Flowers, friends, etc

[smokingboot]

I want and need to cheer myself up, so I checked on my seeds in the conservatory. The corn cockles have gone mental, the moon daisies and chamomile are grooving on down, and at long last the heartsease, meadowsweet, petunias and nicotiana are making some kind of effort. No results from the gourds, bolivian peppers and columbines yet. And I remain disturbed by the pumpkins. One long strand has emerged from the earth, and then there's one other...thing...I don't know what it is. It looks like teeth emerging out of a seed. Maybe it's mould. I'm scared to touch it in case it jumps out of the earth, a fully fledged skeletal warrior. I think I will just avoid it for a while.

And frankly, I still need cheering up.



Friends. Well, the Stabface weekend was IC very difficult, though OOC I think the campaign is moving forward in a more positive way. It's a very good group, full of sincere people. But I am feeling low for a number of reasons; some members of the stabface crew, myself included, have joined a fabbo group for Maelstrom. Great concept and very fair rules; all prospective members have to be universally accepted by already existing members. We agreed to this and it's fine.

Except that now, one of our most excellent chums has been blackballed. One or two members of the Maelstrom group are not comfortable with the idea of them joining. They have a right to their feelings and opinions, I'm not judging them, I don't know what has happened to make them feel this, and what's more I have no right to know. Point is, this was the agreement and I will abide by it without rancour.

I'm just a little dashed by it, a little sad.

I've been blackballed before, but never from anything I wanted to be part of (don't ask - I didn't!) At the time, I laughed and praised my super powers of Wanker Repellent. Now it has happened to a most excellent chum, it's different.

I guess some part of me is so excited by the whole thing, I want the gang to be big and generous and sunny, and without any touch of grudge. I'm not sophisticated really, I'm still a little kid waiting to go off on Summer Holiday with Cliff and Una, where everybody is ready to like everybody else. I know life isn't really like that, that the world is more difficult and complex, that when guys offer you a double decker ride, they may not have a bus in mind. I know that people are just not children of sunlight all day every day. Hell, I'm not.

I know all this.

Still, it makes poor Boot's ears droop.