I'm always cold and wrapped in a blanket

25 | INFJ This huge mashup of random crap is my personal blog, but search my tags for the cool stuff. Search for "good post" if you're having a bad day, or head over to another of my secondaries blanket-burrito-protocol.

[chaotic-neutral-knitter]

I think one of the kindest things you can do for people with various mental health struggles is just... let people back into your life after they've been absent for a while.

Making friends as an adult is so fucking hard already and isolating yourself from other people is a very common symptom of depression, anxiety, burnout, ocd, trauma, grief, etc. Which means that someone will do the hard work of recovery/healing and resurface back into a world where their previous friends have written them off because they stopped showing up.

So if you know someone where you're like "yeah we could have been better friends but they fell off the map a bit" and that person suddenly reaches out, or starts showing up to events even though you kind of forgot they were still in the group chat... well they may have been Going Through It and you don't actually have to punish them for their absence you can just be glad that they're back.

[quadriviummuse]

Needed to hear this today.

[bedlamsbard]

do you all want my hard-hitting investigative research on who was president during the Chitauri invasion

[bedlamsbard]

okay many people other than me have done this research but I don’t care what they think, I care what weird details I pick up on the screen. also discounting any external evidence because all of that contradicts each other.  (also because the guys at the MCU Wiki came to the conclusion that presidential elections in the MCU occur every two years, which I refuse to believe.) trying to come up with an actual functional timeline for Phase 1 is almost impossible because there are three movies that canonically take place at the same time that all came out a year apart and all of the evidence about when those movies take place contradicts each other. (my best guess for when Fury’s week from hell takes place, a.k.a. IM2, Thor 1, and TIH, is fall 2010, but that’s a different thing.)  for various reasons being that they all contradict each other, it’s nearly impossible to figure out what year any given Phase 1 movie takes place.  it’s not much better in later phases but Phase 1 is especially bad about it.  so I am discounting every single date that appears (because seriously, they all contradict each other).

let’s talk about who was president during the Chitauri invasion, which took place on May 4, 2012.

how do we know for sure the Chitauri invasion took place in 2012? well, Hawkeye’s pretty clear about that one. (and I think it’s confirmed elsewhere. May 4 is the release date of the film.)

SO! let’s go back to Iron Man 2, which I’m rewatching at the moment. from the opening prologue about Vanko, we get this shot of a Washington Times cover and a TIME magazine cover naming Iron Man has person of the year.

I’ve got circled a headline about “Bush,” which presumably means George W Bush, president 2001-2009.  Given the top article in the Washington Times, which we don’t see all of but is about Stark Industries (the text that can be read is about Howard Stark), this could have been from IM1 after Tony does his whole “we don’t do weapons anymore” thing or it could follow the IM1 ending press conference.  But if Bush is making a headline, it’s probably as president, rather than as former president, which must put it at late 2008 or in the first couple weeks of 2009.  (Inauguration day 2009 was January 20.)

BUT! let’s look over at that TIME “person of the year” cover.  The person of the year is announced in early December; we know that because it just happened IRL, and in 2008 the actualfax person of the year was Barack Obama, who had just been elected the first Black president of the United States.  I’m not too keen on Tony Stark knocking Obama off the TIME person of the year list, but maybe both IM1 and Vanko’s prologue takes place over a much longer period of time than the “six months” marker, maybe the Times articles is from 2008 and TIME is from 2009 (the person of the year IRL was Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve).  (if I’m going to pick anyone from the 2008-2010 span of TIME people to knock off it’ll be 2010, which was Mark Zuckerberg, but I don’t think we can push it that late, though IM2 most likely takes place in 2010, but probably before TIME puts out their person of the year.)

we do not get a named president of the United States in The Avengers.  we get one in Iron Man 3, Matthew Ellis.  When does IM3 take place?  Either 2012 or 2013.  It could go either way, but I think it was 2013 because – wait for it – 2012 was an election year.  IRL, Obama was reelected in 2012.  Obama is clearly not president in IM3.  (also the Tony-Maya conversation about her hypothetical 12 or 13 year old kid.)

So. was Obama ever president in the MCU?  well, he never appears, and to the best of my knowledge he’s never namedropped in the main MCU (in some of the Marvel shows he’s mentioned, but I’m only talking about mainline MCU here).  BUT! the plot thickens.

in IM2, Tony puts up a painting that’s a clear reference to the Obama “HOPE” poster

and in TWS, Steve has a copy of David Maraniss’s book Barack Obama: A Story in his apartment. that is a real book; it was published in May 2012 and was written during Obama’s first term.

so the evidence seems to suggest that Barack Obama was elected president in 2008 and was president during the Chitauri invasion, but either was not reelected or dropped out of the 2012 presidential race after the Battle of New York.  we do not know Matthew Ellis’s party affiliation, and via the hard-hitting American means of trying to guess party affiliation by what color tie he’s wearing, unfortunately he wears both blue and red (and they cast for “fake Bush” which is a very distinctive face type). he wears two blue ties to one red tie, though, so maybe he’s a Democrat.

one more piece of evidence, this time from TWS again.

from the Captain America Smithsonian exhibit, there’s a big “Welcome Back, Cap” quote on the wall, from…President Matthew Ellis. now, that could have shortly followed Steve’s dethawing, either in 2011 or 2012, depending where one wants to place that (there is still no confirmation on when Steve was found and defrosted, it’s basically just vibes at this point).  or it could have occurred later, well after the Battle of New York in early 2013, after inauguration day (January 21), during one event or another. do we have a date? we don’t. we don’t know what Ellis was doing before being elected president, aside from Aldrich Killian’s comment about “thanks to you, not one fat cat saw a day in court” about the Roxxon Norco oil spill, which could put him in any political office. it’s possible that when he first met Steve, he wasn’t president yet: maybe he met Steve as a senator, or maybe he was vice president (we have no evidence that Joe Biden exists in the MCU), maybe he was secretary of defense. that just later went on the wall as “President Matthew Ellis” because that’s now the office he holds. several options!

so. who was president of the United States during the Chitauri invasion? my best guess: Barack Obama.

why is he no longer president the next term? well, he could have just been defeated in the race. in a normal election cycle, fighting off an alien invasion via the power of fine American engineering (Iron Man and Captain America) would definitely get a president reelected, we’re Americans, we like that sort of thing. (listen, I was around in 2001 and for the 2004 election, I know from “batshit patriotism will get a president reelected”). EXCEPT. as one may recall from The Avengers, there was a nuclear missile shot at the island of Manhattan. was this ever public knowledge? unclear, but people could have SEEN Iron Man grab it. is that something that (a) a president would resign over or (b) drop out of a race over rather than let it come to light? yeah, it is.  (I realize post-2016 it’s hard to believe that anything has consequences, but go with me here.)

am I forgetting or ignoring evidence from later movies that I don’t know as well? possibly. is it something the MCU actually thought about? probably not. do I get hung up on largely unimportant details anyway? yes.

[mylordshesacactus]

For all that the 1800s etiquette guides are--obviously--derangedly sexist from a modern perspective? They're also mindblowing in how casually they will assert things that MODERN DAY CONSERVATIVES would scream and cry and shit their pants about.

"People back then always married young it's natural!!!" Every single 1800s guide I've ever met casually mentions that, of course, you really shouldn't get married before you're at least 20, and waiting until 25 is usually better.

Or, like. Okay here's a long segment:

Just firmly going "it is crazy sexist to blame The Wife for overspending when thirty seconds of asking questions will immediately establish that her husband was outright lying to her about how much money they had. Talk to your wife like a normal person."

Or--okay, here. A section on being honest and not writing love letters in secret, because that's usually a good sign that there's something untoward going on....

....except that he then immediately acknowledges that sometimes, the reason you're hiding this from your parents is that your parents suck. That there are parents who frankly have not earned the right to approve or disapprove of your partner.

(I realize the phrasing there sounds a lot less strong than my summary, but--trust me on this. When you're familiar with the narrative voice of these kinds of books, this passage is downright radical. The mere acknowledgement that if you treat your kids badly, it's your own damn fault when they don't talk to you? I've genuinely never seen that before in this genre. Don't freak out over "properly trained", either. It's just a linguistic shift--at the time, "training" was used the way we would say "raising" a child today. )

[mylordshesacactus]

"Delete all the nudes and sexts after a breakup or you're a piece of shit" has been the standard expectation since EIGHT. TEEN. EIGHTY. FIVE.

[mylordshesacactus]

"Men and women being friends with each other is literally normal. Don't be a controlling freak."

Anyway I was wrong the publishing date is actually 1882 so like.

[mylordshesacactus]

"If you have to abuse a child to keep order in your classroom then you're a bad teacher."

So like @ the modern Republican party, are the "traditional family values" in the fucking room with us right now--

[crokitheloki]

everyone say thank you ao3 volunteers you're the best ao3 volunteers ily ao3 volunteers

[raisedbylibrarians]

[libraford]

Are YOU gonna let THE GOVERNMENT tell YOU what YOUR GENDER is? That doesn't sound like Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness to me! PROTECT your individual FREEDOMS and call your senator: we want the GOVERNMENT to stay OUT OF OUR PANTS! GENDER FREEDOM NOW!

[libraford]

Two men in your neighborhood are married... to EACH OTHER? Congratulate them for exercising their AMERICAN RIGHT to follow the footsteps of our FOUNDING FATHERS! They've got a fully AMERICAN spirit of FREEDOM and REBELLION! GOD BLESS THE USA.

[libraford]

Your coworker has a different RELIGION from yours? Well, that's just INTERESTING and you should talk about it on your UNION-APPROVED LUNCH BREAK. The UNITED STATES OF AMERICA was FOUNDED on Freedom of Religion and ANYONE should be allowed to seek the AMERICAN DREAM!

[libraford]

You think someone might be in this GREAT country ILLEGALLY? NO YOU DON'T! No one is in this country illegally! The minute anyone steps on our SOVEREIGN SOIL they're your FELLOW AMERICAN and where they come from is NO ONES BUSINESS.

[rosslynpaladin]

it's funny yeah, but guys this is actually how you reach the people who prefer these terms to frame all things Good and Correct.

[rosszulorzott]

[cumdumpstiel]

homeless people are part of your community!!!!! get with it!!!!!!!!!!!!! they’re not outside interlopers they’re not invaders they’re not vermin. homeless people = people deprived of homes, they are Victims and you should be angry on their behalf because people are being deprived of shelter in Your Community

[my-ny]

Steve (and friends) + text posts pt. 19/?

[dueseaworthiness]

Special shout out to THIS one, specifically, because Steve Rogers with a honest to Gawd Brooklyn accent would have been the greatest.

[peast]

if you are in the Thunder Bay area, the Whitesand First Nations families who have evacuated their homes burning down in Ontario are requesting supplies or monetary dnations

Source and most frequently updated post

OP last updated: July 15th

[pangur-and-grim]

I got a poem published in a literary magazine, and they just posted the first few lines of it on their website as a ‘teaser’, with the prompt that you can buy the magazine and read the rest, and……. that’s honestly just the funniest thing they could have done. I’m imagining people gnashing their teeth, punching in their credit card info bc they HAVE to know how the poem ends. blueballing the poetry perverts. I wonder how much money they’ve made

[pangur-and-grim]

here it is btw:

[ramshackledtrickster]

Some portraits !! Haven’t done ac in a while and started with Edward bc of the new game, but it didn’t feel right not drawing Ratonhnhaké:ton too (the best)

Patreon || Fundraisers and aid drives|| Daily Click

[strangerconnection]

you know, i don't remember

[headspace-hotel]

I finally got around to reading Not Easily Conquered and I'm just about as okay as you'd expect after that

[headspace-hotel]

this is one of the fics they're talking about when people say stucky fandom in 2014 was writing beautiful poetry and academic papers in their fanfictions

[headspace-hotel]

I am being so, so real with y'all right now

The artistic ecosystem of Bucky Fanfiction is an intricate, fascinating, gorgeous landscape of entwined artistic works that deserves analysis and recognition

Cringe culture, intellectual property law, and the self-destruction of the franchise it was based upon have conspired to isolate and devalue this art-ecosystem, and this makes me want to throw myself in the ocean

[headspace-hotel]

Yes, it's a gay love epic for the ages, on par with kirk and spock, or gilgamesh and enkidu, but it's also just fascinating how so many writers took compelling pieces and bits from the source material and formed an interconnected labyrinth of stories, all in conversation with one another and forming new nodes of compelling concepts that were then picked up by further stories

most contemporary storytelling considers "originality" as an inherently good quality. Creators are encouraged to conceal their influences as much as possible, so it should be difficult to trace directly where ideas descended from. It's not spoken out loud but once you see it, you can't stop realizing how weird it is.

An artistic ecosystem that rejects that premise can do some BONKERS stuff.

It's intoxicating to see stories interacting on an ecosystem level so closely, exchanging and circulating ideas, refining and clarifying

And with early Stucky fandom, it's driven by this frenetic sense of passion. I don't think everyone believed that the ship would become canon, but in a way that's hard to describe, you can tell they believed it was real.

There is no self-consciousness. It is blisteringly sincere art

[headspace-hotel]

I feel like this kind of Storycosystem can't emerge with a franchise that actually understands what it's doing, or reckons with its own implications, or is actually uncomplicatedly good, because then, the NECESSITY of telling the story wouldn't be burning a hole in our heads.

[headspace-hotel]

Once, a painfully mainstream multimillion-dollar media franchise accidentally told like 14% of one of mankind's Great Stories

[headspace-hotel]

A Great Story builds momentum like an asteroid punching a hole in the sky. It seizes hold of people and makes them its tellers.

Once you get the beginnings of one of the Great Stories together, it just won't stop. Creativity will come to people like possession.

And no one person can completely tell a Great Story. Shakespeare's probably the only guy that ever managed to tell more than 50% of a Great Story and that caused a nucleo-narrative meltdown igniting a chain reaction so violent that now most of our stories and a significant chunk of our language itself are from Shakespeare.

[phinarei]

Shakespeare wrote with a team too. The surviving versions of some of his better plays are copies of copies that were edited by multiple people. Some are recreated from notes taken by people "pirating" the play and making copies to sell.

He wrote with his friends and his actors and his lovers. And the people of his time wrote their own (pseudo) fanfiction and some of what we have is most likely that rather than a direct copy of his plays. There was absolutely an interconnected storycosystem in his time around his works.

And I think that kind of emphasizes what you're saying.

The internet allows for more minds and hearts to be thrown together than Shakespeare could have dreamed. And I'll agree that Bucky especially draws in a lot of people who enjoy turning a narrative into a celtic knot made of 17 other stories and thoughts. There are lines from Bucky fics that border on being known sayings.

Also, I agree to my core that truly great fandom can't exist with really good media. Media that knows what it's doing and follows up on foreshadowing and subtext doesn't NEED fanfic written for it. And the fandoms of good media that do have fanfics are often not nearly as deep and don't explore nearly as many possibilities. Because their questions were answered in a satisfying way. In a way that felt true to the characters.

The MCU is one of my favorite sand boxes, but it is a pile of garbage. It gives us some of the most divinely inspired versions of characters and heart breakingly perfect bits of lore and then fucks them up over and over again just to be sure no one can predict what comes next. Also they hate their female fans in a way that possibly only Sherlock has ever truly competed with.

[keepcalmandcarriefischer]

I feel lied to. This is where the bugs bunny NO meme cokes from

[an-enigmatic-mind]

[liquid-geodes]

Ah lads they fucking rotated him

[keepcalmandcarriefischer]

[kalianos]

[yan-town]

[ythok]

Me, reading this whole post:

[pope74220]

NOW it’s you

[keepcalmandcarriefischer]

Oh yea? Well guess what bro

[polyphonetic]

[fallenwillow44]

Best post I've seen all day

[dat-physics-gal]

[keepcalmandcarriefischer]

[ericvilas]

[incidentalcomics]

Hope 

I drew this comic in 2017. Now it’s more relevant than ever.

[noelle-ism]

I will not call myself or other people "gooners" or "npcs" or "larpers". i will not call things i dont like "slop". i will not use terms like "-oids". i dont like how common language is slowly becoming more focused on shorthand terms for hate and apathy

[skylarrikin]

Tags from @crystaltoa

[neverbreakheart]

[vulcartist]

I translated the Ea-Nasir complaint into vulcan and engraved it in on a cooper plate

[tournevis-real]

The tumblrest sentence I have ever seen