insert-tea-emoji

tea?

[henk-heijmans]

Knitting, 2021 - by Joseph Ford, English

[clementiens]

this is one of a [series] and they're all fantastic

joseph ford is the photographer and the knitter who made the pieces is nina dodd (ninadoddknits.com)

[faggotfungus]

[frontmansdefender]

Source

[sufficientlylargen]

It always gets me that the name "Gandalf" literally just means "Wand-Elf" or "Stick-Elf". I'm imagining old Gondorians just being like:

Librarian: I saw that weird guy at the library again today.

Guard 1: What weird guy?

Librarian: The old guy with the beard? Kinda elfy-looking, apart from the beard?

Guard 1: Oh, with the big-ass stick?

Librarian: Yeah, looked like he was carrying an entire tree branch.

Guard 2: Yeah, that's the Stick Elf.

Guard 1: Hell yeah, I fuckin' love the Stick Elf.

Librarian: The "Stick Elf"?

Guard 2: He comes by every few years, usually after some weird book or other.

Librarian: Oh. Yeah, he wanted a treatise on goblin breeding habits.

Guard 2: Like, how they have sex? We have books on that?

Librarian: Yeah, turns out we do. I was as surprised as you are.

Guard 1: What'd the Stick Elf need a fuckin' goblin-fuckin' book for?

Librarian: I didn't ask. So you just call him "Stick Elf"?

Guard 2: I mean, he looks kinda elfy and he always has that stick, so, like, yeah.

Guard 1: Dude also has some fuckin' dope pipeweed.

Guard 2: Oh yeah, his pipeweed is awesome.

Librarian: How long has he been coming here?

Guard 2: Oh, for decades. He's, like, super old.

Guard 1: More like fuckin' centuries. Dude's old as balls.

Guard 2: Wait, really?

Guard 1: Yeah, my gran-gran used to talk about him. She loved his pipeweed too.

Librarian: So he's… an immortal pipeweed dealer?

Guard 2: I think he's just, like, a connoisseur. He doesn't sell it or anything. He just always has some really top-notch pipeweed on him.

Archivist: Oh, are we talking about Stick Elf?

Guard 1: Hell yeah we are!

Librarian: You know about the Stick Elf, too?

Archivist: Oh, totally. Stick-Elf's a super chill dude. Gave me some awesome pipeweed when I was maybe 12, and tee-bee-aitch I think I'm still a little buzzed from it.

Guard 1: What'd I tell ya, fuckin' dope pipeweed!

Archivist: Also he's really old.

Guard 1: Old as balls.

Librarian: Yeah, so Éodan and Jenniforomir were telling me.

Archivist: My grandpa used to tell me stories - he said one time he saw Stick Elf enter a smoke-ring contest.

Guard 1: Ooh, I'll bet he kicked fuckin' ass.

Archivist: Apparently the guy made an entire warship out of smoke and it flew around shooting down the other rings.

Librarian: And how much of this "fuckin' dope" pipeweed had your grandfather had by this point?

Guard 1: No no, that's totally plausible. Dude's got weird elf powers and shit for sure.

Archivist: He brought fireworks for the king's birthday one year, too.

Guard 1: Oh fuck, I forgot about those! Fuckin' incredible fireworks! Dragons and knights and glowy trees and shit! I was fuckin' 6 years old or something, they totally blew my mind. Hey Éodan, did you see that shit?

Guard 2: No, I think that's before I lived in Gondor.

Guard 1: Wait, you're not from here?

Guard 2: Oh, no, I grew up in Rohan. We moved here when I was, like, thirteen because my uncle Éojeff said he could get my dad a sweet job. And also that there were houses that didn't smell like horseshit.

Guard 1: Oh shit, are you related to Éojeff and Éosteve who run that æbleskiver stand on Norndîl St?

Guard 2: Yeah, they're my uncles!

Guard 1: Shit, they cook a fuckin' great æbleskiver!

Librarian: Ok, hold up a sec, "Stick Elf" can't possibly be his real name.

Guard 1: Why not?

Librarian: What? You think his parents named him in the hopes that he would carry around a fucking tree when he got older?

Guard 2: Maybe they gave him the tree when he was born!

Archivist: I don't think a baby could carry that stick.

Guard 1: You ever seen a baby hanging onto something? They're hella strong.

Archivist: It's not a strength thing, their hands are tiny. That staff is enormous!

Guard 1: My halberd's bigger 'n I am, I can hold it just fine.

Archivist: You're not a baby.

Librarian: Also why would elf parents name their kid "stick ELF"?! Presumably they know that their kid's going to be an elf!

Archivist: Is he actually an elf? I didn't think they grew beards.

Guard 1: How'd he get old as balls if he's not an elf?

Guard 2: His ears aren't that pointy. Maybe he's just a really old guy? Like, a Numémoriam or something?

Guard 1: Did you just say "Numémoriam"?

Guard 2: Nûnenorman? Munimõrbitan? Y'know, those guys like the king that can get super old.

Guard 1: You mean the fuckin' Númenóreans?

Guard 2: Yeah, the Númenóreums.

Archivist: Even the Númenóreans don't live THAT long.

Guard 1: Plus he carries that fuckin' stick around.

Guard 2: Wait, what does the stick have to do with it?

Guard 1: That's an elf thing. Y'know, trees and shit? Very elfy.

Librarian: Ok, look, but his parents naming him "Stick Elf" would be weird whether or not he's an elf. In fact, it's even weirder if he's not - what human names their kid "elf"?

Archivist: Huh. Yeah, you're right, he probably does have another name.

Guard 2: Yeah, I guess so.

Librarian: He's been coming here for decades and nobody's ever asked his real name?

Archivist: I dunno what to tell you, he's Stick Elf. Even his library card just says 'Stick Elf'.

Guard 1: Fuck yeah, the Stick Elf!

Guard 2: Maybe we could, like, ask him his name sometime?

Guard 1: Hey, look, Elrond's over there. He's old as balls too, maybe he knows?

Guard 2: Oh, we shouldn't interru-

Guard 1: HEY ELROND, YOU'RE OLD AS BALLS, RIGHT? WHAT'S THAT OLD ELF WITH THE STICK'S NAME?

Elrond (coming over): Do you mean an old man cloaked all in grey and blue, leaning on a rough-cut staff, who came to the great library this day?

Guard 1: Yeah, the Stick-Elf!

Guard 2: (Sorry to bother you, sir...)

Librarian: He's got to have a real name besides 'the Stick Elf', right?

Elrond: Indeed, for no elf is he. You speak of the wizard Olórin, wisest of the Maiar, older even than Eä itself. Many are his names in many countries: Tharkûn among the Dwarves; Incánus to the south; Mithrandir he is called among my people, the Grey Pilgrim.

Librarian: Oh.

Elrond: And here in the North he is called Stick-Elf.

Librarian: Oh.

Guard 1: Fuck yeah!

[elodieunderglass]

Stop posting workplace conversations on main

[thekalpar]

OP I hate to be pedantic, but in Gondor they called him Mithrandir, aka Grey Pilgrim. Gandalf is what hobbits and other people in the North called him. However it turns out the dwarves called him Tharkûn which just means "stick man".

[sufficientlylargen]

I'll see your pedantry and raise you additional pedantry: Tolkien is actually unclear about what most Gondorians called him, and in fact contradicted himself in several of his notes.

Gandalf's names

Gandalf's quote in The Two Towers is:

Many are my names in many countries. Mithrandir among the Elves, Tharkûn to the Dwarves; Olórin I was in my youth in the West that is forgotten, in the South Incánus, in the North Gandalf; to the East I go not.

Gondor is North

In one of Tolkien's notes about this he says that "the North" here refers to the whole north-western region of Middle-earth - basically the entire area that The Lord of the Rings takes place in, from the southern boundary of ancient Gondor up through Carn Dûm (which is the farthest north you can go before entering the Northern Wastes).

So Mithrandir is the Elven name for him; humans in "the North", which includes Gondor, generally called him Gandalf.

Nobles are pretentious

Of course, we see Denethor et al. call him Mithrandir in the books, but in a note from a few years later, Tolkien makes it clear that only high-ranking Gondorians used his Sindarin name:

At the time of this Tale, however, we find Gandalf always called Mithrandir in Gondor (by men of rank or Númenórean origin, as Denethor, Faramir, etc.). This is Sindarin, and given as the name used by the Elves; but men of rank in Gondor knew and used this language.

So "Mithrandir" is the name used by fancy-pants Gondorians who like to refer to things in Sindarin; the average Joeromir Schmoeromir on the streets of Minas Tirith would've used the common name, Gandalf.

But wait!

However, in that same note, Tolkien also changes his stance on what "the North" means - he says that Gandalf actually wouldn't have spent enough time in Harad (the area south of Gondor) to have earned a nickname there, and therefore "the South" actually ought to mean Gondor, with "the North" presumably meaning Eriador and/or Arnor.

So our average Gondorian would actually have called him Incánus.

But wait! 2: Wait Harder

Then Tolkien goes on to say that actually, this is probably also wrong. In fact, Incánus was most likely an old Quenya name from much earlier that was by this point all but forgotten, and instead there was a different common name for him that roughly translated as "Greymantle". But the specific word has not survived.

So actually, we don't know what our average Gondorian would've called him.

[citation needed]

You can read these notes and Christopher Tolkien's commentary on them in the Istari section of Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-Earth, which is free on the Internet Archive.

tl;dr: I dunno.

So my assumption that most Gondorians would have known him as "Gandalf" is consistent with some of Tolkien's notes but not with others.

But since those notes are not consistent with each other, either, I think running with the assumption is reasonable, or at least funny.

[marlynnofmany]

#if you want to be pedantic it's also odd that one guard mentions 'the King's birthday' #and is clearly talking about something that happened years ago #yet the other guard is from Rohan and also Elrond is there #because the last Gondorian High King before Aragorn died five centuries before Rohan existed #and Elrond sailed to the West less than three years after Aragorn was crowned #so there isn't actually any point in the history of ME that has Rohan‚ Elrond‚ AND adult Gondorians who saw the King when they were 6 #the obvious explanation (which I've described in another post somewhere) is that this before LotR #and “the King” is a nickname for a Númenórean musician named Aarondil Préslion #better known by his stage name “Elvish Présli” #that's what I'm Tolkien about #fuck yeah stick elf

[homunculus-argument]

Hey what if dragons are a "no such thing as a fish" kind of situation?

The reason why they're so varied in appearance, but roughly similar in a handful of some very specific traits is a matter of covergent evolution, they're just creatures that all happened to end up as the ones to fill out the same ecological niche.

[relsage]

Oooh like crabs! and trees

[faggotfungus]

[succumbing-song]

[teleroboxer-remade-deactivated2]

how to draw a sheep: draw a cloud, legs, a circle for the head and there you have it a sheep

[teleroboxer-remade-deactivated2]

someone draw a sheep using these instructions

[crowecreates]

this rlly helped i think this is the best sheep i have EVER drawn!!!

[teleroboxer-remade-deactivated2]

its very good !!

[20thcenturystarlet]

New York City ballet production of Midsummer Nights Dream

[thepeelingrenoir]

The fact this isn't a painting is a testament to one of the greatest feats of set design and production I've ever seen.

[thepeelingrenoir]

My god just look at this! The lighting, set design, photography... I've just never seen anything like it.

[sisaloofafump]

This is from 1966 and you can see over a hundred photos on the NYPL digital collections website. It is absolutely gorgeous. These are just a few of my favourites.

Plus Puck's face here:

[wonderful-earth-story]

When Apollo 11 successfully landed and the images were released, ‘The Sun’ newspaper in Vancouver changed it’s name to ‘The Moon’ to report it.

[good-and-colorful]

The exclamation point is a nice touch!

[chipthekeeper]

I have a lot of pet peeves but I think the biggest one is when people say things like “oh it’s such a small town, only 35,000 people” like bitch my town has 200 people, you need to pick a new adjective 

[thegoldengals]

According to Wikipedia, a small town is 1,000-20,000 people. So although you are correct in stating that 35,000 people is not a small town (it is a large town), you are incorrect in thinking that you live in a town. You live in a village. You are a villager.

[chipthekeeper]

I…… don’t know what to do with that information……a villager…

[figofswords]

weary and wary are not the same word and have very different meanings and if i see one more person use wearily when they mean warily I’m gonna combust

[figofswords]

weary: tired, worn-out, beaten down, exhausted, in need of rest. they were weary after their long journey. wearily, she sat down on the couch and kicked off her shoes. he had grown weary of this conversation.

wary: guarded, cautious, on-edge, careful. they were wary of the approaching stranger. warily, she poked at the dark shape in the corner of her room. he paused, wary, but nodded anyway.

[luxwing]

[figofswords]

thank you for this reply you get the funny crown today with bonus points for accuracy

[deermouth]

i really really really really really like hadestown's repeated use of "eurydice was a hungry girl" because at first pass you might think oh, she's scrappy and street smart and her ambition is going to be the foil to orpheus's idealist romanticism. but nope! no she is literally hungry. she is starving. that is her motivator and everybody knows it. she loves, oh she does, but she can't be fucking blamed for fulfilling her physical needs first.

[dragongirlbunny]

you don't like mourning dove? hwoo hoo hoo hoo?

[bunjywunjy]

Have you seen the videos of orca exploding a sunfish?

yeah man that shit is nuts

[bunjywunjy]

for real though they figured out that if one orca holds a sunfish carcass still while a big male winds up and rams it at top speed, the fish basically disintegrates:

there are many reasons they could be doing this, but a small juvenile orca was later seen scooping up the shreds, so my bet is that this was just a family making Orca Baby Food.

sunfish have extremely tough leathery skin with a thick layer of disgusting-tasting gel under it that gives the sunfish neutral buoyancy and also makes it too gross to bite. the traditional way to get around these issues and get at the tender flesh inside is to be a human with a fillet knife, but I guess just fucking exploding them also does the trick.

[luntfontanne]

every day i think about the cat on twitter who looks more like a scheming eunuch than any creature has ever looked

monkey i love you beloved little freak i would die for you

[luntfontanne]

like……… look at this face

UNREAL

[whatcoloristhatcat]

dilute black (blue) tortoiseshell with low white spotting

[garforarts]

『 Psychopomp 』

Inspired by Souls on the Banks of the Acheron by Adolf Hirémy-Hirschl