Thank You Canada 🇨🇦

What's really in that witch's cauldron?

Folk names for herbs

Ass' Ear- Comfrey

Bat's Wing- Holly Leaves

Beard Of Monk- Chicory

Bear's Foot- Lady's Mantle

Bird's Eye- Germander or Speedwell

Blind Eyes- Poppy

Blood From a Head- Lupine

Blood Of Ares- Purslane

Blood Of Hestia- Chamomile

Bloody Fingers- Foxglove

Calf's Snout- Snapdragon

Cat's Foot- Ground Ivy

Crow's Foot- Wood Anemone

Devil's Ear- Jack In The Pulpit

Devil's Plaything- Yarrow

Dew Of the Sea- Rosemary

Dog's Mouth- Snapdragon

Dragon's Teeth- Vervain

Elf Leaf- Lavender

Englishman's Foot- Common Plantain

Fairy Eggs- Nutmeg

Flower Of Death- Vinca

Goose Tongue- Lemon Balm

Graveyard Dust- Mullein

Hawk's Heart- Wormwood

Juno's Tears- Vervain

Jupiter's Beard- Sempervivums

Lion's Foot- Lady's Mantle

Little Faces- Viola

Man's Bile- Turnip Sap

Mortification Root- Rose of Sharyn

Nose Of Turtle- Turtlehead, Chelone

Nosebleed- Yarrow

Our Lady's Tears- Lily Of The Valley

Old Man's Flannel- Mullein

Ram's Head- Valerian

Scale Of Dragon- Tarragon

Semen Of Ares- White Clover

Semen Of Hermes- Dill

Serpent's Tongue- Dog's Tooth Violet

Sparrow's Tongue- Knotweed

Tree Of Doom- Elder

Unicorn Root- Boneset

Weasel Snout- Yellow Archangel

Wool Of Bat- Moss

Body Parts as Plants:

Eye- Blossom or Seed

Heart- Bud or Seed

Beak, Bill or Nose- Seed, Bud or Bloom

Tongue or Teeth- Petal or Leaf

Head- Blossom

Tail- Stem

Hair- Dried Herbs or Stringy Parts Of Herbs

Privates, Genitals Or Semen- Seeds Or Sap

Blood- Sap

Guts- Roots or Stalk

Paw, Foot, Leg, Wing or Toe- Leaves

Animals as Plants:

Toad- Sage

Cat- Catmint

Dog- Grasses, Specifically Couchgrass

Frog- Cinquefoil

Eagle- Wild Garlic

Blue Jay- Laurel

Hawk- Hawkweed

Lamb-Wild Lettuce

Nightengale- Hops

Rat- Valerian

Weasel- Rue

Woodpecker- Peony

I borrowed this from:

How a Character’s Anger Can Show Up Quietly

Anger doesn’t always slam doors. Sometimes it simmers. Sometimes it cuts.

╰ They go still. Not calm... still. Like something is pulling tight inside them.

╰ They smile, but their eyes? Cold. Flat. Done.

╰ Their voice gets quieter, not louder. Controlled. Measured. Weaponized.

╰ They ask questions they already know the answers to, just to watch someone squirm.

╰ Their words are clipped. Polite. But razor-sharp.

╰ They laugh once. Without humor. You know the one.

╰ They leave the room without explanation, and when they come back? Different energy. Ice where fire was.

THE ERA OF VANISHING HAS BEGUN

They are not arresting people. They are vanishing them.

Rumeysa Ozturk wasn’t read her rights. She wasn’t told why she was being detained. She was walking to break her fast in Somerville, Massachusetts when masked men in an unmarked SUV pulled up, took her phone, slapped on handcuffs, and dragged her into a vehicle like she was some kind of national security threat.

She’s a doctoral student. A Fulbright scholar. A trauma researcher. But in Donald Trump’s America, she fit the profile: Muslim, foreign-born, sympathetic to Palestinians.

Now she’s locked in a for-profit detention center in Louisiana, hundreds of miles from her lawyer, after a federal judge specifically said she wasn’t to be moved.

They moved her anyway. Because rules no longer apply to those with badges — real or fake.

A MOVEMENT BUILT ON CHAINS AND COWARDS

Alireza Doroudi is gone too.

He’s a doctoral student at the University of Alabama, born in Iran, studying mechanical engineering. No criminal record. No warning. Just scooped off the grid.

ICE refuses to say where he’s being held. No public charge has been announced. His only crime appears to be existing in the wrong body, from the wrong country, in the wrong era.

Mahmoud Khalil was next — a Columbia student, arrested for leading pro-Palestinian protests. Trump labeled him a “radical foreign Hamas sympathizer” on Truth Social. Days later, he was gone.

Jeanette Vizguerra was taken from her Target shift in Colorado, chained at the waist.

Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez, a farmworker organizer, was dragged from his car at dawn in Washington. His window was smashed by federal agents. His voice silenced.

These aren’t isolated incidents. These are deliberate acts of political intimidation.

They are testing the system — testing us — to see how many people they can disappear before we stop calling it democracy.

WHEN ICE IS A BADGE — AND A COSTUME

While the real ICE disappears scholars, organizers, and mothers, the fakes are circling like vultures.

In South Carolina, Sean-Michael Johnson posed as an ICE officer. He pulled over a van of Latino men, screamed slurs, jiggled their keys, and knocked a phone out of someone’s hand. “You’re going back to Mexico!” he shouted. He wasn’t an agent — but he played one with conviction.

In North Carolina, Carl Thomas Bennett used a fake badge to sexually assault a woman at a motel. He told her if she didn’t comply, he’d have her deported. He held up a counterfeit ID and pretended to be the state.

And in Philadelphia, a Temple University student in an “ICE” shirt tried to storm a dorm building with two accomplices. They were dressed for the part, intoxicated by the illusion of authority, emboldened by the climate.

This is what happens when the state makes cruelty a brand. When a badge becomes a fetish object. When the line between enforcement and cosplay disappears altogether.

THE WHOLE SYSTEM IS THE CRIME

Let’s stop pretending this is a coincidence.

This is a unified strategy. The Trump administration is using ICE like a personal strike force — targeting international students, protest leaders, organizers, and mothers with surgical precision.

They invoke secret designations. They bypass due process. They manufacture pretexts out of thin air and rely on the fog of bureaucracy to hide the blood on the floor.

The point isn’t law enforcement. The point is deterrence. Spectacle. Control.

This is what political cleansing looks like when it’s dressed up in the language of national security.

They’re showing the world that resistance has a cost — and the cost is your freedom, your voice, your visibility, your future.

SILENCE IS CONSENT. AND WE ARE LOUD.

There is no middle ground here. No fence to sit on. No neutral position when people are being kidnapped in the name of the state.

ICE doesn’t need your applause. It needs your silence. Every time a student vanishes and the media shrugs, every time a woman is cuffed and the public looks away, the machine gets stronger.

They are daring us to ignore it. They are counting on our numbness. They are betting that we’ll keep scrolling.

We cannot let them win.

This is not border policy. This is not visa enforcement. This is not safety.This is authoritarianism with a PowerPoint presentation.This is fascism disguised as formality.

This is the state stripping people from the land and pretending it’s order.

Let the record show:

They took people.

And we did not look away.

We saw it.

We named it.

We raised hell.

And we did not stop.

(I didn’t write this. Credit goes to Fear and Loathing: Closer to the Edge)

Making Fight Scenes Sound Nicer

Euphonics is all about how the words "feel". By incorporating certain sounds, you can influence the mood of the passage.

Mood: Foreboding

use words with 'ow', 'oh', 'ou', 'oo' sonds. These are good for building tension before the fight.

moor, growl, slow, wound, soon, show, show, grow, tow, loom, howl, cower, mound.

Mood: Spooky

use words with 's' sounds, combined with an 'i' sound.

hiss, sizzle, crisp, sister, whisper, sinister, glisten, stick.

Mood: Acute Fear

use word with 'ee/ea' sounds, with a few 's' sounds.

squeal, scream, squeeze, creak, steal, fear, clear, sheer, stream

Mood: Fighting Action

use short words iwth 't', 'p' and 'k' sounds.

cut, block, top, shoot, tackle, trick, kick, grip, grab, grope, punch, drop, pound, poke, cop, chop.

Mood: Speed

use short words with 'r' sounds

run, race, riot, rage, red, roll, rip, hurry, thrust, scurry, ring, crack

Mood: Trouble

use words with 'tr' sounds to signal trouble

trouble, trap, trip, trough, treat, trick, treasure, atroscious, attract, petrol, trance, try, traitor

Mood: Macho Power

If you wan to emphasize the fighters' masculinity, use 'p' sounds.

pole, power, police, cop, pry, pile, post, prong, push, pass, punch, crop, crap, trap, pack, point, part

Mood: Punishment

If your fight involves an element of punishment use 'str' sounds

strict, astride, strike, stripe, stray, strident, stroke, strip, instruct, castrate strive

Mood: Defeat

use 'd' sonds

despari, depressed, dump, dig, dank, damp, darkness, drag, ditch, drop, dead, deep, dark, dull

Mood: Victory

use 'j' and 'ch' sounds

joy, cheer, jubilant, jeer, chuck, chariot, choose, chip, jest, jamboree, jig, jazz, jive, rejoice, rejoin

In print, the effectiveness of such euphonics will be very subtle, and it can only serve as an embellishment to what you already have.

Don't use or replace words for the sake of achieving euphonic effects, but this can be something to keep in mind when you are editing your draft!

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The classic betrayer

This is where everyone subtly knows that this guy's going to turn the other way.

The betrayer puts on a show for our heroes - kind, compassionate and supporting at first.

it just so happens that the villainthinks the heros are the bad guys.

make them actually likable.emotionally ruin the hero upon betrayal.

The remorseful traitor

whether he had bad intentions from the start or was deceived by others, the betrayer regrets his choices.

when he realizes his mistakes, it's too late to stop the evil, which introduces guilt.

throw the guilt and shame on the character.

even the protagonist can be a traitor! will others forgive him?

The Double Agent

this type of traitor will keep the readers wondering whether this guy is truly on your side.

keep your readers guessing. is that an evil smirk or a genuine smile? does he really love drinking, or is he just trying to get the hero drugged?

Snape in Harry Potter is a great example.

The guy can be good or bad - just keep balancing the two

Unrealiable narrators

these characters are not entirely betrayers, but horribly misinformed. they can make others appear like traitors - when in truth, they just have it wrong.

pit your narrow-minded narrator against his allies.

these characters are great for misunderstanding plots.

have your narrator do irreversible damage to the hero. would they forgive him?

Tragic betrayers

these are characters, due to their past wounds and trauma, cannot help but betray the group.

they confess the hero's secrets under physical/mental torment and doesn't have the backbone to do otherwise.

these characters can either be pitiful or frustrating would the hero still fight for the betrayer?

Play around with pov

you can have the readers know about the upcomong betrayal by switching points of view, building up anticipation to the moment of realization.

on the flip side, you can change povs in a way that the reader doens't see what's happening at the hero's back.

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This is a message of appreciation 🙏 to all of you for standing by us.

As the announcement of the ceasefire in Gaza approaches 🕊️, the first thing I do is write these words to express my gratitude and thanks 🌟 for being part of our survival.

This post is a message of gratitude and appreciation ✨. I hope it will be shared and spread widely—just reblog 🔄.

Post link

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I hope you are well🌹

Can you help me get my voice heard

and share my family's story?🙏🏻

Can you Reblog my pinned post from my blog or donate 10$?

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antigone was right

concrete circles ⚪️

Writing Update:

Words Written: 1537

Excerpt:

Esther mused as the insomniac nyctophiles ambled underneath the moon, swooning by the promises of halcyon days framed by the stars and meteors and heartbreak. Days that stretched too long in its burning intensity and nights where rain draped lovers in midst of sweet kisses. 

The warmth of Ivory's breath lingered down from ear to her collarbone, pressing a ghost of a kiss as she commented offhandedly about her day. Esther wondered if she hadn't spent days underneath the earth in its caves and stations, if she'd still have the sun-kissed skin of her mother when she looked in the mirror, missing her in the curve of her lip, the shape of her jaw, and the dip in her brows.  

She missed her terribly, the lilt in her lullabies, the firm frown laced with mirth when Milas burnt his mouth for the fourth time in the same meal.

She remembered the familiar weight of her hand that had now been replaced in her chest, uncomfortably tight around her throat and ribs. 

Her father would keep them safe, with his calloused hands that could lift her up and twirl her in a dance, with the rage and ferocity that rivaled her mother. 

She would gather their numbers, keep them safe- find them again.'