Hiya Skeleton Crew,

Are ya havin one of those weeks? I know I am! Sometimes it just feels like a slog, y’know?

Anyways, here are some trivias! Those are always nice, right??

Trivia 1

Speaking of poppies, didja ever read those Poppy War books? They’re these like grimdark fantasy books set in a kinda Song dynasty era China. But, y’know, with magic!

I ain’t ever read ’em myself, but the books are definitely on my agenda. R. F. Kuang is who they’re by—& as a matter of fact I think actually ALL of Ms. Kuang’s books are on my agenda!

There’s Babel, or The Necessity of Violence (I love a novel with a subtitle!) that’s a fantasy book about Oxford translators & imperialism; there’s Yellowface that’s not a fantasy book about the publishing industry & racism; & there’s what 2023 novel that’s back to fantasy & about two PhD students who descend into Hell to get a recommendation letter from their dead adviser?

In case you’re like me & a couple millennia behind on your readin list, here’s one more hint: this answer’s also an antonym of the title of Xenophon’s account of a Greek mercenary army’s failed foray into Anatolia.

Trivia 2

All this talk of poppies reminds me of this one time I was on vacation. I was traveling & I had the weirdest feeling, like I was in a play or something!

I was wanderin near one of those rotaries—or maybe ya’d call it a traffic circle or a roundabout or somethin?—& there was this shelter where behind it was a nurse sellin poppies from a tray. Earlier in the day I’d gone to a local barber where I was sittin, just waitin for a trim, when whaddya know but this banker friend of mine I knew from my motorcar club came sauntering in! He sits down next to me & we get to chattin, mostly ’bout the weird weather: it’d be blue suburban skies one minute, then pouring rain the next. Then—get this—all of a sudden a fireman rushes into the barbershop & he’s holdin ... an hourglass?

I dunno, it was weird.

Anyways, where was I when all that happened?