Eva Stratt's double-parked coffee

Kaidariel/KJ. professional lurker. "Let us go and do these things we can't do." Pictured: the blogger's recreation of Chihuly floats, Franklin Park Conservatory, 2014

[holymagdalenes]

"There's no hope for the future." And that's how they felt during the Atomic Age, during the World Wars, during the Enlightenment Revolutions, during thr plagues, during the Viking raids, during the fall of Rome.

Yet, we persisted.

[ave-immaculata]

[letmetakeastabatit]

CS Lewis had something to say about this

[whocalledhimannux]

Honestly this is one of my favorite moments in Thick as Thieves. Because the original scene is so iconic, and I love that you can see when Costis thinks back to it. And I love that it doesn’t work, because Costis is not enough of an ass to pull it off. And I love that Costis has no response, and deliberately says “someone else” instead of “my king,” because in my head, Kamet’s question is what suddenly makes Costis realize that he’s treating Kamet the exact same way Eugenides treated his wife and hoooooooly shit, what does that mean, why has every part of this stupid little errand gone wrong in the most hilarious way possible and what the hell is Eugenides going to say when he hears about it?

[whocalledhimannux]

#an unreliable narrator describing somebody omitting information#mwt (via @thecrenellations)

if I can expand: an unreliable narrator describing somebody omitting information in telling a story about someone concealing information by broadcasting information

these books are incredible

[forgottenscarves]

Happy Moon Day Monday!

It forever amazes me that it was a mere 66 years between the first piloted, heavier than air airplane flight and a man walking on the moon

[declan-mice]

of the many many praiseworthy things that the hierarchy series has, i think the fact that each vis version was operating off of such limited information was by far the coolest (and most ironic). one has to spend the entire book trying to kill god and then another finds out that oops! we needed god alive actually lol. the third didn't even realize he was on a different world for like 500 pages. everyone is living and dying but bi twunk vis is eternal

[omegastation]

just because i want to, inspired by tim collins' video

Which duo in Mass Effect can assemble flat pack furniture together without screaming at each other once?

Steve and James

Samantha and EDI

Shepard and Anderson

Miranda and Samara

Jack and Kasumi

Ashley and Kaidan

Jacob and Thane

Liara and Javik

Garrus and Wrex

Tali and Legion

Joker and Zaeed

Mordin and Urdnot Bakara

Voting ended onJul 19

[woahits-transformers]

:)

[k-she-rambles]

@abigailspinach I can't find the post but I can give you some bits! I might get some of the locations wrong. (Spoilers for the whole series)

• It's mentioned that Eddisian winter hobbies are fighting, fibercraft, and seducing each other's spouses.

• Eddisian priests keep track of bloodlines

• Helen and Eugenides look strongly alike

The Thief:

• Gen says his mother was called the Queen Thief because she stole people's hearts away.

• Gen and Helen share a Grandfather who was Eddis

• it was on the strength of Gen's father's arm (who would be the prince!) that Helen succeded her father as Eddis.

• Helen visits Gen while he's delirious and offers him Hamiathes' Gift. Being given the Gift grants you the right to rule Eddis. He says no.

• reveal at the end that the plot was kicked off by the MoW giving Gen the idea to steal Hamiathes' Gift (and money!) & telling him that if something doesn't happen to reinforce Helen's right to rule the council will vote to force her to marry Old Sounis.

QoA:

• Helen says she and Gen are "too close to marry"

• the other option besides Old Sounis was some Attolian baron with royal blood (Erondites 😬)

• The Thief of Eddis is not allowed title or property by tradition

ACoK:

• Helen and the MoW are in Attolia for a reason I don't remember Sophos being privy to. Seems to be more of a family visit than a state visit.

• Sophos calls Eugenides a bastard. Helen does not go 'lol we all say that sometimes.' Instead something about Helen's expression makes Sophos go ohshit and apologize immediately.

• Eugenides makes a snide comment that "Sophos isn't the one who's illegitamate" apropos of nothing

• for Reasons, Helen can't offer fealty to Attolis directly, she'd be betraying her country. It has to happen through her marriage to a vassal king, Sophos.

RoTT:

• the Eddisians demand Eugenides go through an ancient ritual (letting them beat him up) before they'll accept him as high king

• Helen's mother had a thing for the MoW before Helen's father the crown prince asked her hand (and who says no to being queen?)

• revenge seduction? So says the Eddisian rumor mill.

• Queen Thief who steals hearts..

• the MoW and his brother the king did pay the priests to basically seal Gen's and Helen's baby brother's birth records

• the Eddisian council voted to have Eugenides killed right before The Thief to avoid civil war

We're never actually told whether the rumors are true, but...

[pvrrhadve]

happy valentine's day to these freaks 💖💖💖

[whyenn-reader]

firm believer you can't be a ''good person''. too much niuance to life.

[whyenn-reader]

you can be good (adjective) but you cannot be good (identity)

[whyenn-reader]

if you think you are good (identity) you are more likely to cause harm as you don't consider yourself to be capable of it

[misti-step]

project hail mary is a movie about circles.

watch on youtube

[beatrice-otter]

Queen Amidala: Headcanon About Naboo "Royalty"

The Naboo royalty is one of the most fascinating bits of the worldbuilding the Prequel Trilogy gives us, because it's so weird. And people don't really ... grapple with that very much, even in fic, but tend to take it for granted. We have an elected monarch (and why give an elected official a hereditary title?!?) who wears elaborate ceremonial robes and elaborate ceremonial makeup that literally nobody else in their society wears. This person has a reign name that is not the name they grew up with, and which they will keep as their primary professional name even after they are no longer monarch. And even their personal name seems to have changed. (There are two choices--either all the handmaiden's names were changed to match Padmé, or all of them including Padmé changed their names.)

This elected monarch is surrounded by body doubles/bodyguards who are not only good at fighting and can pass for the monarch in a pinch but who can also be the one making decisions and treated as the monarch in important diplomatic situations. Yes, sure, the reveal of the Real Padmé when dealing with the Gungans is cool, but why the fuck is the decoy the one leading the negotiations. Like. If Sabé-wearing-Padmé's-clothes-and-makeup had negotiated a treaty and signed it, would that treaty still be legally binding even though Sabé isn't Padmé? It sure seems so! Why didn't they swap Padmé back into the lead for the negotiations, and then back out for safety when the negotiations conclude?

This group of body doubles/bodyguards have personal names that are changed to match the monarch's personal name (and there's a good chance that the monarch's personal name is also changed to match theirs--to the best of my knowledge, Padmé and her handmaidens are the only Nabooians we see with names that end in "é". This group continues on for the rest of the monarch's life, including recruiting new members who change their names to match when they join. This group is separate from the regular security.

All of this does not smell political to me, especially when you see the difference with every other Nabooian political role. It smells religious.

Which is why my headcanon is that until fairly recently the monarch of Naboo was not, actually, the political ruler ... but rather the religious ruler. Consider Japan, where the "emperors" have beenmostly religious leaders (head of Shintoism, descendant of the god Amaterasu) and had very little political power for most of history.

Sometime in the not-too-distant-past, the monarchs of Naboo had a role that was mostly religious and ceremonial. It was probably at least sort of a group role--not just one person, but a cadre of a leader and their attendants, who all had ceremonial parts to play that were to some degree interchangeable. Being part of this cadre was prestigious, and probably meant agreeing/vowing to serve the priorities of the leader for life, so that it shouldn't matter which person is actually wearing the ceremonial makeup at any given time. There was no age limit on this role, but it does require giving up parts of your identity or subsuming them into the role; this is often easier for young people who are still forming their identity, so you get a stronger cadre if you elect them relatively young and then they grow up together.

What, exactly, the religious duties of this "monarch" are I haven't thought up, and depending on the needs of the story you could go a lot of different ways. Are they an arbiter of theology, in the Christian vein? Are they a representative of the god(s)? Do they give oracles? Is it mostly about seeing that the proper ceremonies and rites are observed, and running the priesthood?

At any rate, while this was going on, there was originally some other sort of political leadership on Naboo. There were religious leaders, and there were political leaders, and the monarch was the religious leader not the political. You could have the secular leaders be a sort of shogun, or a President, or something.

And then, somewhere along the line, the secular/political structure collapsed, and the only leadership still in place was the monarch, who sort of ... appropriated the powers of the political leadership and joined them into the existing role. (This is basically what happened in Europe with the fall of the Western Roman Empire, btw; in most places the local bishops and the local churches were the only bit of the Roman bureaucracy left standing, so they sort of found themselves holding the bag.)

By the time Padmé was elected, the political/secular aspects of the role were the primary ones; certainly, we never see any sign of any religious duties except possibly that white makeup that nobody else wears.

And that would explain just about all the weird stuff quite nicely.

[fictionadventurer]

Hallmark should make more period drama adaptations. No one expects anything out of Hallmark, so instead of all the discourse being about how it butchers the book, history, or costumes, people can be surprised and delighted by the things it gets right.

[k-she-rambles]

what's the equivalent of "hobbyless behavior" but "unimaginative excuses" instead

[k-she-rambles]

The frogs down in the bottoms by the river sound like a giant, snoring. Just now a morning bird started his song...and stopped halfway through as if someone had shushed him and said "It's still dark!"

[chlorial-ofthelibrary]

This bookmark seemed fitting for the book!

[doriangraysrockcollection]

i must say, i am a huge fan of when a book is in the middle of a very exciting plot containing many interesting problems when out of nowhere for a few pages it's like, "hey by the way, real quick, here's a detailed explanation of the city's water filtration system! i'm telling you this for a reason and you should worry about it. anyway! haha okay back to the plot" and you just get to be Scared for a while

[doriangraysrockcollection]

i am kissing you on the mouth right now

you are the only person who understands me. you and the person who tagged a series of unfortunate events

[elgreytea]

What are you reading rn, why are you reading it, and what format are you reading it in (physical book, ereader, on your phone etc)