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our flag means death plus other unrelated cool stuff. ixwin on AO3 ( mostly fanart, formerly secondwalnut) and bsky (mostly lurking). middle aged, she/her.

[mermaidinn]

Mermay daaay 16- wind

[reasonably-tattered]

the thing about memory

can't stop thinking about how a finale ostensibly in tribute to Pratchett ends with the obliteration of memory--and with it, the existence of the characters he gave us. given the craters left by Alzheimer's, in his life and the lives of those who loved him, that ending strikes me as especially cruel.

[akinmytua2]

... Hadn't thought about that aspect. Oof

[ngkiscool]

And it especially reach, coming from the author who coined GNU.

[reasonably-tattered]

A man is not dead while his name is still spoken

[theotherwesley]

I love baby foxes. Nothing has ever had less of an idea.

buffering

[theotherwesley]

feather obtained, purpose unclear

leaf obtained, purpose unclear

ground:

unclear

sibling obtained, purpose: biting

[hms-terrorble]

miles from nowhere guess I'll take my time made as a gift for owltrousers

[fangirlsovertoomanythings]

The way that most of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories’ most horrible villains are rich dudes that are abusive to women, in a time such as the 1880’s, compels me.

[gardnerhill]

There’s a whole subset of Sherlock Holmes stories that could be labeled Asshole Guys Try to Control Women’s Money.

[three--rings]

Yup, there’s a huge number of times where Sherlock Holmes is the ONLY person to take a young woman’s complaint or worry seriously and finds out someone is up to some serious evil.  Holmes also shows a lot of compassion and empathy with the victims over and over again.  (This is why I find “Secretly a woman” or “Trans” Holmes headcanons much more convincing than “sociopath” Holmes.)

[waterhobbit]

I am never going to shut up about how much I specifically love The Adventure of The Copper Beeches because it is literally Sherlock Holmes listening to a young lady he does not know except as a potential client, agreeing with her that a potential job she has interviewed for that she thinks is SUPER SKETCHY is, indeed, sketchy as fuck and when she says she’s probably gonna take the job anyways because the money is good and she needs it going “OKAY I GUESS but for the love of god please write to us so we know you’re okay we will literally drop everything and jump on a train if you want us to”.

The job turns out to indeed be sketchy as fuck, she writes to them, Holmes and Watson drop everything and jump on a train when she asks them to. I read this story for the first time when I was twelve and it made a HUGE impression.

[three--rings]

This is also the basis for a lot of speculation about Holmes’ family life.  The idea that he has been a victim of abuse, or his mother was abused (or even murdered by his father.)  There’s definitely SOMETHING that makes him very aware of how dangerous isolated families can be, and the dark things that can happen behind closed doors.  Plus, of course, the motivation to devote himself to stopping crime.  And yes, so much of it is of the personal type. 

[volkswagonblues]

dude see this is one aspect of the original books i NEVER understand why modern remakes (cough cough) don’t go all in on. Like, in the 21th c we HAVE all the dumb forensic shit that made Victorian Holmes stand out, but we STILL DON’T HAVE uh….you know, compassion for women and minorities, or the willingness to believe them, adequate community support for domestic violence or hate crimes, etc. etc. which you’d think is exactly where a renegade consulting detective would come in handy. A good modern day Sherlock Holmes remake, instead of trying to convince us that Holmes is some super genius for being better than fingerprint analysis or whatever, could have him just be…a good person who helps out people the police can’t and won’t help. There you go. That’s how to write a relevant modern Holmes.

[fahbee]

One thing that annoys me is how much the BBC version of Sherlock (and the fandom around it) focus on police cases or cold cases.  In the stories, Holmes’ bread and butter cases had fuck-all to do with the police and in a few stories, he actively works around/against them, or outright lies to them.  Of the many, many things I wish that show had done differently, this is one is particularly obnoxious since it’s such a gimme.

[tiger-in-the-flightdeck]

There were very few actual murder cases in the Canon, and Holmes handled them either one of two ways:

Option one: The murder victim was innocent while the killer was an abusive bastard, see Speckled Band. Conclusion, arrest and have the killer charged (Or in the case of Speckled Band, indirectly murder him yourself then shrug and go home)

Option two: The victim was murdered to protect someone that the victim was abusing, or for vengeance, see Boscombe Valley, Devil’s Foot, Abbey Grange. Conclusion, Oops, I don’t know who the killer is, I am suddenly incompetent, oh look a pheasant.

[faejilly]

#my favorite murder in holmes canon#is when they straight up witness a lady murder her blackmailer#do nothing except destroy his other blackmail material#and then straight up lie to lestrade about it#sherlock holmes#more of this in modern adaptations pls (via @cactusspatz )

[muffinworry]

Let’s not forget the time Holmes helps a young woman who’s being catfished by her own stepfather to steal her inheritance, and when the villain sneers that the law can’t touch him, Holmes grabs a horsewhip out of sheerest chivalry.

[smokingtigerhiddengun]

So, the most canon-accurate iteration of Sherlock Holmes in the last few decades is actually Benoit Blanc….

[marzipanandminutiae]

I think it’s also important to note, and complicates our ideas about what the highly patriarchal/misogynistic society of 19th century England looked like, that these stories SOLD

they were POPULAR

the Victorians LIKED reading about women who won out over shitty men in their lives, even when that plotline reaffirmed a woman’s power and agency or put an active sexist in his place (ie Irene Adler besting Holmes)

which is fascinating in light of. you know. [gestures broadly at all of Victorian gender dynamics, laws, etc.]

[ixwin]

Okay this is something I've been working on for a while and I'm finally ready to reveal. Basically, what if Ed and Stede were rabbits in the world of Watership Down. First chapter up now with regular drops between now and early May.

Bramblewood (2581 words) by ixwin Chapters: 1/18 Fandom: Our Flag Means Death (TV), Watership Down - Richard Adams, Watership Down (1978) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet, Oluwande Boodhari/Jim Jimenez, Archie (Our Flag Means Death)/Oluwande Boodhari/Ching Shih | Zheng Yi Sao/Jim Jimenez, Black Pete/Lucius Spriggs, Buttons & Olivia the Seagull (Our Flag Means Death) Characters: Stede Bonnet, Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Buttons (Our Flag Means Death), Jim Jimenez, Oluwande Boodhari, Frenchie (Our Flag Means Death), Black Pete (Our Flag Means Death), Lucius Spriggs, Israel Hands, Ching Shih | Zheng Yi Sao, Auntie (Our Flag Means Death), Hellkat Maggie (Our Flag Means Death), "Calico" Jack Rackham, Mary Allamby Bonnet, Alma Bonnet, Louis Bonnet, Chauncey Badminton, Nigel Badminton, Fang (Our Flag Means Death), Archie (Our Flag Means Death) Additional Tags: Rabbits, Adventure & Romance, Happy Ending, Nature, Story within a Story, Animals, Talking Animals, xenofiction, Animal Xenofiction, injuries, Non-Graphic Violence, child death (reference), Infanticide (reference), Alternate Universe - Animals, Rabbit Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Rabbit Stede Bonnet, basically everyone is a rabbit except, Seagull Buttons Summary:

That night, Stede gnawed the wooden support even thinner. Then he tilted his head to one side; gripped the bottom part of it in his teeth and pulled. He felt the wood splintering, and then it snapped. As he pulled it upwards, the wire netting attached to it lifted as well, creating a gap between it and the floor. He took the netting in his teeth, grimacing at the acrid metallic taste of it, and bent it further. Eventually the gap was just big enough for him to squeeze under.

He stared at the gap in slight disbelief. Although this had been his plan all along, it was somehow only now hitting him that this was happening. His heart was beating faster and his mouth felt dry. He licked his paws and started grooming his face, which helped calm him a little.

Stede is a domestic rabbit, frustrated and bored with his monotonous life. Ed is a wild rabbit: chief of a highly successful warren, but equally frustrated and bored. When Stede escapes and makes his way to Ed’s warren they feel an immediate kinship. But then a new threat emerges and they must use all their ingenuity to save their warren from being destroyed…

[ixwin]

Now complete!

[ixwin]

It's been said before but there really is something about writing that's a bit like casting a magic spell. I combined some words in a certain order and now people I have never met are Having Emotions.

Bless all fanfic commenters.

[lyraisnotonfire]

favorite thing about tumblr is having a fandom in law. no i haven't watched this show and i'm not planning to. but my moot is having fun!! look how much they love it!!! i'm supportive from the sidelines!

[sherlockig]

[galesburgdogs]

just found a presentation on wolves i made recreationally when i was 8 years old

[galesburgdogs]

its these and then one other completely blank slide. wolves. wow.

[infectiouspiss]

a tiny heist went down to rescue Rise and now he's being taken everywhere by Reid Wiseman because he's extremely important (he was supposed to be left on the craft, he has instead been adopted)

[toastbutteregg]

[ixwin]

This is the same energy as the %$@#!ing 'smooth typing' in Windows, which I have to switch off immediately every time I get a new laptop from work because it is so aggravating

[j-train13]

Astronauts are so funny man. Here's just a couple of things I've found hilarious from this past week of space stuff:

It's probably already been spread around here enough already, but in case anyone's missed it; 7 hours after launch, commander Reid Wiseman, dealing with tech issues, uttered the generational quote "I have two Microsoft Outlooks and neither one of those are working."

After fixing the issues that were afflicting the onboard toilet, mission specialist Christina Koch (who has quickly become my favourite of the four) laughingly said “I’m the space plumber, I’m proud to call myself the space plumber.”

On Easter Sunday, the Artemis II crew hosted a makeshift egg hunt, by hiding packets of dehydrated scrambled eggs around their Orion capsule.

The way the crew always makes sure to make it very clear they're in space when doing interviews. From stuff like Wiseman just hanging out floating sideways on screen or Koch letting her hair loose so it can freely span out flowing around her.

While in transit, the crew decided to record a parody of those bad 80s sitcom intros where everyone turns and smiles at the camera.

When the crew reached the furthest point from Earth in the mission, they jokingly clambored over each other in an effort to get to the far side of the capsule, so that they could individually claim to be the furthest person from earth.

At the same time, on the ISS which was at the time on the other side of earth, the 7 astronauts onboard had a light-hearted race to the far side of the station, making jokes about being the furthest humans from Artemis.

On the way back to earth, NASA actually managed to establish an audio call between the crews of the ISS and Artemis II (where they shared the above info), and Koch called one member of the ISS crew, Jessica Meir, her "astro-sister" as the two of them previously spacewalker together in 2019. Meir then responded I'm so happy that we are back in space together, even if we are a few miles apart" (a few here being 230,000).

While Jeremy Hansen was doing an interview, Wiseman and Koch were just in the background swatting the mission mascot (a little moon plush toy named Rise) back and forth between each other.

[pastelispunx]

My emotions about space travel, and the history of, are strong today.

[vantavarmint]

vimes in his natural habitat

[yarn-cryptid]

okay I have a headcanon about The Swede

so you know the part in season 1 where Jim's secret is out and they're all sitting around badgering them with questions

and The Swede says "if you're not going to be Jim anymore can I be Jim?"

my HC is that The Swede's name is also Jim but to make it less confusing they just all started calling him The Swede

and he's just asking if he can have his name back now but nope, sorry, Jim's still Jim

[lesbianknighterrant]

He drinks a whisky drink (action) he drinks a vodka drink (bonus action) he drinks a lager drink (hasted action) he drinks a cider drink (action surge)

[lesbianknighterrant]

He sings the songs that remind him of the good times, he sings the songs that remind him of the better times (bardic inspiration)

[lesbianknighterrant]

i get KNOCKED DOWN (prone condition) BUT I GET UP AGAIN (HALF MOVEMENT)

YOURE NOT EVER GONNA KEEP ME DOWN (GRAPPLE IMMUNITY)