None of this Nonsense Please

A nerdy, sporadically insightful blog by a persnickety pagan with a penchant for plaid.

[syro-malabar-baby-deact]

Someone please take my phone away from me

[attentiondealer]

lucy: “i am in love with this man”

also lucy, literal five seconds later: writes some of the most homoerotic sentences i’ve ever read to mina

[sculcuvant]

Not to be That Gay but Healthy Polyamory would have solved literally all of the problems in Dracula. 

[sculcuvant]

Quick Note

Hi - I don’t know if anyone will find this, probably not, but I was on here looking for something I reblogged a LONG time ago, and found some old, cringe stuff. So, this is me gently disavowing anything I posted here and have since forgotten and outgrown, it doesn’t necessarily reflect who I am today (in 2022). If some day someone finds something shitty I posted, hopefully I’ve grown since then. 

[tastefullyoffensive]

Is your dad Ron Swanson? (via blooper2112)

[edgebug]

this is the money axe of good fortune, reblog to receive money and axes

[captain-acab]

Sleipnir doesn’t make sense

One thing I never really understood was Sleipnir (meaning “slippery one” fyi) in depictions of Norse mythology. Sleipnir is an eight-legged horse, the steed of Odin and the son of Loki, and he is commonly depicted like this:

(image not mine)

But why would you depict an eight-legged horse like this? Horses gallop the same way most other mammals run, with all feet leaving the ground at one point, so having extra feet here doesn’t seem like it could make the horse any faster. I’m also not sure it would give it any more stable footing, since it doesn’t have a wider base.

If you want a stable eight-legged form that can reach great speeds for its size, wouldn’t you want to start with what nature has already provided? Wouldn’t you want something more like… this?

(my drawing)

“But wait!” you might say, “Sleipnir was conceived when Loki, in horse-form, seduced another horse! That’s why it looks all horsey, just with extra bits!”

Well, that’s a good point, but consider that Loki as a deity was originally based off the spider, and his name even derives from the old Swedish word for spider (source). Therefore, it’s not too hard to believe Sleipnir inherited his horse half from his mother and the more spidery half from his father. In conclusion:

Spider-Horse, Spider-Horse, He does spider-things of course! Weaves a web, Makes you gawk, Riding round ‘til Ragnarok! Look out! Here comes the Spider-Horse.

[edderkopper]

I am all for creative interpretations of Sleipnir. And spiders, obviously. This is epic.

But just so you know, that journal is from the 60′s, and the current scholarly consensus no longer considers the spider etymology to be likely. We still aren’t sure where the name comes from, and probably won’t ever be, but I’ve seen quite a few more recent academics lean toward Old Norse luka, meaning “close”, “shut”, or “end.” (See Simek’s Dictionary of Northern Mythology.)

[myreligionisconfused]

^^^^ my research found much the same. (which is sad, i like spiders)

As far as Sleipnir having eight legs, it’s probably a reference to Icelandic horses. Icelandic horses are one of the few horse breeds with five gaits. They can do a walk, trot and canter/gallop, like most horses. But they have also evolved to have a tolt,

[ gif of a man riding a brown Icelandic horse doing a tolt. The back legs of the horse move rather stiffly back and forth, while the front legs are lifted up almost to the horse’s chest. While the horse bounces slightly, the man riding the horse could probably hold a glass of water without spilling. ] 

which is fast, smooth and noted for its explosive speed and ability to cover long distances.

The second unique gait is called flugskeið, or flying pace.

[ a light brown Icelandic horse demonstrating the flugskeið. With the exception of the wind in the horses’ mane, the upper part of the horse and the rider seem to almost be still, with the background simply zipping by them. The horse’s legs, however, move fast enough to blur. Unlike with a full gallop, the horse does not fully extend its legs away from its body. This is particularly obvious in the front legs of the horse, which lift up to the chest of the horse and land under its chin the same way as in the tolt]

It is both smooth and fast, some horses being able to reach speeds of 30 mph. Not all Icelandic horses can do a flugskeið, but you’ll notice that when done properly the legs move in unison and so fast they can blur, giving the illusion of the horse having eight legs.

Anyways, here is a video to further emphasize how cool the flugskeið is;

[edderkopper]

I’d never heard this theory! That’s so neat.

The one I’ve read attributed the eight legs thing to a metaphor of a coffin + 4 pallbearers.

[lokikissesmyforehead]

This is FASCINATING, and I adore Sleipnir! 😍 @tinaferraldo

[catwinchester-deactivated201901]

You’ve brought my horse geek out now. You have been warned!

The thing is, until the late 1800s we didn’t know how horses moved. 

In old paintings you typically see horses with their legs stretched wide as they thought that gave the appearance of great speed. 

But it really just looks like Timmy’s big brother was being an evil bastard and bent the legs of his tin horses out . 

It’s completely unnatural looking, but horses moved too fast for us to be able to see how they moved, until Edward MAuybridge captured their motion in a series of consecutive photographs in 1878.

And for the first time we could see that all four legs did leave the ground. (and are never stretched uncomfortably wide!). 

He also created the first motion picture as the individual photographs could be put together as a series of film frames (below).  

So, all this is to say that back when Sleipnir was being dreamed up, they didn’t understand how animals moved and probably thought more legs = faster, and to a degree they were right, things on four legs run faster than bipeds so they continued that principle to its logical, if incorrect, conclusion. 

[hesaidsidhesaid]

THIS IS THE BEST HORSE MOVEMENT DISCOURSE EVER

[jumpingjacktrash]

or we can consider that norse epics were, above all else, poetry, and consider that the image of an eight-legged horse brings to mind a horse that moves like a spider – with that fast darting scuttle that so many people find terrifying. an alien horse. a divine horse. a monster.

(personally i find the spider run adorable, like when a cat gets startled and does the skitter. but i recognize this is an unusual reaction.)

[furball891]

So, inspired by the whole concept of a spider-horse I very loosely sketched this:

…To which my brother @foxofwar simply pointed out, that being a spider-horse, it’s a sporse.

[monstrous-hourglass]

Slightly off topic, but it isn’t unique to Norse mythology to give a magical horse unusual number of legs tho. In Hungarian folklore special horses (usually fond of eating cinders, capable of flying or running faster than the win or even faster than thoughts, usually liked to sass the hero of the tale) had 5, 6 or 7 legs.

Obviously those numbers were chosen because they held cultural significance (our dragons/giants had odd number of heads too), but it probably sounded like common sense that more legs=faster horse.

[odinnsdottir]

I have nothing to add but damn is this thread epic.

[cluegrrl]

There’s a Peruvian horse breed called the Paso that has a fifth gait as well – kind of a smooth, toe-skimming shuffle between the trot and the canter. It’s smooth as butter.

[boogiewoogiebuglegal]

Epic horse thread is epic. And fascinating :)

[robininthelabyrinth]

@oneiriad

[mias-back-from-the-dead]

@gallusrostromegalus

[some-italian]

@scales-and-tales

[dovewithscales]

This is excellent. @kinfriday

[sculcuvant]

Consider also the nine worlds - an eight-legged horse could theoretically stand in all but one world (with the last being either Asgard, Midgard, or Hel, depending on what is more theosophically satisfying), representing Odin’s mastery of/ability to move through all the worlds. This ties into the idea of Odin as Ur-Shaman, able to move seamlessly and at will through dimension after dimension. 

[postcardsfromspace]

Stop HB2796

HB2796 is an absolutely blatant attempt to strip away the civil rights of transgender people; and it’s absolutely fucking terrifying.

Quoting the official summary of HB2796:

This bill prohibits the word “sex” or “gender” from being interpreted to mean “gender identity,” and requires “man” or “woman” to be interpreted to refer exclusively to a person’s genetic sex, for purposes determining the meaning of federal civil rights laws or related federal administrative agency regulations or guidance. No federal civil rights law shall be interpreted to treat gender identity or transgender status as a protected class, unless it expressly designates “gender identity” or “transgender status” as a protected class.

HB2796 is currently with the Republican-majority House Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice. Please, PLEASE–especially if you’re cisgender, and doubly if you’re one of their constituents–call the Representatives on the committee and explain just how much damage this will do, how many lives it will destroy, and how many legislative careers (hopefully) hinge on its passage or failure.

Committee members are:

Chairman Steve King (R-IA-04; King is also one of HB2796′s sponsors) - [phone]

Vice Chairman Ron DeSantis (R-FL-06) - [phone]

Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ-08; Franks is also one of HB2796’s sponsors) - [phone]

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX-01) - [phone]

Rep. Karen Handel (R-GA-06) - [phone]

Ranking Member Steve Cohen (D-TN-09) - [phone]

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD-08) - [phone]

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY-10) - [phone]

(Note - Listed phone numbers are for DC offices only, but links go to pages with both district and federal office information, as well as additional avenues of contact.)

[postcardsfromspace]

Once more for the weekday / West coast crowd.

OP back, with a few additional notes:

If you’re not getting answers at the numbers listed above, the representatives’ names link to info on additional ways to contact them.

Contact your own representatives, too, and make sure they’re aware of the bill and that it’s important to their constituents.

On one hand: yeah, this is probably junk legislation. Handel attempted to pass a similar amendment to the military appropriations bill and failed, then immediately introduced HB2796 in response. On the other hand: With the current political climate and an administration that gives no shits about constitutional rights, I’m not willing to gamble on that; and furthermore, it’s a goddamn unconscionable piece of legislation whether or not it’s expected to pass.

Let your elected representatives know that trans lives and dignity matter to American voters. Please.

[badpsychicadvice]

Bad Witchcraft Tip: Cursing

Want to curse someone but don’t know how? Lacking inspiration? Out of jars? Relax and save your energy: after the events of 2016, everyone is as good as doomed already!

[selenophilicc]

WHY DIDN’T THEY GIVE FLORA A HISTORY LESSON THAT WHITE PEOPLE IN COLONIAL GARB WILL NEVER BE A BLACK GIRLS FRIEND

[cookingwithflorence]

They made Lily Rabe and Sarah Paulson the same character so we can’t ship them.

[sculcuvant]

Not with that attitude. 

[goodmorningkhaleesi-blog]

Everybody watching AHS: what’s the theme?

Ryan Murphy:

[plutomeetsgenius]

someone, somewhere is logged on to my tumblr, because I haven’t watched stranger things yet, and from gifs and other fans only, I ship Nancy and Barb… @sapphickillers, what is this?

[bookishbloomsbury]

Now that you’ve finished #StrangerThings … here’s what to pick up as you wait for season two! 

[jonathan-byers-blog-deactivated]

tag urself im hoppy and jonny boy

[sculcuvant]

I’m Barbie and Hoppy

[sculcuvant]

Stranger Things OT3 - Shopping

Their first date as a triad is to take Jonathan shopping. “What if people see us holding hands..and you’re wearing that!” Steve says, poking at Jonathan’s brown T-Shirt and laughing to hide how terrified he is of anyone finding out about them. So Nancy and Steve take Jonathan to Merry-Go-Round and he’s utterly overwhelmed. Steve can’t help but to bring him the worst options, garish and poorly designed, and Nancy plays along because she wants to see Jonathan in this weird one-size-fits-all thing. It backfires when Jonathan loves it, he thinks he looks great, and the other two have to scramble to convince him out of it.  In the end, he just walks out with a few different T-Shirts and Jeans anyway, plus one nice button down. 

Steve buys the same shirt in a different color, so that he can have a matching outfit but no one will know. 

[sculcuvant]

Stranger Things OT3 - Movie Night

Movie watching is Jonathan’s favorite ot3 Date. Either Nancy gets super invested in the plot, eyes glued to the screen, trying to figure out where it’s all going, or Steve can’t hold back his feelings and is on the edge of his seat, shouting “No Luke don’t give into the dark side!” Jonathan likes both options, because he gets to cuddle with whoever’s less into the plot and silently evaluate the camera angles and lighting. 

Sundays are VERY IMPORTANT because Murder She Wrote starts airing. No one else is allowed in the room. Everyone’s clothes stay on. This is serious business. 

[brightwalldarkroom]

“The Mad Max films are a kind of modern myth-making, a notion that is present even in the way they treat continuity. If you sat down and tried to piece together a timeline for Max or his world over the course of the four movies, it wouldn’t add up. Instead, each movie functions like a different story someone is telling about Mad Max, the Road Warrior. He is an archetypal figure within a new mythos. It doesn’t matter if it’s the same sawed off shotgun that sparks and fails the first time Max tries to use it—what matters is that there is a gun like that, because Max has a gun like that. Just like Max has a leather jacket carried down from his days in the Main Force Patrol, and at some point he or someone near him will wind a tiny music box. In each Max story, there are certain symbols that are constant, like Orpheus’ lyre.”

—Tarra Martin, “Ride Eternal” (Bright Wall/Dark Room, Dec. 2015)

[bobschofield-deactivated2018101]

I cannot put into words how much I love that the “continuity” of these films is a broad swirl of repeating motifs and patterns rather than any kind of hard and fast timeline. 

It makes me sad that this isn’t a more readily intuited concept, and that actually a lot of people react with hostility to it. Talking about Fury Road and the previous Mad Max movies this summer, I found myself insisting that it doesn’t actually matter whether the gyro captain from Road Warrior and the pilot in Thunderdome are the same character or not. They just fulfill a similar role in the myth.

As a teenager I read way to many superhero comics, and something that ultimately drove me away from them, and comics in general for a time, was the continuity bubble. A new mega-event each year, an ever-increasing volume of interlocking pieces to be put into play, meant to appeal to only the most “hardcore” reader, and if you aren’t spending money on just about every single title a publisher puts out, the story is incomplete. 

It’s the most short-sighted kind of storytelling. And eventually people will get tired and peace the fuck out. I sure did.

And as I watch the film industry be swallowed alive by one superhero movie after another, each one a semi-independent appendage in a larger “universe,” employing these same continuity-heavy storytelling practices, I find myself so relieved that Mad Max exists. 

Where it does not matter where each little piece of story fits inside a cumbersome mechanism meant only to milk you of your dollars. No retelling the origin story every five years.

Where it’s just: 

“My name is Max.”

“My world is fire. And blood.” 

*stomps a lizard and away we fucking go.

[jas720]

My head canon for the Mad Max series is that the movies are the folktales of the civilization the rises out of the wasteland. Thats why they don’t have a real chronology, the events of the movies would have to be decades if not centuries apart. It is also why in Fury Road Max is such a side character, its Furiosa’s story he was just added later.

[writerlyn]

Hey @supergeekmike and @amanduhjoy , you should read this Also, this hard-core appeals to my love of mythic characters and how they develope

[charminglyantiquated]

a short comic about witches and wishes and wanting things.

[grypphix-deactivated20160423]

I WILL NEVER NOT REBLOG THIS IT IS THE CUTEST THING