Idk how to put this but I always end up feeling that discussions around sustainability seem to center the lives of upper middle class people. I am not in the position where I could even consider purchasing an electric car. Choosing lower-carbon flights doesn’t matter if you can’t afford airfare. Paying triple for “sustainable” food at the farmers’ market isn’t an option when even Aldi feels expensive.
And I’m not saying that people who have more options available to them shouldn’t try to make thoughtful choices, I’m saying that I’d rather see buses that run on time than more electric car chargers.
I was rereading Lilia's Dorm Uniform vignettes recently and honed in on the third part, which reminded me a lot of the events of book 7. I think it's highly likely that part 3 here foreshadows book 7, similar to how Ortho's Precision Gear vignettes foreshadowed the original Ortho's passing, revealed in book 6.
***Lilia Dorm Uniform vignette(s) and Book 7 spoilers!***
Quick recap, these vignettes focus on Lilia looking after a baby bat with an injury. The third and final part involves Malleus chatting with him about the experience. Lilia describes parenting as thus: "There's never a guarantee in life that someone will be there to support you. Once you fly out into the world, there may be days when you go without a proper meal and sleep on an empty stomach. You'll experience failures and setbacks. You may have days where your heart feels like it'll shatter into a thousand pieces. As long as you're alive, there will be moments—many moments, in fact—when you must face adversity entirely on your own. A parent must ensure their child can handle such harshness while the little one is still under their protection."
Knowing what we know now... It sounds as though Lilia is reflecting back on his time traveling the world in hopes of finding a way to hatch Malleus from the egg. Firstly, Lilia (especially in the past) has expressed sentiments about being alone. He was an orphan taken in as a ward by the Draconias, yet he still never felt as though he "fit", not with the way the senate treats him like a lesser being, and not with his two best friends (Maleanor and Raverne) marrying and conceiving a child--starting a family, something Lilia feels he does not have and cannot have himself. There's never a guarantee in life that someone will be there to support you. And that's true of Malleus as well. His father is missing and presumed dead, his mother died in a battle to ensure his safety, and his grandmother is kept busy with royal duties to be there for him all the time. That's why Lilia had to step up as his father figure--because otherwise Malleus would have no guidance, just like Lilia did in his youth, which led him into becoming closed off and unwilling to learn about the world beyond Briarland. He doesn't want Malleus--or any of his "kids"--to perpetuate the hatred and distrust that claimed so many lives and left scars on the survivors.
Once you fly out into the world, there may be days when you go without a proper meal and sleep on an empty stomach. This line is reflective of the experiences Lilia had on his travels. In the beginning, it was particularly difficult due to the prevailing anti-fae sentiments among humans. Lilia was not welcome in their communities; he'd have things and nasty words thrown at him and literally be chased out of towns. True, he's also had to deal with rations and always being alert while serving as a general, but it feels particularly frustrating in this context because 1) none of his men are around to support him in these moments; he is lacking the feeling of being a part of a group, and 2) the harsh treatment is being committed by a group for which he cannot retaliate, so it forces Lilia to stand there and just take it... Both conditions which are also true of Lilia when he is able to safely bring Malleus's egg to Castle Blackscale. The senate gang up on him, isolate him, and deem him unworthy of touching the heir... and Lilia can't do anything about it. He isn't accepted at home and he isn't accepted by the world. This makes it that much more meaningful when, later on his travels, he meets an elderly couple in Harveston that welcome him into their house and home. They offer him a warm bed, food, and, more importantly, they are his company. They want to hear his stories, learn more about him and his life experiences. They’re that light at the end of his tunnel--but those things aren't promised to him, and Lilia knows he can't count on them all the time, especially as he travels to the most remote regions. And don't we all fear that dreadful realization of being out on our own with no net to catch us if we fall?
You'll experience failures and setbacks. You may have days where your heart feels like it'll shatter into a thousand pieces. As long as you're alive, there will be moments—many moments, in fact—when you must face adversity entirely on your own. Again, Lilia is also speaking about himself. He was forced to abandon his princess and flee with her child. He lost his best friends and large sections of his home country to a bloody conflict. He took the senate's verbal abuse and degradation. All of this, he faced alone--even when Baur tries to stand up for him, Lilia silences his ally because, deep in his heart, he thinks he deserves this. The wild bat incapable of love, only able to slaughter, doomed to be alone forever. It's through his forced exposure to the world that Lilia learns to open up, and it's through the connections--after enduring so many hardships, so many trials and tribulations--he makes with others that he comes to learn he is capable of love. As Silver says, this must be why the happiest moment of his father's life is the moment of Malleus hatching. A dragon's egg can only do so with the love of a parent--and Lilia has always been that for him. Diasomnia is Lilia's new family, and he's no longer alone.
The problem now is that it's Malleus's turn to learn harsh life lessons, and he isn't exactly prepared for them. A parent must ensure their child can handle such harshness while the little one is still under their protection. I think this line perfectly summarizes Lilia's motivations for leaving in the fashion that he does. When Lilia attempted to depart NRC without so much as a formal farewell to Malleus and Silver, many fans were confused as to why he was acting so callous towards his children. Some theorized that Lilia was lying about losing his magic or had some other ulterior motive for lying--when, really, I think the answer is much simpler than that. Lilia wanted to leave as soon as he could, without facing his kids, because that's just in his nature. As Malleus points out in the vignettes: "Is that why you took the approach you did? [...] I suspect this bat will thrive in the wild." This entire time, Lilia hasn't been the gentlest or the most prudent with the baby bat. He fed it milk from a cup instead of a bottle (which resulted in getting the bat all wet), roughly toweled it off, allowed it to hang in a tree when it may not be ready to fly yet, brushed off the possibility of it being hurt again if it falls out, etc. On a surface-level, it looks like bad caretaking. But Malleus wonders if it's intentional. Because the bat was put through those experiences, it can take care of itself once it has parted from Lilia's care. I suspect Lilia may think the same of how he raises his own children. After all, Silver and Sebek sometimes bring up how hellish Lilia's training sessions with them were. Some of his bad childcare is due to Lilia being disorganized and just winging it in the moment, yeah (something which Malleus comments on at the end of the vignettes)--but a lot of how he raises others is also built on the idea that this should make the kids stronger and able to stand on their own.
When Lilia goes to return the baby bat to its flock, he says, "Go on, little one. You can't cling to my hand forever. Get flying." Then Malleus laughs and remarks, "Heh, it seems rather attached to you. It doesn't want to let go." Lilia continues with, "I'm shaking my arm and it's still not letting go... Goodness gracious. I didn't raise [the baby bat] to be so clingy. There comes a time in every creature's life when they have to take action. This is your time, little one. Don't miss your window." And, at last, when the bat is able to take off, Malleus realizes, "[...] I must say, it was rather harsh of you to forcibly shake off the poor fellow when it clearly liked you. Did you intentionally act detached so that it wouldn't fall too far behind the colony?"
THIS WHOLE SCENE IS AN ANALOGY TO LILIA TRYING TO LEAVE NRC WITHOUT SAYING GOODBYE TO HIS KIDS.
In this analogy, Malleus is that bat that Lilia has reared--and when it comes time for Lilia to leave, Malleus won't allow for it. Malleus is the clingy baby bat gripping onto his caretaker for dear life. I wonder if Lilia knew that his prince would have a hard time with it, so he tries to have one last happy send-off--so he can grant Malleus the happiness of being invited to something, to be included, and to provide him ample opportunities to socialize with his peers from all the dorms and make other connections so they can be there for him when Lilia is no longer able to. Then Malleus was late, and the time for Lilia to depart has already arrived. But maybe it's better this way, Lilia may have reasoned with himself. If Malleus doesn't appear, maybe he can't be hurt. If Lilia acts detached, maybe... just maybe... it will give Malleus the final shove he needs to let him go, to open up to the people who are going to be present around him, so he won't "fall too far behind the colony", like what happened with the actual baby bat he raised. This is especially suspect because Lilia makes the same plea to the first years earlier in the party by asking them to please give Sebek a lil' push if he ever needs it. "Just... If you notice [Sebek is] ever stuck at some point during your time here... I would ask that you card soldiers give him a little nudge."
THE LILIA DORM UNIFORM CARD FIRST CAME OUT ON THE JP SERVER IN FEB 2023 ALONG WITH SOME EARLY BOOK 7 UPDATES 😩 It’s such good foreshadowing for what happens much later in the same book… OTL I just hope that Malleus is able to learn the lessons Lilia wants him to. Then Malleus can finally be the baby bat that’s able to take flight on his own and join a flock without his guardian at his side forever and ever…
ive said this before but one of my semi-serious crackpot opinions is that sending healthy jet pilots and STEMgymrats to space is a huge waste of everyone's time and money. those people take up too much room, eat too much food, and require years of training to tolerate the living conditions of the average furry polycule flophouse. they should be sending deranged hypermobile shutins with python metabolism gastroparesis, POTS, hyperacusis, and prehensile toes. it's absurd to be trying to behaviorally modify a healthy outgoing NASA jock into an orbital NEET when highly-specialized freaks already exist for that on Earth, and we do not like it here
I miss when library books used to have little paper pockets inside with a list of all the people who borrowed it and when... I hate that this is now exclusive knowledge of librarians. I do care that a miss Mariana borrowed this book in 1985 and then Dario in 1997. They're my brothers and sisters
but really, there's a million reasons why it's an issue for users and staff of the public library to have immediate access to a record of who has borrowed a specific item and when.
and that's not even about keeping the information "privileged" to the library staff, these days they don't even keep a digital record of an item's history of borrowers; once you return a book, there isn't a list of everyone thats ever taken that book out that your name gets added to (though they probably take a tally of how many times it is checked out for circulation statistics).
i think the card system is a remnant of a culture that could only exist in the world before the internet as it exists today, where this identifying kind of information wasn't always readily at your fingertips, even for those at the "information professional" level.
don't get me wrong here, i do understand the nostalgia factor to it as being part of a different time, but i think it's always important to understand why this kind of system has its flaws and has been (at least in north america) taken out of practice
bear in mind that US public libraries spent most of the past twenty years fighting off lawsuits that they were prohibited from disclosing to the public because when 9/11 happened the federal government wanted a list of every person who read certain books and the librarians had a really bad feeling about where that kind of policy would end up going, for some reason.
not keeping the records in the first place is a way for the libraries to protect themselves when they stand up for your privacy.
they were prohibited from telling us when the fbi had been through to check who was reading what. so they told us when they hadn't been. anyway librarians are heroes for privacy and freedom of information
I’ve come to the startling realisation that Crowley looks similar to Muzan. They even have the same hat. The white hat Crowley wears with his vacation outfit, not his usual tophat.
OMG YES.
I realized it when I started studying the panels, and than I had to mentally elaborate on Crowley for this au or esle he would be just a copy-paste of muzan (visually) THO I still think sus they look so much like each other on canon media???? What's wrong with white hat and pretty curls????? EVEN THEIR CLOTHES!
That's just a side line, but I really like to think on Crowley having bird like features? It's not like on a beastman way but more on a "bird faes have longer features" type of thing, plus I LIVE for the natural gothic features of the dark faes
Mononoke Lore Crash Course - So There Are 64 Medicine Sellers Running Around
A short summary of Mononoke lore. Originally posted this on Twitter, basically the same but I added some stuff after rereading the bagua wikipedia page
Sources:
- On multiple medicine sellers and their swords
- On the Shuuga realm and Shingi
- On the exorcism swords and the organizational structure of Juuyoku
Theres a customer at work who I've never worked with and just seen their company name since it's kind of a part of the business I don't know. But last week I did have to put together a quote for them and. I'm not going to be specific but this company has decided to do a massive sudden rebrand into being an AI company. New email address and everything emphasizing AI as much as possible. and I cannot stress enough their previous (successful) business had absolutely fuck all to do with AI. The cost of rebranding is massive and doing that to chase a trend as a mid size business???? What the hell are you thinking
i understand that peer pressure is a very real phenomenon but i always sort of thought being in charge of shit meant you were able to combat it to some degree. not to mention that they're too late???? like the technology is still roughly the same but the zeitgeist got geistbusted
people get masters degrees in business administration to make as much money as possible so they can put it all in a pile and pour gasoline on it and just light it up. and culturally we are supposed to admire this and call it ingenuity
the only guy i knew in college who went for an mba dropped out and is now a successful stand up comedian, further proving that all business guys are fuckin jokesters
you have NO idea how many times i've personally confirmed that the higher in the business executive hierarchy you are and the stupidest you are. like it's a proportional graph at this point. i have covered so many bankruptcy/mass layoffs procedures that were completely and easily avoidable except that the CEO suddenly got obsessed with one stupid ass idea that he forced onto his company, effectively ruining it. you have no idea how many times this has happened. in every single field. Ever. and don't get me started on the for-profit business schools that are in my client portfolio lmaoooooooooo these people are literally so stupid it's impressive.
#I completely believe it based on what I've seen just as an outside observer#the infinite growth mindset probably makes this even worse???#and it's workers who suffer the consequences. CEOs get golden parachutes for their incompetence
yeah, and it's what's really infuriating. it's awful in every context, obviously, but particularly evil in the Traditional Industry Sector (think: dairy, chemical plants, factories in general) because usually entire communities are based around The Factory, so you have entire towns that are fated to basically become ghost towns overnight, mostly in deeply rural areas, while extremely expensive and sophisticated equipement is just left to rust somewhere. and they don't care about it at all. entire families, businesses, schools, etc are completely devastated just because some stupid asshole threw a tantrum to prove he was the most special boy in existence. it's really something
#like they don't care about their businesses they don't care about the machines they bought (!)#i KNEW they didn't care about the workers or communities but they don't even care about the things you'd THINK they care about#it's. ???????????#pure chaos and incompetence for its own sake. to the point a business owner who knows what they're doing is basically a godsent.#it's dire.
THEY DON'T EVEN SELL OFF THE STUFF INSIDE THE FACTORY???
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