, not just by kids in his school but also by his own siblings and his parents couldn't care less, one day he ran away, believing that living on the streets would be better than living with his awful family, he would survive by stealing people's wallets or anything he could sell in order to have the bare necessities for survival, one day he would come across the Moonshine mob, who were hiring for a bodyguard at the time, he signed up for the interview, believing that it would be nice to not have to live on the streets and pickpocket for food, he got the job because Sheldon thought having an anteater would scare off the ant cops for sure, they shook hands and the rest was history.
Walter: Walter was a shy, sweet, and nerdy kid, he would always play by the rules and would try to politely get the other kids to do the same, his big brother Sebastian was his best friend and was always supportive of Walter, growing up Walter always wanted to be a police officer and protect the city from law breaking criminals, when he got to high school he fell in love with a squirrel named Annabelle who seemed to love him back and they started dating, after graduating high school Walter got accepted into Inkwell law school, Walter was so happy and his life felt perfect, until one day he got a call from his mother telling him that Sebastian was shot in a mass shooting and was killed instantly, Walter was devastated and went to tell Annabelle the news and saw her cheating on him with another man, he kicked both of them out and to and insult to injury he failed his first semester due to his brother's death and girlfriend's betrayal taking a major toll on him, he became homeless and started stealing and sleeping around with women to get by and he would even start smoking cigars to cope with his awful life and inner demons, he eventualy joined the Moonshine mob so that he could at least have a roof over his head, he worked up the ranks and eventually became Sheldon's right hand man, at first he was angry and hated how he became the exact opposite of who he both used to be and wanted to be, but eventually he started to embrace being a criminal because it's all he had left in his life, he became sadistic and loved torturing anyone who got one his or the mob's bad side, he also started smoking more often and slept with alot more women, some of which were even married, he kept doing that until a certain firefly entered his life.
Lucy: Lucy came from a family of all daughters, her parents we obsessed with being perfect so they forced Lucy and her sisters into competing in pangents, her parents made them jump through many mental hoops and forced them to wear dresses that clearly focused more on looks rather than comfort and a lot of make up, if neither Lucy or her sisters won, her parents would bribe the people running the pangents to change the winner to one of their daughters. When Lucy became an adult she tried to get up job outside of just being pretty, but she flopped because it was all she knew outside of reading and writing, one night she encountered Sheldon who was offering a job as a cabaret singer at the Moonshine mob, Lucy accepted the offer and joined the mob, she would meet Walter and the two would get along instantly. They would eventually start dating and Walter would stop smoking as much and stopped sleeping around, after a few years they got married and they couldn't be any happier.
« Dear Great Sage! Reciting a spell, he changed with one shake of his body into a pangolin, also named scaly anteater. Truly His four iron claws Could bore through hills and rocks like sifting flour; His scaly frame Could pierce cliffs and ridges like cutting scallions. Two luminous eyes Seemed like a pair of refulgent stars; A sharp, pointed beak, Stronger than any steel chisel or diamond drill. This was pangolin of medical fame; Scaly anteater was his vulgar name. »
( The Journey to the West, Revised Edition, Volume 3 (English Edition), trs Anthony C. Yu)
For more information on the fic, look here. For the rest, it’s all under the cut.
@cocoa-collabs for the Hurt/Comfort.
Getting thrown into prison can really make one question their life choices.
That was the very first thing Savannah realised when she realised that this was not, in fact, a situation she could get out of very easily.
“Here you are,” the guard grumbled, before locking her door behind her. Though she had mostly been gentle with her, Savannah grunted a little bit, maybe to get the guard’s attention, maybe to address her ‘roommate’, even she did not know the reason.
Whatever she had tried, it seemed to work, and before she could quite grasp what was happening, the Englishman addressed her sharply, “What is it this time?”
He must think I’m one of them, she realised with disgust, and said, with a bite to rival that of the Englishman, “What it is, is that we shall be sharing a, uh, an accommodation, let us say, and I will NOT be spoken to that way.”
He seemed to realise his error, and said hastily, “Dear lady, I do apologise!”
She softened a little at this. He was supposed to be the enemy, strictly speaking, as he was due to be involved in the ‘disappearance’ of Julio Che Rodriguez Alvarez de la Fuente, Major General of 1972, or as she liked to call him, the tyrant.
Still, there was something about him that she couldn’t help but find just a tiny bit adorable.
“I forgive you, I think.”
He extended a hand awkwardly. “My name is Anthony, but I go by Ant.”
She took it. “I’m Savannah. I shall be your new….roommate.”
He chuckled slightly, something she had come to realise was simply the English way. She stood around in her cell for a while, wondering what it was exactly that the Englishman found so fascinating about the floor.
“What are you looking at, Mr. Ant?”
He smiled gently. “No mister, just Ant. Speaking of, your people have a fascinating variety of ants. It’s a shame that you haven’t been able to tap into their potential as yet.”
Savannah couldn’t care less about nature, but the way his eyes seemed to light up when talking about it genuinely intrigued her. What could this man find so interesting about….ants?
“Their…..potential?”
“Why yes. Ants are economically important as well. They are enormous assets to the ecosystem of course, but underappreciated as far their monetary value is concerned.”
“What do they do? I know that bees make honey, and the worms help fertilise the soil….but ants?”
“Your indigenous ants, the red-fanged tropical ant, I mean, can cure acne within a matter of seconds! It will hurt of course, but it is extremely effective!”
“Ah, I see.”
“We didn’t have a surgeon,” he continued, “So the interviewer and I strategized various ways to change the former president’s face. I understand it was wrong, and I do apologise, lady, but it was what I needed to do to survive. See it as an ecosystem. In the moment, the interviewer and I were the ants, waiting to be slurped up by the anteaters lest we should mess up.”
There was no excuse for what he had been about to do. It seemed to Savannah that he was extremely aware of that fact, and felt genuinely badly for it, as a result. What surprised her even more about all this was that she was able to empathise with him, understand where he had been coming from with it all. She came a little closer to where Ant was seated.
“I- I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”
“Me too.”
She blinked. Didn’t they generally express condolences for others? What did he have to apologise to her for?
He continued, as if to elaborate. “I can see that you have been through a lot as well. I’m sure that this transition of power wouldn’t have been easy.”
For an insect-lover, Ant sure was intuitive. Alarmingly so, in fact. Even Perez, her oldest and dearest friend, hadn’t known just how much of a toll the revolution had begun to take on her. He cared, certainly, she wouldn’t dispute that. But Ant…..he somehow seemed to know that there was more to it.
She sighed. “My sister was one of the revolutionaries. Well before Perez had been able to form a somewhat stable state, she’d enlisted for the cause. A month into the fight, she disappeared. No one knows where she went, and now… now I do not wish to hope for her safety any longer. I know that it’s pointless.”
As she said all this aloud, she began to cry. Small hiccups one moment, a raging sob the next.
The English way began to return in Ant’s demeanor again as he awkwardly patted her shoulder.
“I am sorry for pouring all this out to you,” she said, the roughness in her voice not quite willing to leave just yet. “We have only just met, and here I am, pouring all my woes on to you.”
“Hey,” he said gently. “It’s all right. I could tell you really needed to talk, so I let you. Don’t worry about it.”
“Do you know were actually a lot younger than dragonflies? On-on the evolutionary scale, I mean.”
She laughed. “Ant, I appreciate your support, but you are terrible with people, do you understand that?”
He waggled his eyebrows, a rather silly gesture for someone so serious. “What can I say, I’m like a rock bee!”
She cocked her head at him, thoroughly confused, then realised that Ant’s intention was not in fact to feed her incredibly random facts. His pathetic attempt at socialising seemed to have the intended effect, however, as the mental image of the Englishman before her as a bee seemed utterly ridiculous. She burst out laughing, and after a very confused Ant interjected with protests of “I am” and “I really am!”, he finally joined in.
After they’d finished, Ant muttered, “I did not know I could make a woman laugh like that!”
“That’s because they wouldn’t have had a sense of humour. You really are a charming man, Ant. I’m trapped in a prison in a desolate wing of the palace, but I am glad that it’s with you.”
She found herself at the receiving end of that nervous, nerdy, charming, incredible smile, yet again. “Me too, lady, me too.”
They smiled at each other for a while, and before she knew it, he kissed her. She didn’t know how long it lasted, just that it wasn’t long enough.
They talked about all sorts of things after that, ranging from subjects as droll as finance, to as fascinating as ecosystems and management. After a while, possibly when it was approaching nightfall, Ant wished her good night, walked back and promptly collapsed on his bunk.
Savannah stared up at the ceiling, thinking about everything that had transpired. She didn’t know when the madness would end, or when she would see the freedom of the Monterosan streets again. For now, she was just happy to be in his company.