Vivat Libertas

Ah, more HBI. It's a good site. I was reading some of the stuff they have about abusive relationships and came across someone picking apart a guy's response to the site. Most of the time it was funny, but this disturbed me: " When people treat you bad on a regular basis, you're more often than not the author of your own misery. " I have to say I disagree. Not because I've actually done this and I'm trying to cover it up (if I had done this, after reading HBI I would have taken a long, hard look at my life and tried to stop, and I certainly  wouldn't have been blogging about it right now), but because this has happened to me and my friends. No, not abuse - our families aren't, for the most part, that dysfunctional, and even if they were I doubt my friends would really want to talk about it - but things like bullying. Keep in mind that I'm still in my teens and don't really know how the adult world works, having not had any experience

Ah, it's that time of the year again. No, not the time when they start herding you into large, draughty rooms and plonking exam papers in front of you - it's the time of year when they start trying to prepare you for that, otherwise known as "study skills". I put those words in quotation marks for a very good reason. Half of this is a rant about what happened at school and, to be frank, how much it pissed me off. Instead of our much-unloved Congers session (basically hymn practice), which is a chance to switch one's brain off for half an hour, one of the Learning Support people came in to talk to us about revision. That already set off warning bells in my brain, or more precisely, it set off an urge to suicide. That urge to suicide only grew into an urge to murder the speaker. Why? Well, there are a lot of reasons, and I'll go through as many as I can remember - you see, the speaker didn't take her own advice about making notes easier to remember... Fi

At last! I managed to write a new chapter! The next one will probably be up in May though, maybe April...just joking. Hopefully that doesn't turn out true. Apologies if anyone acts OOC - please tell me so I can rewrite it. Also, from here it starts to diverge from the published universe as I embroider the world (which, from the translations so far, isn't very embroidered). Also, NEVER do Les Mis in choir or elsewhere - you will  get addicted. "Lovely Ladies" is haunting me at the moment. “That’s it,” yawned Ceo, his tone silky smooth. “I really can’t go on any more.”  “I can,” sniffed Neo, “and we will go on, because we don’t have a place to sleep.”  “Ceo’s right,” said Teppe. “You’re not the only person in the world, and...er...we’re tired and need to get some shut-eye.”  Angering Neo was both easy to do and not advisable, especially when he was tired and even more short-tempered than usual, and Chasel had to physically restrain him from beating Teppe into a b

So you really  want to write a medieval European fantasy. You have everything wonderfully planned out: the characters, their clothes and facial expressions, even the drunken antics they got up to at a bar 15 years ago which, unbeknownst to them, started them off on their mysterious quest to get the MacGuffin and save the world as we know it. And then it hits you: you don't actually know anything about  medieval Europe! What do you do? Never fear: just make it up as you go along. I mean, as long as you don't throw in references to computers or phones, you'll be OK. And it's not like they didn't play basketball back then, right? Thing is, I'm quite sick of seeing "medieval" settings which are either LOTR ripoffs, have had no  research done on them, or both at the same time. It shows lazy thinking on the part of the author and disrespect for history and logic. "But it's in a fantasy world! I don't have to be completely accurate!"

More posts from  HBI ...yes, they are awesome, but this doesn't stop me from disagreeing with them sometimes. Yes, this one was from HBI, but it also applies to a lot of other situations. The long and short of it was that somebody, let's call this person A, was picking apart a response from somebody else, let's call this person B. Now, I have no problem with picking apart somebody's arguments. I do it a lot. I do, however, have a problem with insulting somebody in lieu of responding to their actual points. That's not really behaviour worthy of a heartless bitch, that's behaviour worthy of the assholes they're supposed to be attacking. Even more sickening was the fact that A refused to take B's reasons as stated and instead decided that ad hominem was a valid, educated debate tactic. Generally it's better to take people's motives at face value and work out their personality from there, even though - gasp! - it might involve changing your preconc

Ah, yet another article from  HBI .  This one talks about how women are expected to act like doormats to get men, which is something I've had experience with and which, as an intelligent girl respected by males as something more than a sex object (I have quite a lot of male friends, and more male acquaintances who won't tell me to get in the kitchen), really pisses me off. What also pisses me off is the article's use of the word "feminine" as a stand-in for "spineless wimp". And no, putting it in fancy pink text does not help. Being too lazy to think up new terms is not an excuse, whilst we're on this topic. And I believe the English language has many words to describe the kind of brainless bimbo in the article: "vapid", "vacuous", "spoilt"...I could go on. Being feminine means being like a woman. Being feminine, and by extension being like a woman, does NOT mean having to act like a shallow, worthless, mentally ret

Yes, I am  actually working on Summer Holiday and not just sitting on my arse doing nothing, but I felt I had to write something about this. Recently I found  HBI (Heartless Bitches International) , which for those of you who don't know is a pretty damn awesome site by strong-minded women for strong-minded women (and, by extension, pretty much everyone else if they have the strength of will to read it). I'm glad that not all of my sex are dishrags and I like reading their opinions, but sometimes I have to disagree, or I have to explain my points. Like now. Take  this link . For those of you who can't be bothered to open a new tab or window, what it basically says is "if you can't get a boyfriend, don't salve your ego and stop thinking you need a man to be complete". More specifically, what I take issue with is their stance that "if you want a boyfriend and can't get one, you must obviously be a stupid, needy vagina on legs who can't unde

Hallelujah! I finally managed to write a new chapter! Going into serious stuff now, and I might try my hand at black humour soon. Everything said before still applies. (By the way, if Vival isn't as snarky as I've written him, I heartily apologise and will hand the lines to another character.) “ Elves?! ” everyone said, more or less in unison. Sure enough, there were about fifty elves standing in the wreck of the woods, bows raised to kill.  “I think we know who we are,” said the one who had first spoken. Compared to the others, he was small and frail, and almost effeminate with his light brown hair and large eyes. Ceo was even about to practice throwing a flirtatious wink or two, but Teppe restrained him.  “Excuse me,” Elmyr began, “but – well, could you give us directions to Seabloom?” Not for the first time, Neo shot him a death glare.  The elves cast the humans some decidedly snobbish looks. “Well, we don’t have knowledge of a place called Seabloom,” the elf who had f

OK! I have now officially run out of buffer, so updates will be very slow and random. As Lesus predicted, Grisia did indeed end up with a massive hangover. He also ended up with a visit from his teacher, a reprimand from the same, and an order from the doctor not to get out of bed.  As soon as the bells rang out for Sices, Lesus snuck into the “warm, good” faction’s quarters and into Grisia’s room, where the future Sun Knight lay bandaged like a mummy.  “How are you going to get your things packed now?...” Lesus gently put a plate of cookies by Grisia’s bed, and the future Sun Knight turned to sniff them. “Echilan made these for you once he found out what happened.”  “Tell him I said thanks,” Grisia said, or at least he tried to say it; the poor boy was so badly battered that he had trouble speaking. Lesus frowned.  “Grisia, are you quite sure you’re all right?...Speak slowly.”  “...I’ve been worse off.”  “Do you need any help?”  “I’ll be fine.”  “No, really, do you need any help?”