Cecil Gershwin Palmer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lasthumanvoice) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
ph_logs2024-10-13 02:12 pm
lasthumanvoice) wrote in ph_logs2024-10-13 02:12 pm
[OPEN, Mingle] Yamsgiving
Who: Cecil and EVERYONE
What: Another Harvest Celebration
When: Beginning of Pumpkinfest
Where: Center of town
Warning(s): Discussion of the Gala and its attendant CWs may come up
1. Yes, we're happy as fish [Food Prep, Oak and Iron kitchen]
Cecil's made a point of seeking out the best known chefs in town to help him put everything together for this meal. While sweet potato dishes are the star, at least one available with every course, he's hoping to hit a broad variety so everyone can find something they like. He, of course, is peeling and chopping his eternal sweet potato to make sure there's enough to go around.
(Of course you don't need to worry about him with a knife! He's fine! Don't you know he was once a boy scout?)
If someone needs an extra hand for their dishes, though, he's happy to lend one. There's an attitude of camaraderie and cheer in the room, with Cecil even breaking out singing at one or two points in the evening.
2. And gorgeous as geese [The Meal; Festival Green]
Everyone's invited to the feast. That is, in fact, the whole point. Cecil's always been pointedly neutral in the town's tensions, working as the most unbiased media monkey he can. He's the Voice of Pumpkin Hollow, and that means not taking sides between Dahlia and Neil and the Temple and whoever else. But after the gala, he's made a choice to act, to try to foster goodwill and warm feelings. This isn't the stone stew he offered during January's famine, this is a Redwall-style feast.
So, between glasses of mead from Kasprak Farm and dandelion wine, everyone is invited to fill their plate with candied yams and zucchini bread, roast chicken and venison donated by one of the Enforcers. There's a homemade cranberry sauce with citrus wedges and dandelion-leaf salad with an apple cider vinaigrette and toasted acorns for garnish. There's pasta with a homemade pesto sauce and cheese. Desserts, too, are plentiful, some even flavored with...chocolate. But many are not, and feature sweet potatoes. Muffins, pies, etc.
Find a table with a friend or a stranger, and indulge. This is a warm-fuzzy type thing--feel free to use it as a mingle.
3. And wonderfully clean in the morning [Cleanup; Also Festival Green]
Cecil is, quite honestly, expecting to be the only person to stay and clean up. He's been up since about five in the morning and he's dragging a bit at this point. Oh, he did take the time to eat, so he's not starving, but like. He could use help putting the Green back to rights.
4. We've got everything, we're growing everything [Cecil Wildcards]
[You know how to find me to plot.]
What: Another Harvest Celebration
When: Beginning of Pumpkinfest
Where: Center of town
Warning(s): Discussion of the Gala and its attendant CWs may come up
1. Yes, we're happy as fish [Food Prep, Oak and Iron kitchen]
Cecil's made a point of seeking out the best known chefs in town to help him put everything together for this meal. While sweet potato dishes are the star, at least one available with every course, he's hoping to hit a broad variety so everyone can find something they like. He, of course, is peeling and chopping his eternal sweet potato to make sure there's enough to go around.
(Of course you don't need to worry about him with a knife! He's fine! Don't you know he was once a boy scout?)
If someone needs an extra hand for their dishes, though, he's happy to lend one. There's an attitude of camaraderie and cheer in the room, with Cecil even breaking out singing at one or two points in the evening.
2. And gorgeous as geese [The Meal; Festival Green]
Everyone's invited to the feast. That is, in fact, the whole point. Cecil's always been pointedly neutral in the town's tensions, working as the most unbiased media monkey he can. He's the Voice of Pumpkin Hollow, and that means not taking sides between Dahlia and Neil and the Temple and whoever else. But after the gala, he's made a choice to act, to try to foster goodwill and warm feelings. This isn't the stone stew he offered during January's famine, this is a Redwall-style feast.
So, between glasses of mead from Kasprak Farm and dandelion wine, everyone is invited to fill their plate with candied yams and zucchini bread, roast chicken and venison donated by one of the Enforcers. There's a homemade cranberry sauce with citrus wedges and dandelion-leaf salad with an apple cider vinaigrette and toasted acorns for garnish. There's pasta with a homemade pesto sauce and cheese. Desserts, too, are plentiful, some even flavored with...chocolate. But many are not, and feature sweet potatoes. Muffins, pies, etc.
Find a table with a friend or a stranger, and indulge. This is a warm-fuzzy type thing--feel free to use it as a mingle.
3. And wonderfully clean in the morning [Cleanup; Also Festival Green]
Cecil is, quite honestly, expecting to be the only person to stay and clean up. He's been up since about five in the morning and he's dragging a bit at this point. Oh, he did take the time to eat, so he's not starving, but like. He could use help putting the Green back to rights.
4. We've got everything, we're growing everything [Cecil Wildcards]
[You know how to find me to plot.]
no subject
"Lenushka!" Lyubov exclaims. "I've been ... feh, as good as can be expected."
The Gala was a little too much excitement for her. But maybe she's starting to get used to it all; or maybe the strategy of not thinking about it has been paying off in the short-term.
"'Tis good to see thee here! I thought thou wert not one for big gatherings? Or like, is the lack of ... nu, pomp make the difference between Cecil's party and the Gala?"
no subject
Less of a chance of her becoming an obstacle to others. She likes the atmosphere of all of this - it feels safe, unlike the threads of tension she's used to sensing in crowded events and places. But this reminds her of New Avalon, of her sister, of a memory soaked in warmth and strength. She's basking in it, and in her mind, shielded under soft wings.
"That, and the food smelled so delicious I knew I'd regret it if I stayed away. I can cook some, but not as good as this."
And a meal you don't have to cook is one you don't have to clean up all on your own. Whether or not she stays to help with this will depend on if she gets waved off or not.
no subject
"No obligation to dance, neither," Lyubov says. "Like, even without the unpleasantness, I rather regret attending the Gala? It's really like, too much."
She shifts in her seat, trying to find the words for why a formal ball is so different to the discothèque, but the words elude her. No matter; it's unlikely Helen will want to catch her out or treat the inconsistency as a betrayal.
"I can barely cook myself," she confides. "Nyura cooks. And, like ... back home, Gigi. Gigi and Nyura cook for the whole flat. I just like, nu, help out. Mostly by staying out of the way?"
It stings a little, to talk about the people she's left back home. She's been trying very hard not to think about it — something made much easier by Anzu's presence. Something of the pain flickers across her face, jarring her smile, and is then gone; but though Helena's privy not to her expressions, that flicker's reverb lingers in her voice for a full moment.
no subject
When. Not if. Not might. But the word when, with a certainty that the sun rises and sets, that a rock sinks when dropped into water, that spring comes anyway. It is a waiting game. But it is not eternal. It is not a permanent divide. That resolution, that stubborn and unwavering belief, is something she offers out to Lyubov. A jewel pressed into her palm, and Helena curling her fingers over it. It is hers, now, to do with as she likes.
no subject
"I hope thou'rt right," Lyubov says, accepting the jewel with gratitude. "Thank'ee. Thank'ee for ... saying so. For believing it when thou say'st it."
She surreptitiously brushes away a tear and, out of habit, smiles on purpose. She does feel like smiling, but without the scripts and routines she's carefully honed, her face would remain impassive, and only her eyes and sometimes her voice would show emotion.
But she doesn't need to do that with Helena, she realises a second later, and lets her face relax.
"Thou could'st be a rabbi thyself, nu? Maybe like, a Maharas rather than a Rabbah, if thou'rt more inclined to tread carefully 'round tradition."
no subject
"That's very high praise indeed. Perhaps in a life, there is a me who would be. But...there's a slight hurdle in this one. My beloved is Catholic." She shrugs her shoulders in a what can you do fashion. "I don't know if I understand the divine in the same fashion she does, but I'm doing my best to listen. At the very least, I want to understand the faith that gives her such resolve, that means so much to her. I want to know the beauty that is in her life, because it is hers, because it matters to her, and because if we share our lives, it will be in mine too by proximity."
Even if she never agrees with it fully, it feels like the most basic thing in the world to put in the effort to understand Darcy on this point.
no subject
[Continuing in overflow here!]