daybreakacademy | MARCH IN-SERVICE

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MARCH IN-SERVICE

March In-Service
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Flowers festooned the faculty office, from merry little snowdrops in tiny planters to crystalized crocuses suspended in windows to catch light, and with pastel seat covers the room looked much brighter and lighter than the norm. The food prepared is a mix of late winter and early spring, from winter salads with bleu cheese and gratin to quiche lorraine, cherry clafouti, simmered bamboo shoots, sakura mochi, and lemon rosemary cake - all served with American-style iced tea, lemonade, and matcha.

Poisson d'avril - Senior Prank day
Despite the cheery decor, it was serious - all hands on deck for faculty and TAs - for while true graduation is not until May, the long-running tradition of senior pranks starts on April 1st and who knows what will happen, especially when magic and alchemy widens the possibilities. The alchemy grad students, in particular, have been hinting about their surprises for the week - animal transformations, as a topic, have come up more than once.

Walpurgisnacht Ball (We're not invited)
Speaking of pranks… Walpurgisnacht is coming soon, a time for those inclined towards magic to celebrate or hold rituals, and to ward off evil - but among the Mages of Europe, it is a time for an annual ball where they introduced their new heirs, arrange marriages, and (in theory) cast aside old grudges. However, there is one long-standing grudge: Thanks to an incident long lost to history, Daybreak Academy has been snubbed and disinvited from this gathering - and a new tradition was born: to crash the party and prank the hell out of the Mages, and every year they had succeeded without fail - to annoy the mages without being bad enough for them to justify going after the academy, and the Seers are hoping this will continue.

The faculty will be discussing the various visions that have been displayed recently.

code bases by tricklet

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Oh, that'd make you fit in incredibly well. Like you're straight out of one of the families.

[You know, for claiming the whole thing was petty, Christo seemed to have quite the handle on how to be petty himself and play it back.]

And then when they're not looking, you put flavored creamer into their coffee. They hate that.

[So it's just like home. That makes things easier to navigate, at least. He can handle a situation like that.

He hates it, but it's a knowledgeable sort of hate]

Is there something wrong with flavored creamer?

Of course! It is a vile invention meant to conceal the natural, wonderful flavors of a fine coffee. Especially if you have a specialty roast!

[It's of course, delivered with his usual dramatic, intense flair.]

...That said, it's not bad in all circumstances. It has a place in cheap coffee, or something you get at a gas station. But no self-respecting coffee connoisseur would have it in the good stuff.

I'm sorry, Professor Valvatorez, but I must disagree. While I'm more of a tea drinker myself, there is nothing wrong with a cup of coffee with hazelnut creamer on a cold day.

[He's just as serious.]

Yes, but you're not putting hazelnut creamer in a cup of freshly ground Kona blend, are you? I should hope not. Or if the specialty roast is itself already flavored?

It's a waste, I tell you!

Sometimes coffee is too bitter for other people to handle, and they might not be able to grasp the right proportion of sugar and milk to the drink to make it to their taste. Flavored creamers provide these people with an easy alternative to help them.

You might as well be putting hazelnut creamer into some fine French wines while you're at it! That'll help people ease their palates into tasting nuance and subtlety perfectly well!

[This is almost as heated as he gets about arguing in favor of sardines. ...Almost. But not quite.]

Even just plain creamer is fine to cut down on bitterness. You don't need to be drinking a mug of Nutella to settle it!

Not everyone is capable of creating an artisan drink on their own. Don't you think it's selfish to deny them that bit of indulgence based on your feelings alone?

It's coffee, Christo! You put it into a filter, pour water over it, and let it brew in a pot! You don't have to hand craft the damn grounds! The farmers and producers already did the hard part! If anything, you're denying the artistic vision of the blend's maker by adding flavored creamers that were never intended to go in them!

Would you put hazelnut creamer into a fine Darjeeling tea?! Or pumpkin spice into a fine Earl Grey?

That's hardly comparable! You don't put cream into tea to begin with! Milk and sugar, yes, but not cream!

Cream is a perfectly acceptable addition to coffee!

I never said plain cream wasn't acceptable! I said flavored cream wasn't in good cups of coffee!

But if we're going to continue this metaphor, why don't you just put chocolate milk into your high class tea and tell me you can still appreciate the subtleties!

Chocolate mi--?!

[He immediately pushes himself to his feet. Unnoticed by him, a feather flutters gently down to the floor]

That's still not the same thing! The producers of coffee creamer come together to create tastes that compliment the coffee itself, along with various seasonal promotions that take place throughout the year! Chocolate milk is what children drink with their meals at lunch time!

If the intricacies of coffee are that important to you, why bother putting it into a coffee pot to begin with? Shouldn't you be going to a proper coffee shop instead?

Unless you're proposing I build a cafe right in my office, there's still a certain value to having a good coffee maker and not bothering with a coffee shop. There simply are not the hours in the day, my friend. You wouldn't go to a tea ceremony every day at tea time if you're as busy as we are here!

[Yes, he does still legitimately mean the "friend" thing, despite his heated tone. He's just like this.]

And it's close enough to the same thing! Most flavored creams are overloaded with sugar to the point of parody! Hell, there's more sugar in a cup of hazelnut cream than there is in chocolate milk! If anything, chocolate milk is too conservative for the metaphor!

Even if that's the case, creamer is not meant to be used as a drink on its own--Miss Jailbreak, please do not take that as a challenge.

(no subject)

nor_iron_bars - 2020-03-17 15:42 (UTC) - Expand

...welp, I'm curious now.

[And that's all the warning anyone gets before Jail reaches over, picks up the hazelnut creamer, and dumps a generous portion of it into her tea.]

[She drinks it without even pausing.]

[Cheerfully:] Wow, that sucks.

[...she's still drinking it.]

I could have told you that.

Tried putting creamer in what I drink once, just to see if it would help the taste.

It didn't.

I doubt anything would help the taste of what you drink. It's too far gone for that.

[ The day he convinces Avery to stop drinking that horrible concoction is the day hell freezes over probably. ]

I once saw him pour three energy drinks, two cups of coffee, 10 grams of sugar, and what appeared to be 100 grams of ginseng into a blender along with some ice and press "puree."

He then drank the whole concoction in under a minute.

[How has his heart not stopped yet...]

Edited 2020-03-16 13:15 (UTC)