Very enjoyable chapter, I hope I did it at least partially justice. Also, we all know that the answer is: since a certain WKX appeared in your life.
Thank you Emma P whose proofreading and commentaries are precious :) <3 <3
Notes
1. æĄè±, the osmanthus is a symbol of wealth and nobility because æĄ (gui) is a homophone of "expensive" or "noble" which are themes associated with Lord Seventh through the chapter.
2. èć °çæ idiom translated literally, said of people born in riches and who have a bright future.
3. æ»Ąæé It was a tradition to celebrate the first full month of a baby because the first month was considered a critical time for a newborn in an environment with high infantile mortality. Tangentially, mothers who just delivered babies were to remain bedridden for a full month to nurse the baby and themselves. The practise still exists.
4. Lord Seventh is the second person to qualify as ZZS's ç„ć·± (blossom buddy/soulmate/person who can understand him).
5. Lord Seventh basically talk while using a literary reference/turns of phrase every two words. In this sentence, he evokes a rich environment (the Court) with the golden cups and kingfisher plumes â the latter being a kind of hair ornament worn by men. Then he alludes to his surprise at gay!ZZS while citing ăæŠé”æ„ă by ææž ç § with "ç©æŻäșșé" ("objects remain the same while people pass/change")
6. éæ çç fromăèçŸäșșăby æç . Evocation of ZZS being a playboy who probably has seen the inside of a number of bordellos or "baluster houses".
7. "çžæäžć€ç„ć€ć°ïŒæ„ç çĄæ»äžè§æ" creative variation from Gu Xiang on the æ„æ (Spring Morning) by Meng Haoran. She mocks the guys getting sentimental/jealous, and humorously use "sleeping like the dead" (no pigs in her mouth, I added it to recreate the intended effect) in the verse: it's a coarse turn of phrase in Chinese that wouldn't turn up in poems.
8. The Inlaid Harp (éŠç) is a poem Li Shangyin about nostalgia.
9. é 积性äŒȘïŒäżç§ŻććŸ· idiom translated literaly.
10. Convention on never using the name of an emperor who is always addressed as "his majesty". Since characters in an emperor's name also couldn't be written, emperors were either obliging and changed the character in their names to obscure/rarely used homophone when accessing the throne, or were dicks and let everyone else struggle with the taboo by, for example, removing strokes when they had to write a taboo character.
11. äčæșȘ "crow creek". Why must people resemble their names? Or is that the other way 'round?