PurpleHello98

Happy Friday, to those of you who celebrate!

Yesterday was a L.'s 22nd birthday. We had a good celebration for her. She picked White Castle as her birthday dinner and a rewatch of the The Super Mario Brothers Movie as her birthday movie. She wanted a copy of Xenoblade Chronicles 2, and I was able to find a copy at a local Gamestop for her, and she was thrilled with that. When we went to pick out her birthday cake, she found several other foods that she wanted, so we got those as well, which was really good — it's always been hard to find foods that she wants to eat, so it's hard to keep her weight in a healthy range, so it's always good to when she finds new foods that appeal to her.

But of course because yesterday was L.'s birthday, I had the worst mental health day I've had in quite a while. My depression has been gradually getting worse (it could just be my brain, could be the new antiseizure medicine, could be a combo of the two), but yesterday it really smacked me down. After a little while I was able to perk up some and put on a brave front for the rest of the day, but it's bad enough that I'm going to talk to my doctor about going back on antidepressants. Today is less bad, so at least that's something.

Anyway, hope you're all doing well. Take care.

There are so many milestones that mark the various social and legal phases of transition from childhood to adulthood. L. has just hit another one — possibly the final one, although I'm sure another one will pop up to hit us right in the feels when we least expect it.

Tomorrow is L.'s 22nd birthday, which marks the point that her pediatrician will no longer see her. So yesterday was L.'s final visit with her pediatrician. She got her yearly physical, got a recommendation for a new PCP, and got to say good-bye to the doctor who's seen her grow up. It was a surprisingly emotional event.

The other day on Facebook I read a post that was a repost of an earlier conversation from Tumblr (I'm sure you've all seen this sort of thing). Anyway, the topic was a discussion of whether or not a vampire policeman (a la Forever Knight) could use a judicial warrant to force you could grant them permission to enter your house. The discussion seemed to divide into two camps:

1. Yes, they can.
2. No, they can't, because the permission forced from you by the warrant is not a true expression of your will.

Recently I've been reading Seanan McGuire's October Daye series (highly recommend, if you haven't read them), which contain a lot of this sort of verbal jiggery-pokery tied into the magic system. This got me to thinking further about the vampire policeman problem and how, as the person in the house, it seems like there's got to be some combination of words that you can say which will simultaneously keep you out of trouble with human law (by honoring the validity of the warrant) while at the same time protecting yourself from the vampire (by indicating to the vampire that you do not freely give permission for them to enter your house), and which further could be stated in such a way that a bystander who is not aware of the existence of vampires/fairies/etc. would not find anything amiss in what you said. I was mulling this over while doing some chores and listening to some music when the Grateful Dead's "Trucking" came on and (in my opinion) handed me the answer on a silver platter[^1]: "If you've got a warrant, I guess you're gonna come in." It simultaneously acknowledges that the warrant grants the power of entry and fails to grant your open personal permission to enter.

[^1] Upon writing it here, I'm wondering if "on a silver platter" has any relevance to faerie. Expect a post on that in the future.