Sydney’s abuse of genre savvy may eventually backfire on her. She could be burning trope karma for all she knows. But this is the beginning of the media circus that will be an important part of all the supers’ lives. Endless invitations to grand openings, clubs, morning news programs, talk shows, cooking programs, whatever. Eventually they’ll be rejecting far more than they’ll be accepting, though most of that will be filtered through Arianna’s staff.

I struggled with Aurelius’s use of the word “demarcation” because I had convinced myself there was a better word to use there. I wanted a word that meant something like demarcation, milestone, achievement or threshold that signifies a quantity which once achieved, tips you into a new category. Those words basically mean what I’m thinking of, but I still feel like there is an actual word that means exactly that, like it’s buzzing around on the tip of my tongue. Demarcation works, but it would be grammatically better if he said “A curious demarcation of wealth.” instead of “for” The word I want to exist would be grammatically better with “of.” It’s weird, even though English is, if not the language with the most words, then certainly a contender, but even in English it’s possible to find these sorts of gaps. I’m not sure if this is one of those times or if I’ve totally blanked on a perfectly cromulent word, but hey, new words get invented all the time.

In Sydney’s mind, the ability to afford an infinity pool means you have crossed from being a fiduciary plebeian into being “rich.” I’m not even sure those are especially expensive (and neither is Sydney) – more so than a regular pool to be certain, but they just feel opulent. That’s probably because while it’s possible to install one in your backyard, they certainly have more impact when attached to a house on a cliff, an ocean front property or a penthouse, so they’re more of an icing on the cake affair.

Sydney grew up in a very middle-to-upper middle class home. Her mom and dad do ok but were generally quite conservative with their money most of the time, to make sure they had enough for an annual summer vacation, to help Sydney with her first car, general planning for the future stuff. Growing up, Sydney was never flush with cash, but had enough to support her hobbies, and now that she’s living on her own she usually has enough to keep up with the usual luxuries but has to scramble whenever a big ticket item comes around like a new console or a trip to ComicCon, but little future proofing. We’ll have to see what having a flush bank account does to her in the coming chapters.

Here’s the link to the new comments highlighter for chrome, and the GitHub link which you can use to install on FireFox via Greasemonkey.