Nathan Xavier
July 26, 2020 7:15 PM
Beginners: Pepper-up the Peppermint by Nathan Xavier
Nathan's second child wasn't even born yet and was already costing him sleep. Or rather, they were costing Isis sleep. And he woke up every time she got up to use the toilet, so neither of them was sleeping entirely well anymore. It was a kind of training for them, he supposed. It would get much worse than this once the baby was born and he'd be called upon to do more than mumble something vague as he commiserated with her frustration with the squashed size of her bladder and her inability to find a comfortable position to lay in, despite the body pillow and cushioning charms. At least the nausea had largely passed, or else the crackers and water next to her side of the bed were doing their job sufficiently that it was a negligible problem.So he was reacquainting himself with a coffee habit (that, too, would surely worsen later, but he was currently at a single habitual mug every morning now, up from the occasional one he used to get only when Dora slept poorly or he was up half the night harvesting under the light of a full moon). His students were probably noticing he was looking slightly more haggard sitting at the staff table now than he had been prior to the midterm break, particularly the beginner ones who didn't know what a Truly Haggard Looking Professor Xavier looked like. To the advanced students who would remember when Dora was born, though, he was most likely still looking pretty normal once he'd imbibed his daily caffeine.
The good news for the Beginners was that their class was situated right in the middle of the day, after he was fully awake, after he'd gotten the energy boost from enjoying his lunch break, and before he started to crash again. During their class, he could almost still feel normal.
So today he met them at the door to Greenhouse One with his usual smile and the homework essays he'd graded and was returning now with personalized comments about their work or letting them know when his office hours were.
Once everyone had arrived, gotten their homework back, and taken seats at one of the two long work tables that ran down the center of the larger of Sonora's two greenhouses, he began his lecture. "So today, we're going to talk about a plant everyone here should have heard of before. It's an interesting one, in that it's used in a number of potions but doesn't actually have much of a magical effect. Though it can be used to help with potions dealing with alertness and improving memory, it's usually there for just one reason: It's got a very powerful taste that can cover up some of the less appealing ingredients in elixirs intended for ingestion. So."
He used his wand to float trays of fragrant leafy plants in front of each student. "What you've got in front of you are some peppermint plants. They're getting too big for those trays, so we're going to moving them into larger planters until it warms up enough outside to move them into the garden. We learned repotting techniques just before the break, so this follows the same pattern. Get your pots from that shelf over there," he pointed over to the shelf full of orange ceramic pots.
He then reminded them all of the steps involved, because the first years had only done this twice before, and the purpose of this lesson was equally as much to review the re-potting process as it was learning anything about peppermint. "Fill the pots with soil, dig your hole, pop the peppermint plant out of its tray, tuck it into the hole, fill in more soil, pat it pretty tight but don't crush the plant, then water it. Repeat for the other two plants in your tray. If you want, you can add fertilizer either on top after its planted or to the hole right before you add the plant. Second years, you should be getting to be old hats at this, so if you see a first year having trouble, please help them out, if you can. I'm also available for questions if you have any or run into trouble. You may begin."
Subthreads: I...understand? by Sadie-Lake Chalmers with Valentine Duell
With plenty of pep! by Theo Spurn with Quincy Wright
Even for wizards. by Alexander Pierce-Beales with Josephine Clyde
This sounds so much easier on paper. by Graham Osbrook
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Nathan Xavier
Beginners: Pepper-up the Peppermint
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Theo Spurn
July 31, 2020 6:00 AM
With plenty of pep! by Theo Spurn
“Thanks! You too!” Theo told Professor Xavier with a cheerful smile when the teacher handed back his assignment with a ‘good job.’ Professor Xavier was rounder and squishier than most of the other professors so Theo sometimes gave him hugs as he took back his assignment. Today was one of those days. He was pretty sure that everyone needed to hear nice things and be hugged as much as possible.Theo took a seat near the front because he liked seeing what was going on. He pulled on his gloves so thathe was ready. A lot of times, Herbology was not very nice to touch. He did not love it. Dirt was gritty and small and unpleasant. But with gloves on, sinking your fingers into dirt was squishy. It was a sort of weird alarming but not bad experimental good. The outside of the gloves were not soft enough for it to matter that dirt got on them, and there was no reason to think the dirt would get inside. He did not like the thought of it trickling down his skin between his glove and his hand, but plunging his fingers into it from the outside was intriguing. It was one of those textures that varied depending on how you interacted with it.
Today they were repotting! There were pots over there! Theo bounced up, going to get some. He became vaguely aware as he returned to his seat that Professor Xavier was still talking but he mostly just seemed to be saying things Theo already knew. He turned to his plant, considering where to begin.
“Hello!” he said cheerfully to it, because it was always nice to start with introductions. Luckily, Professor Xavier had finished talking by this point. “I’m Theo, and I will be your repotter today! And you are a peppermint! Pep-pep-peppermint!” he grinned. It was fun to say, so he continued to chant it. After a while it evolved into a little song. There weren’t really any more words but there was just something rhythmical and nice about pep-pep-pep-pep-pep-pep-pep--pep-peppermint that wanted singing and repeating. Plants liked being talked to. They probably liked being sung to too. Singing was fun.
He remembered that he was supposed to be repotting, and began heaping some earth into one of the pots, continuing to sing as he did so.
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Theo Spurn
With plenty of pep!
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Quincy Wright
August 07, 2020 10:31 AM
SO much pep. by Quincy Wright
Quincy loved Herbology. It was hard to say whether this or Potions was his favorite. Care of Magical Creatures was definitely his third favorite, although he liked Professor Marsh. He liked animals, too, but he liked them better to study as a specimen than to get pooped on, kicked, squirted at, oozed on, or some other horrifying atrocity of magic kind. Plus, COMC was sometimes less hands-on than Quincy preferred, as they were often observing creatures, or doing chores for them. He liked it well enough - it was still third place, after all - but herbology and potions took the cake.Today's herbology lesson seemed weirdly easy, but he supposed not all of his classmates maybe weren't as comfortable. They'd already studied repotting techniques last term, so this sort of felt repetitive, but that was okay. Although Quincy generally didn't like tedious activities that much, he could appreciate that they were helpful. Plus it gave him time to think and he could do it quick, which gave him time to look at the plant, check out the soil, etc. Which he began with, because he took a small vial from his pocket to collect a sample of the dirt that was near the roots of the peppermint plant already, intending to study it later. First, though, he had to get the plant out.
His neighbor seemed to have another way to do that, although Quincy wasn't sure that talking the plants out of their pots was going to work very well. At least he seemed vaguely interested in the thing though, so Quincy took up the spot by his side. "Did you know it's a hybrid?" he asked curiously. "Peppermint is from watermint and spearmint. It's called peppermint because it's peppery." Technically, it was called peppermint because it was mentha piperita, but it was called that because it was peppery. Except . . . it wasn't really. "There is some wild peppermint now, though," he added.
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Quincy Wright
SO much pep.
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Theo Spurn
August 09, 2020 6:03 AM
Whoop whoop! by Theo Spurn
There were words happening nearby. Theo continued to sing a little bit, but he was also listening. You could listen and sing at the same time. A lot of people thought you couldn’t and didn’t like it if you did anything except hold your body in this weird, rigid perfect silence whilst they talked. Very stillness was stiff and itchy and he didn’t like it. He kept thinking about how he wanted to move or touch something or do things with his hands and he often ended up thinking about how uncomfortable he was way, way more than he was listening to what they were saying.“COOL!” he beamed enthusiastically when the words next to him stopped. They had been some pretty interesting things. Including that there was wild peppermint! “Wild!” he echoed cheerfully cos that was a slang word for cool and it fitted here and he was imagining like some grooving 1960s peppermint just getting its freak on and also people said werewolves were wild by they totally weren’t they were just people.
“I’m doing werewolves for my charity,” he explained to Quincy, forgetting that without having been along for the rest of that ride, he might not have known how they’d got to this station. He might think Theo’s thoughts were off the track but they weren’t. Just cos you couldn’t see the tracks didn’t mean they weren’t there. Though to add to the confusion, he hadn’t actually lifted his eyes from the work in front of him whilst he said this.
“Welcome to your new home!” he grinned enthusiastically, this time talking to his plant again as he transferred it from its old small pot to its new nice and spacious one. “I prefer being all snuggly closely wrapped up but you do you, my peppy little friend.”
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Theo Spurn
Whoop whoop!
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Quincy Wright
August 18, 2020 12:28 PM
I'm glad you're excited. by Quincy Wright
This dude was so loud. Like, he was pretty okay, but he was so loud. Quincy found himself looking around automatically, wondering whether they were drawing attention from others in class. He sort of hated when people did that to him, though, so he cut himself short and focused on his classmate. Well, actually he focused on his plant, until his classmate said he was doing werewolves for his charity. Which could mean a lot of things but he suspected that this guy wasn't someone to start a charity in favor of werewolf eradication."That's awesome," Quincy said, genuinely excited. "Werewolves are really cool." Now that he thought about it, he remembered seeing the werewolf charity post last term, but he'd signed up for a different one and hadn't thought too much about it. He hadn't been sure it was serious, since all the other ones - except one in Spanish - seemed really serious for the most part and he couldn't be sure whether this one was or not. "Do you still need people?" he asked, letting his curiosity lead him into what just might turn out to be a friendship or something. He wasn't really looking for friends but it was silly to block them out on principle.
He moved his peppermint plant at about the same time as his classmate, and he wondered at it as he listened to the older student talk to his. Quincy wasn't really sure he had enough experience to say whether he liked being snuggled or not, but he definitely liked space. It was good that this guy was willing to let the peppermint do its own thing. "You're kinda weird," Quincy told his classmate matter-of-factly, not seeing this as either a good or bad thing. "But I think you're nice. Some people like space," he added, looking again at his own peppermint. "It's good to respect that."
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Quincy Wright
I'm glad you're excited.
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Theo Spurn
August 24, 2020 7:22 AM
Me too!!! by Theo Spurn
Theo’s head snapped up from his plant, eyes staring at… person, and shining with excitement. Most of the time looking at people wasn’t as big a deal as other people made it out to be. He could kind of take it or leave it. He could especially leave it when they started going on at him to look. Theo looked when people were interesting. Being told to look was not interesting so he generally didn’t. But this person was being enthusiastic about werewolves!“Yeah they are!” he grinned happily about werewolves being cool, “And yes, you can help if you like. Or you can just be someone who comes to our booth. We need those too. It might be a treasure island. My dad’s one and he’s the best,” he chattered away, mixing up the different threads in his excitement without really noticing that he was doing it or thinking about how it might not make sense to this guy.
“Yeah, I am,” he agreed when boy-o called him weird. That was fine. It was true. “I am an oddity,” he added happily because that was another word for it that was just more playful to say. There was nothing wrong with being weird. He liked being him. His mum and dad liked him being him too. They always made sure that he knew they wouldn’t change him even if they could. And he had lots of other people who seemed to think the same way or at least be willing to make dens and roast marshmallows and respect boundaries about bad textures. “Yes,” he agreed regarding space. That was a fact that he had learnt even if it was baffling, “That’s why there’s a no-touching-without-asking rule if you’re not friends,” he nodded. “I didn’t hug you by mistake did I?” he checked. He didn’t think he had but he was sometimes excited and forgot, and people usually only brought that up if he had hugged or looked like he was in danger of hugging unwantedly.
“Today is a good day,” he declared cheerfully, pressing his fingertips into the ends of his gloves and rocking them back and forth on the table to feel the softness for a minute before he moved onto the next plant. Good days were good and soft things were brilliant and when you underlined happy moments with soft feels it just made everything even more his favourite. He loved the world! The greenhouse was all sunshiney and this dude was being really nice and nothing was rough at the edges. “You’re nice too,” he stated. "You might be weird as well. I just don't know yet," he added, in a tone that very much conveyed there was hope for this person, and that just because his weirdness could not be immediately identified didn't mean he should worry that he didn't have any.
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Theo Spurn
Me too!!!
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