wat.

what even is this.....

[rosswoodpark]

Everyone agrees! Your intestines squirming around like eels in your belly is horrifying!

[rosswoodpark]

IM SORRY THEY FUCKING WHAT NOW?

[thatthinginyourshoe-deactivated]

The racks even have hooks to keep them from squirming right off and onto the floor apparently. They desperately want to escape our bodies

[aesclepianbanshee]

Intestines are muscles, and function involuntarily. If your muscles did not squirm around, then they wouldn’t be able to move food through them, thus you wouldn’t gain any nutrients from anything you eat, and the food would spoil and make you sick. I agree the squirmy wormies are a bit unsettling, but hey it’s actually really good for you! Your intestines work so hard for it! Please give them a little love.

[official-liberty-prime-deactiva]

I don’t like that get them out

[brattylikestoeat]

Okay…this is unsettling.

[daglout]

This post is actually my nightmare

[micaxiii]

Breaking News! You are full of eels!

[iridium-light]

#wait til you hear about how they put them back#they just stuff them back in and the mesenteric lining slowly pulls them back into place#no helping required#so it 100% looks like a bunch of squiggly eels getting comfortable in their space again (via lampfaced)

[awellboiledicicle]

we all make jokes about humans being weird, and aliens finding them strange as hell but honestly we’re very creepy and strange creatures

[glitterydelusions]

EELS EELS EELS EELS EELS EELS

[yesmrskarsgard-onhiatus]

Hemlock Grove - 1x06 The Crucible

If this the epitome of Roman I don’t know what is

[tastefullyoffensive]

(via mrbrianfirenzi)

[glitterydelusions]

In the many months I have been on tumblr, the only followers/users who find my page (which, yes, is like a barren field where fucks cannot grow) are all porn related. It's like a constant reminder of how badly parenthood has killed my sex life. WHY THANK YOU TUMBLR, I NEVER THOUGHT PORN WOULD FIND ME SO INTERESTING.

[paper-mario-wiki]

Visit Original Link

just so you know, X Gon’ Give It To Ya’ and A Thousand Miles have the same BPM

they didnt match up perfectly but I did some editing.

[w4rgoddess-deactivated20200825]

THIS IS SO WRONG THAT I CAN’T STOP LISTENING TO IT

[bigmammallama5]

[this-too-too-sullied-flesh]

is this terry crews’s workout jam

[witch-apologist]

This slaps honestly.

[theavengers]

“Avengers: Infinity War” exclusive new photos

[marvelsdefenders]

How was anger management? Still angry.

[earendil-was-a-mariner]

George R.R. Martin: dragons are huge ferocious beasts who answer to a master  

Tolkien: dragons are annoying, talking assholes

[jenniferrpovey]

One interesting thought on this:

Fairy tale dragons? They’re like Smaug. They’re arrogant, talkative, they hoard treasure, they eat virgins. They’re amoral rather than evil, but they are intelligent monsters.

The dragon in Voyage Of The Dawn Treader, the one indirectly responsible for Eustace’s draconic curse is along the same lines.

At that time that is what a dragon was. There was a general consensus in western literature that dragons were, well, that.

In Medieval stories, dragons are to be killed by brave men. Gawain fights “wyrms” - a kind of wingless dragon. St. George slays a dragon. So does Beowulf. So does King Arthur. To be a worthwhile myth hero you have, at some point, to slay a dragon.

Early modern and nineteenth century dragons - we see one counter example - Faustus chariot is drawn by dragons in “Doctor Faustus.” The first really solid “friendly dragon” story is The Reluctant Dragon, which became a 1941 Disney film. That is the first story I can find about a dragon that befriends a human - but it’s friendship, not “human masters dragon.”

The second friendly dragon is E. Nesbit’s “The Last of the Dragons” who decides he’d rather hang out with the princess than fight the prince (the first example of subversion of the dragons eat maidens trope that I can find).

But they’re the minority.

In the 1930s, when Lewis and Tolkien were writing, dragons were the bad guys. The rare exceptions were dragons deciding not to act like dragons.

Then something happened.

That something probably started with a 1948 children’s book called “My Father’s Dragon - about a kid who runs away to Wild Island and rescues a baby dragon. Heard of it? If you’ve studied kid lit, sure, it won a ton of awards. Otherwise…nope, and certainly in Dawn Treader, written in 1950, dragons were still bad.

In the 1960s we start to see a couple more “good” dragons. But it’s almost always the same thing. Dragons are bad, except this one. This is a special dragon.

Then in 1967 John Campbell ran a story in Analog named Weyr Search. Heard of that one? Yup.

It was part of a novel called Dragonsflight, written by Grand Master Anne McCaffrey.

And she completely changed what dragons were.

Anne’s dragons were gentle, genetically engineered protectors who bonded to a human rider at birth and were “mastered” by that rider - the dragons offered instinct, but the reason came from the humans.

Anne McCaffrey was one of the first female authors to write science fiction by women about women - and while she had a number of flaws and was honestly a better worldbuilder than writer she inspired a lot of people.

And changed our view of dragons as a fantasy trope.

Since then most fantasy writers that include dragons have them as friendly and willing to be ridden by humans. Even the “good” dragons in the DragonLance novels.

In other words: In the space between Tolkein and Martin, who’s first short story collection was published in 1976, almost a decade after Weyr Search Anne McCaffrey turned dragons on their head.

Daenerys’ dragons owe more in their lineage to Ramoth than they do to Grendel, the dragon slain by Beowulf.

(In other words, literary evolution is fascinating).

[d20-darling-deactivated20181011]

@pinkpurlknits

[wrangletangle]

Wait, wait, can we also talk about the genre McCaffrey helped establish? Say what you like about Political (Romantic) Fantasy (and there is a lot to say, since it was hella white until this century), it didn’t just remake dragons. It remade the public image of what Fantasy is as a genre.

McCaffrey came from a romance writer background. She brought that ethos with her when she migrated - namely, that plots should revolve around character and relationship development, that people are complicated, and that Real Fantasy™ isn’t giant wars, impossible quests, and morality tales but instead complex and evolving societies and the individuals who try to navigate them. She was also, as jenniferrpovey said, a better worldbuilder than writer in a lot of ways. This helped redefine what parts of a world need to be built to satisfy the audience. Tolkien’s legacy was history and language; McCaffrey’s was society and politics.

You don’t have to stan McCaffrey, MZB, Lackey, Kurtz, Rawn, Kushner, Flewelling, Hobb, and Cherryh to understand the impact that their work had on the concept of what western fantasy is. Most English-language fantasy TV series this decade have been Political (Romantic) Fantasy. A large portion of YA fantasy novels carry at least some of its elements. It makes for good plot and easily latchable characters.

So dragons, yes, but also the very core idea of what a fantasy story should talk about has been impacted by a series of women, often mentoring and supporting each other through cowriting, editing, etc. If anyone watched the Hobbit movies and wondered what was up with all the changes, this was up. The genre has changed; audience expectations have changed. You can’t just write 22 chapters of a fairy tale anymore (unless you’re McKillip or McKinley, and even they dip their toes). People want to know what characters other than the protagonist think and feel, what their motivations are. We want to watch relationships evolve. We want to know what makes the world tick now, not just 4000 years ago.

So hat-tip to the literary queens who forged a path. Because of them, you can have your badass dragon queens. (And yeah, there’s a reason Daenerys is a woman. She owes a lot to Lessa.)

[einarshadow]

@deadcatwithaflamethrower literature/history !

[deadcatwithaflamethrower]

Don’t forget that Anne also put gay men into her books and didn’t shine a light on it–she treated it in the text as if it was COMPLETELY NORMAL and at age 12 it was my first introduction to both men-being-together and it being *normal*.

That helped pave the way for Lackey to be able to write books where a gay man is the *main character.*

(Their lack of lesbians is disturbing, but it was still hella-needed progress in mainstream fiction/fantasy.)

[s-leary]

“General.”

[juuls]

Brings a whole new meaning to “stands at attention.”

… the original one.

[figmentforms]

Part 148 of  “A Tale of Two Rulers” (Feb- 12th- 2018)

—★ New comic comes out every Monday! (and if you’re a Patreon supporter you can see it a little sooner on my Patreon page* - here)

Thanks so much to all my amazing supporters that help make this fan-comic happen! ♥ (If is wasn’t for you it would be a lot harder for me to have time to work on this and keep up with the bills so I’m super grateful.)

—★Archive below

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[icel0vesfire]

“You know mistletoe is important to Druids but do you know why people kiss under the mistletoe? It’s a Norse myth. Baldur the son of Odin was the most beloved by the other gods. So much that they wanted to protect him from all the dangers in the world. His mother, Frigg, took an oath from fire and water, metal, stone and every living thing, that they would never hurt Baldur. At a gathering, they tested him. Stones, arrows and flame were all hurled at him. Nothing worked. But there was one god that wasn’t so enamored of Baldur, the god of mischief, Loki. Loki discovered that Frigg had forgotten to ask mistletoe, a tiny, seemingly harmless plant and completely overlooked. Loki fashioned a dart out of mistletoe and it killed Baldur. Frigg was heartbroken. She decreed that mistletoe would never again be used as a weapon and that she would place a kiss on anyone who passed under it. So now we hang mistletoe underneath our door during the holidays so that we will never overlook it again.”

[systlin]

Reblogging again because SOMEONE ASK ME ABOUT WHERE SANTA CAME FROM AND WHY HE HAS EIGHT REINDEER DO IT. 

[orie-ana]

@systlin why?

[systlin]

OKAY BUCKLE UP CHILDREN

Santa? Is Odin. With a bit of the Turkish Saint Nicholas plastered over top to make him more acceptable to Christianity.

Let’s wind this back a bit.

So. In Norse tradition, Odin rose with the wild hunt on Midwinter. Children would leave out offerings of hay or root vegetables in their shoes for Slepnir, Odin’s horse. In norse tradition, all gifts create an obligation that must be returned in kind, so if Odin found the offerings pleasing he would leave treats and sweets in return.

So. We have a magical bearded man riding through the sky on a winter feast day and leaving treats for children in footwear if they pleased him. Sound familiar? Yeah.

As for Slepnir, Odin’s mount? He has eight legs. So. Bearded man with powerful magic flying through the air on an eight-legged steed on a winter feast day and leaving treats for children in their footwear if they pleased him.

Yeah.

Enter Christianity. Now, the midwinter season is important to all cultures that live in cold climates. The passing of the worst of the hard times and the beginning of the longer days and the promise of the return of life and light and fertility is a powerful thing. There were Christian festival days around the same time as Midwinter was celebrated in many polytheistic faiths. Christians found that they couldn’t get people to stop celebrating the feast days they’d been celebrating for several thousand years, so opted instead to just absorb those traditions into their OWN midwinter festivals. It was a far easier and more effective way of convincing people to convert.

So. The tradition of Odin leaving gifts hung on, in a far different form. This was helped by the legend of Saint Nicholas, a Turkish man who inherited a large amount of wealth and who was known and beloved for his habit of slipping money to poor people via leaving it in their stockings as they were hung out to dry after wash day, or by dropping it down their chimneys. This was similar enough to the old Odin myth of leaving gifts in footwear to paste right over top of the older stories with relative ease. So, the man delivering gifts became not Odin, but St. Nick, who delivered gifts via stocking and chimney.

However, the idea of him flying through the sky, being associated with elves, possessing powerful magic, and the eight-legged steed stuck. (reindeer, incidentally, are an animal with a lot of symbol and power in Norse tales. Ullr, the god of the hunt, had ties to reindeer, and at some point the eight legged horse became eight reindeer.)

Incidentally the image of Santa as a chubby little jolly man didn’t come around until modern advertising began depicting him that way. Before that? A tall, strong man, usually with a staff (echoing Odin’s staff or spear).

So. There you have it. Santa, the jolly bearded old man of beloved childhood Christmas memories? If you ever wondered where he came from in a ‘Christian’ holiday, there’s your answer. He didn’t. He’s the amalgamation of an ancient Norse god and a Middle Eastern saint, filtered through the lens of pop culture.

Jim Butcher actually did this very well in the Dresden Files, where Odin makes several appearances, one wearing the mantle of Father Christmas.

Christianity never really managed to make the old gods vanish.

[spellbookbitch]

I love these omg origins of holidays fascinate me

[juuls]

[[ As Vadderung (one of Odin’s personas), he is described as not all that imposing, though a man in good shape and in his early fifties. Lean and spare like a long distance runner only with heavy shoulders and arms. His hair is long, a bit shaggy, and the color of a “thundercloud”. His one eye is ice blue with a patch over the other eye that bears a vertical scar running from above the eyebrow, through the space where the eye would be, ending at mid-cheek. His laugh is hearty, “like Santa Claus must have had when he was a young man and playing football.” ]] (from the Dresden Files Wiki)

^ I love Jim Butcher’s depictions of Odin/Kringle/Vadderung/Santa Claus. He looks different as each persona, but Dresden sometimes sees them meld together.

I love origin stories!

[catsbeaversandducks]

UPS drivers have the most interesting photos to share. 

Photos via UPS Dogs

[thispersonisillogical-blog]

Vocally political and liberal Steve Rogers

Fox News has no idea how to handle it because he’s Captain America and he’s literally from the 40’s like how do that handle that

He refuses to go on half of the news shows because they lie

Mostly ends up on the Daily Show, the Colbert Report, and the Young Turks

Starts charities that focus on kids and the poor

Donations to veterans charities go through the roof

Treatment for PTSD in veterans suddenly gets addressed after he admits to being diagnosised with it

[osointricate]

Steve Rogers starting a twitter specifically for linking people to horrible news stories and calling news stations out on their lies and scare tactics 

Using his twitter to complain about the state of public news and how it should be a space of change and value and honesty for the American public, and how he’s so ashamed of it all

[thispersonisillogical-blog]

He accidentally becomes like public face for the new generation of politically savvy people

They make of shirts like WWCD “what would Cap do?”

Tony is thrilled and proud and hires of team of lawyers exclusively to handle the news stations screaming about Steve

Fox news gets slapped with so many libel fines and law suits

[osointricate]

Going on a show and regretting it the moment an offensive question or comment comes up and decides he’s completely done and just tears the interviewer a new one.  It goes viral.  

The public face thing is just the start.  It starts this whole new wave of people that shut down offensive shit during interviews and holding their own.

There is a short time period once he turns 35 where there is a rally cry of “Captain America for President” that he gracefully turns down.

[thispersonisillogical-blog]

But politicians starting courting him, trying to get him to publicly state that they support him because his influence is just so massive, and they keep getting shut down hard

Talks about growing up in the depression when people bring up financial issues - says things like “With all due respect, ma’am, what others may remember as being over 80 years ago was less then 5 ago to me. Things were supposed to get better. Those issues we thought we fixed were supposed to go away - we were supposed to work to a future where it was gone - and instead it seems to be worse then ever.”

And of course he’s a raging feminist and is absolutely appalled when Natasha tells him about rape statistics

Bruce takes a lot of time to fully educate him about the social and medical side of abortions, teaches him about the various birth defects and medical issues the mothers can face, shows him the demographic information of access and need, and Steve is horrified by that too

Then Tony walks him through gay rights and other LGBTQ issues, all of them helping him understand how sexuality can manifest differently and the difference between sex and gender identity

[osointricate]

Steve just REAL FUCKIN DONE with everything.

Angrily stands in protest rallies and dares people to start something with peaceful protesters.  Just DARES them.

Rolls his eyes at baby boomer articles about the newer generations.  He’s heard that mess before.  He’s done with it.

Understanding people have problems with medical bills, having been there himself.

Fucking standing up for single mothers becaUSE LIKE WHOA THAT’S HIS MOTHER YOU JUST DISSED.

Steve Rogers hating bullies.  Hates that kids are actually KILLING THEMSELVES because of bullying and people are just “oh boys will be boys” about it and he’s just LIVID. 

[crotchgunsamurai]

I would go into debt to read this comic. This is what Captain America should be. This is what America should be.

[babblingbug]

cries i want to embrace this post forever

[elementalsight]

Peaceful protests staying peaceful because when the cops try to start something it doesn’t matter how many of them there are, Steve’s there and he will shut them down, but more than that: Steve gets pepper sprayed. Steve gets chemical burns. Steve on shaky iphone video blind and disoriented and still using his body to protect others as the cops close in. And suddenly the heroes who stay back because they don’t want to get involved - because they shouldn’t use their powers ‘like that’ start showing up in droves.

Peter gumming up the smoke and pepper bombs before they go off. Thor becoming a one man blockade. Natasha working with organizers to help plan for escapes if things do go badly. Tony’s not only keeping Cap up to date - he’s putting considerable money behind the political candidates who will actually work to improve things, because we all know you need money to represent at the polls. They’re not there attacking the police - even if the officers are being assholes, they understand they have a job to do and often bad orders - but they will protect the protesters who have done nothing but show up. And the more they do, the more heroes join in. Because it’s not just about using your powers against the mighty evil empire Strexx or taking down some guy calling himself the Boomerang. It’s about making sure you want to keep living in the world you keep saving.

[stefani-germanotta]

[faembrosia]

Oh my God.

[starksinner]

what am i doing?

[cuthian]

@juuls OMG this is too accurate

[juuls]

YUP.

[ashesrose2613]

Horror Icons Playing With Cats

[slasherimagines]

I HAVE A MIGHTY NEED FOR ALL OF THESE

[pepperonipigeon-blog]

I LOVE THIS

[cwote]

Three Simple Rules In Life.