there are a lot of posts out there that are positive and healthy coping mechanisms for handling the holidays. this is not one of them :)
i think there's like. going to be times in your life you will be stuck in a social situation that you cannot escape from gracefully. i do not know why the internet doesn't believe these times exist. it's not always just that your physical safety is at risk - sometimes it's legit like "i just don't currently have the energy or time to put in the effort of responding to this." sometimes it's a coworker you hate so much. sometimes it's just like, fine, you know? like you know you can handle your aunt when she's cheerily horrible, but if you actually set a boundary around her, it's going to be weeks of fallout with your father.
i don't know why people think the answer is always just "cut them out!" or "don't let them get away with that!" because ... the real world is tricky and complicated. i think kind of a lot of us have an internal "radiation poisoning" meter for certain people. like - i'm talking about the ones who are absolutely giving you gradual ick damage. like, you can handle them, but you'll be exhausted.
and yes. you absolutely should listen to your therapist and the good posts about handling others and set good boundaries and take care of yourself. prioritize peace.
HOWEVER :) ...... since im often in a situation with a Gradual Sense of Ick person i cannot just "cut out" of my life (without losing someone else precious to me) - i have sort of developed the most. maladaptive form of mischief possible. because like, if i'm going to have to listen to this shit again, i like to have a little bit of private fun with it.
now! again, i am physically safe, just mentally drained by this man. you should only do this with people you are not in danger with. which leads me to my suggestions for when your Unfortunate Acquaintance shows up and says oh everyone pay attention to me.
my favorite word is "maybe!" said as brightly and happily as possible. whenever the Horrible Person starts in on a topic you do not want to go further with, particularly if they make a claim that you know to be inaccurate, do not respond to it. you and i have both tried to actually argue with this person, and it hasn't gone well, because this person just wants the drama of an argument. however, "maybe!" gives them literally nothing to go on. it is incredibly disarming. they are used to people having some response. they know they can't prove what they're saying, and maybe! treats them like the child they are. it dismisses them in the politest way possible.
i like to say maybe! and then, in their stunned silence, immediately change the subject. this is because i have adhd and i will have something unrelated to talk about, but if you can't think of topics fast enough, i recommend just pointing to something and saying, "isn't that lovely?" because fuck you let's bring in some positivity.
by the way. that second trick - of pointing to something and stating an opinion about it? - that just works on its own, like, 70% of the time. i picked it up from teaching preschoolers. it's an intentional "redirect". it stops children crying and it also stops grown adults from finishing their explanation on why women belong in kitchens. dual wielding!
keep it silly for yourself. i absolutely do not care if people think i'm fucking stupid (it's more fun if they do) and as a result i will purposefully misunderstand things just to see how long it takes them to realize i've completely removed them from the subject at hand. when they say "women aren't funny" i get to be like. "which women." "all women." "all women in america?" "no in the world." "like the mole people? the people in the world?" "what? no. like, alive." "oh are we not counting the mole people?" "what the fuck are you talking about." "you don't believe in the mole people?"
similarly, i play a personal game called "one up me." my Evil Acquaintance literally knows this game exists (my family & friends caught onto it and now also play it) and it always fucking gets him. i don't know why. you have to be willing to be a little free-spirited on this one, though. the trick is that when they make one of those horrible little bigoted or annoying comments they are always making, you need to go one unit weirder. not more intense, mind you - just more weird. "you don't look good in that dress." "yeah, actually, my other dress was covered in squid ink due to a mishap at the soup store." "you shouldn't wear such revealing clothes." "wait, what? oh shit. sorry, your son tears off strips when no one is looking and eats them. i swear it was longer before we left the building."
the point of "one up me" is to completely upend this person's narrative. we both know this person likes setting up situations where you cannot "win" and then they really like telling other people how badly you handled it. in a usual situation, if you respond "please don't say something that rude", you're a bitch. but if you let it happen, you're letting yourself be debased. they are not usually expecting door number three: unflappably odd. because what are they going to say when they're telling everyone how badly you behaved? "she said my son eats her dresses" ".... okay?"
if you can, form an allyship with someone whomst you can tagteam with. where they can pick up on your weird "soup store" story and run with it.
the following phrase is amazing and can be deployed for any situation: "oh, be nice :) it's the holidays!" i do not know why this works as often as it does. i'll say it for the most random shit. i think this is bc most of the time these people know they're being impolite, they just like to fight.
godbless. when in doubt, remember that you could always start stealing their pens.
the whole point of this is - if you can't escape. maybe see how long you can just be. like. a horrible little menace.
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thinking about The Girls again and how thematically interesting Ward would have been if Taylor had been living with Lisa. Only barely tangentially involved cape business. Would mostly just work as a barista or a bookshop owner or something and went home to help Lisa with Aiden and played card games with Aisha and the rest of her group on the weekends. Would give people advice and stuff but very deliberately didn't get involved.
I understand that the absence of Taylor was almost it's own character in Ward, but all the same, I really do think that Taylor being shown to have almost succeeded in moving on from capery, being about a normal person as she could be- maybe not happy all the time but content with her life where she gets to live with her best friends, sell books and maybe help some people here and there on the side would have helped with how emotionally distressing ward got, and provide hope that even someone as horrendously unstable and damaged as Taylor managed to find some peace in a world where peace often feels like an abstract concept.
heck, i think Taylor being there would have also provided Victoria with someone who would have been able to give her the perspective check she really needed at times. Because while i love that girl, my god did some of her plans and actions reach some real moments of horror. Would have been a really cool narrative moment for Taylor to hear Victoria's idea for the new superprison and be like
"This is an idea I would have had when I was a cape. I didn't expect I'd hear it from you."
Basically I'm saying that it would have been cool to see Ward be less about the massive, sprawling fights and crazy shard shenanigans and be more of a contemplative story about the rebuilding of society, how and if capes can retire, how can you be a good person and also enjoy being a superhero when your job is largely defined by violence, ect.
Oh and also Victoria and Ashley should have had more homoerotic moments with each other so taylor and lisa could stare at them and go "ah, remember when we were like that? good times."
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hi y’all !! i’m getting to my inbox messages , i promise , but i saw that it's been confirmed that logan and j*mes aren't on speaking terms , and that's genuinely insane to me . and yes i will be censoring his name from now on because i am pissed off !!!
especially considering how chipper j*mes has been recently , piping up on logan's radio as often as he can to tell him how wonderful he's doing after that article . i'm not saying it isn't true ; it's been confirmed by marcus ericsson on the swedish podcast viaplay F1 .
i personally find it ridiculous to see that a team principal is no longer speaking with his own driver . that , for whatever reason , he dislikes logan so much that it's lead to this . and the mistreatment of logan will continue . just wait until we find out in two weeks that alex's new teammate isn't logan , and better yet logan might even be replaced after the summer break . it's absolute heinous for him to be continuously treated this way , and it's absolutely infuriating . to see logan continue to be treated like this makes my blood boil . i genuinely am beginning to believe that they only kept logan on the team because of the fanbase and american sponsors he brought in . and to think that could be true is actually insane . it's incredible to me that a team principal can be so conceited that this is what his relationship looks like with a driver . that he only speaks to him and is kind for pr reasons , as we've clearly seen . and it makes me both so sad and so pissed off for logan . he genuinely deserves SO MUCH better .
the quote from the podcast , as has been translated to english , is as follows:
"I was also told this weekend by some American friends who know Sargeant that it is... He doesn't have fun in that team either. He thinks it's really hard and apparently so are he and James Vowles. They don't even talk to each other, it's hardly that they greet each other. There has been a complete disconnection between them."
please excuse any errors that may have transpired through translation ; i don't know swedish and had to use an online translator !
here is a link to a twitter post where the quote above is said (again , in swedish): https://x.com/F1_Tracktion/status/1815802308208254998
if anyone speaks swedish and can better translate the quote , please do ! it would be greatly appreciated so i can update the translation and i'll be sure to credit you for it !!💓
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race day thoughts from Singapore !! aka danny ric truly the dotd + main character max verstappen
nothing to really say about the win, considering this is exactly what lando should be doing with the rocket, miserable time for me as a max fan but we move ig
almost got a grand slam but my man, my hero, my petty bitch boy's bestie Daniel Ricciardo decided to not only ruin his slam but also lessen the damage that max took from this weekend, muahhhhh (i have never really liked you king but this deserved a standing ovation)
max verstappen pulling that rb20 into the front row and then defending that spot from a lewis with soft tires was Beautiful, an incredible result
speaking of max, the fact that he only lost like 10 points to lando over the double header is Insane, considering this was the worst track combination for red bull lmao this is truly what i call damage limitations
i was quite surprised by what mclaren (🤮) did with oscar, no clue what that pit strat was, cuz that man could have very easily been p2 but he didnt manage to close up the gap to max at all at the end so idk man
the mercs were kinda underwhelming, i thought lewis would be an insane threat to max but he fell off quite quickly and then george was busy fighting his car and defending from oscar so also idk man
oh ferrari, my sweet sweet summer children, why have you decided to go back to your roots and completely fuck yourselves 😭 no clue what went on there
also carlos needs to stop picking fights with rookies dude, colapinto having the balls to pull off an incredible start is exactly what he needs to do considering he doesnt have seat next year anyways
also carlos has zero room to talk about someone potentially causing a collision when he has crashed 2 race weekends in a row from his own dumb mistakes
charles jumping from p9 to like p5? i think? was quite impressive considering we had zero safely cars
speaking of that
WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY SAFELY CARS
SINGAPORE IS NOTORIOUS FOR THE AMOUNT OF SAFETY CARS, AND THE FIA TAKE AWAY THE ONE PART OF THE TRACK THAT USUALLY CAUSES THEM AND RUINS MY FUN ????
bro we have gone like 8 races with zero safety cars, what the fuck is going on 😭😭
kmag promised me that he would "fuck shit up" and all he gave me was a botched attempt at a fastest lap 😔 all men do is Lie
also i didnt think this needed to be said but because zak is crying in the media, danny ric was not the only one trying to get fastest lap lmao i cant believe we are back at the 'rbr have 4 drivers on the grid :((((" debate again lmao
the way some people talk about rb, it sounds like h*rner has direct radio comms to yuki and daniel and can just order them to do shit lmao
also welcome liam lawson to rb 🫡
Honorable mentions list:
max verstappen my sweet petty bitch i adore you, this man got community service for saying "fuck" and made it everyone elses problem lmao
the other drivers cracking jokes about it and defending max makes me so fuckin happy dude, i love seeing the drivers united like this
we saw it after the media shitstorm after the austria weekend and now here ❤️
max conducting special press cons cuz the media isnt at fault here and they shouldnt be punished for something the fia did makes me smile, cuz this is max being a mature but still petty bitch and i love him for it
the "theres something with my voice" comment was so funny pls
but also his comments after the race about how f1 is turning the environment unpleasant makes me miserable dude
max already fuckin hates the circus around the sport and now this weird need to clean and polish the sport even more is annoying as fuck
kinda ironic that they want to promote the sport in america more and then pull shit like this lmao
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