Helleau, I'm Alex or Howie (short for HotDogHowitzer). I have one brain cell that gets bounced around between fandoms like a hackey sack.
- Asks and DMs are currently OFF because I couldn't keep up with deleting spam and porn bots. So unless we're mutuals, there isn't a way to send me stuff atm, sorry guys 😔
Other Blogs:
Main
Demons (OU I plug blorbos into for fun)
Doodles
Commissions (currently closed)
My Ghostbusters fic, When Protons Collide, is on AO3, along with other bits and bobs, both for Ghostbusters and a handful of other fandoms.
List of Headcanons!
List of tags and what they mean!
OC Masterlist, organized by IP.
🔞If you are under 18 or just want to avoid nsfw/hornyposting (for characters or Harold himself) or high/drunkposting, block the tags #ghost bustin and #ghost blazin or unfollow if that isn't your vibe.🔞
Once when I was in undergrad, someone described something as “problematic” in class and our professor was like, “That’s cool, but ‘problematic’ doesn’t really mean anything. It means that the thing you’re describing has a problem, and in and of itself that’s not bad. Art, especially, should always have problems, or else it’s not interesting and not art, either. It sounds like you’re trying to say that this is bad, but you don’t want to say ‘bad.’ Is that right?”
So from then on whenever one of us called something problematic, he would make us talk it out until we could name the “bad” thing we were hinting at. In this particular class, 7/10 it was some type of oppression, and the remainder was like, “I’m uncomfortable because this is very new/confusing/pushing boundaries that made me feel safe.”
Once we stopped calling things “problematic” and stopping at that, class got way more interesting and... we all had to say, like, “that’s racist” or “that’s misogynistic” or “ew capitalism gross” out loud, which a lot of us had never done in a classroom before. Or we had to be like, “Uhhh... I’m not sure what’s so bad?” and confront our own beliefs and that was maybe even more useful.
Anyway. Whenever I see the word problematic, I can’t help but think of this professor being like, “Good starting point, now let’s get specific.” I think when we have to commit to saying “that’s ___” it requires a lot more careful thought about the truth and impact and complexities of whatever we’re claiming. Sometimes there really is some bullshit afoot, and also sometimes it’s art, and it should be full of problems, because that’s what art is.
HOLY FUCKING SHIT YALL. This is not something I expected to see anytime soon with all the ignorant anti-nuclear sentiment that's been part of the social zeitgeist since TMI, and certainly not during tang hitler's reign.
we're not ever gonna make this website a safe space for black people or have a substantial black user base anymore unless y'all (non blacks obv) come to grips with the fact that y'all hold internal biases whether some of y'all be blatantly racist and hide behind your disabilities/mental illnesses queerness/transness or it's something as simple as if you see black face on your dash you immediately swipe up
I dip into a lot of spaces on this site. non black fandomites I don't ever see you all discuss or celebrate the black characters in the media you partake in. You don't reblog fanart or gifsets of said black characters. You actively don't follow and ignore the black fans in the space you occupy. When the topic of racism gets discussed in these fandoms there's a lot of denial and throwing stones and hiding hands. On queer visibility days I don't ever see y'all reblogging selfies of black trans women, black trans men, black lesbians black gays or black bisexuals. I very rarely see y'all circulating mutual aid posts of black users. People in NSFW arenas, I don't ever see you reblog content of black swers. For whatever reason y'all keep the black people in your likes. It requires posts to be made by white and non black people discussing racism and social justice to actually get some traction when black tumblr users will make the same talking points but get a fraction of the notes.
We Keep Having Discourse About Rap Music For Christ sakes.
*If you send me anything after the 13th, I am going to delete it! Pay attention!
Y'all been asking about this one forever, and I admit that I had to really think about how to make something like this possible without dying due to overwork 😅 but I think I got it!
The rules for this one are long and specific, under The Submissions, The Critics, and Things to Expect from Ice. So I'm putting them under a read more.
PLEASE READ THE RULES! Y'all were not reading the rules during the character polls and it drove me nuts 🙏🏾
The Submissions
In order to be accepted, your submissions REQUIRE:
The Title and Genre
The premise of your story- this can be a description, a blurb, a summary, anything that allows us as the reader to understand the set up of what's going on here.
A description of your character- this doesn't have to be their entire life story. We just wanna know their name, what they look like, background, powers- RELEVANT things! Ideally, this should tie in smoothly to the premise!
Think of it as the summary that's on the back of books when you go to read them, plus a little extra. It should pull your reader in!
Rules for Submission:
Character has to be Black. This includes Black biracials, yes! If it's a side character, fine. But don't tell me all about your nonblack MC's life saga just to go "and then here's Black Buddy". Keep that. We want to hear something tailored to the Black character!!
PDF converted into an image. That way we can click it and read the whole thing without it taking up a huge amount of space in the ask. If you can include an image description for accessibility, that would be kind of you.
One Page! 12 Point! Legible Font! You can write your magnum opus if you want, but I won't post it 🤣 twelve point font MINIMUM, one page MAX! Calibri is the font I find easiest to read, but be reasonable.
You don't have to fill the whole page! If you think you've got it in two paragraphs.... Great! Don't use no damn AI though.
Only do this challenge if you're willing to accept constructive criticism. This is a major one! People are going to judge your work. You have to accept that! You're ASKING them to! I will not accept submissions with apologies and clarifications and "this might sound racist now but-" Let the viewers make their own calls, unbiased! It'll reveal to you things you may not have even considered, which will guide your writing. Maybe you'll drop an idea, maybe you'll take on an extra challenge, it's fine!
The Critics
Be constructive, not destructive. These are people looking for genuine feedback. Put on your Mrs. CBC hat and give that to them. You are well within your rights to say when something makes you uncomfortable, or if it's not something you would read due to that discomfort. Use your words to explain WHY. But if you feel yourself about to blow up with how much you hate an idea or a person... Keep it in your head or take it to your own page. We didn't ask for that.
Keep feedback to a reasonable length. I don't mind one or two comments with feedback, but if you got a LOT and you really wanna have this conversation with the poster (which is great!) you can always take it to the OPs inbox! I know it's selfish, but I'm gonna get a lot of notifications from this and if it's a back and forth, that is something that can be held between the two of you!
Understand that the premise is not the entire story. As always, you cannot determine if something is a problem based off of a page worth of context. So when you offer feedback, recognize that you can only approach it from a "consider this idea, because it may be a problem" perspective. Not a "this is inherently bad!!" We've talked about this! It's not on the idea, it's on the writer!
Things to Expect From Ice
For real, I won't be saying much! This is everyone's chance to play as CBC for two weeks lmao. But I will pop in as desired. I do know there's gonna be some little things I'll be checking for in every submission.
I'll be turning notifications off after a point for each one, so I don't get overwhelmed. If something feels wrong, if boundaries are being pushed and it comes to my attention, I may turn off reblogs.
I am not pre-checking submissions! Do not ask me in advance how I feel- that defeats the point of the project.
Okay! If you read this far, good job and thank you 👍🏾
This is an example of what the polls will look like:
How do you feel about this prompt and/or character description?
Black readers: Could currently use work (how?)
Black readers: Sounds cool so far!
Everyone else: Could currently use work (how?)
Everyone else: Sounds cool so far!
Voting ended onJun 2
Yes, this IS subjective! It's not like we're going to have full group agreement on "what needs work" and why. It's the Critics' job to elaborate and offer a constructive thought process. These poll are more so to quickly gauge the mood of a potential audience, just based off of what you (the Writer) are currently showing them. In other words: don't take this to heart as Law, take it as feedback.
when i was reading the book entangled life which is about fungi and the author merlin sheldrake said that once he got his first author copies he was going to dampen the pages and use them to grow oyster mushrooms and yeast and then use the yeast to brew beer and then drink the beer with the mushrooms to complete the cycle of fungal knowledge. i was like really and truly this guy gets it
His brother cosmo's music is cool as fuck tbh. The sounds in that song? Made by running electrodes through mushrooms. He has songs where every single sound comes from the ocean- the sound of coral reefs growing, of otters, of icebergs. He has songs about pelicans. He's a fun musician!
I know that you mean the "bloop" sounds in the backing track were made by running electricity through a mushroom, but I'm fascinated by the implication that he ran electricity through a mushroom and those vocals are what came out.
just learned about a building in london that is so poorly designed it becomes a death ray that melts cars and creates a downdraft effect with wind so powerful that it knocks full grown adults to the ground
i learned about this like last year or somethign and this building is literally th satan come alive. building that tries to fucking kill you and fry you like an egg
I wish that this person would receive perfect clarity of mind about her actions and their consequences, and I wish a gun with a single bullet would be placed before her so that she could make good use of this mindstate
reminds me of the time I said something pro-nuclear to my ex and they said “I don’t think you’d feel that way if you grew up near a nuclear plant like I did” and I asked “oh what happened” and they were like “well. nothing. nevertheless”
Anyone who is anti-nuclear is anti-environment. Nuclear is safe, it is clean, and it is even more energy dense than fossil fuels. It might not be truly renewable, but there’s so much energy available that it doesn’t make much of a difference. To try and shut it down is to put down one of your strongest allies in the fight against fossil fuels.
Everytime this comes around again, I remember that there was a push to refit coal power plants to run on nuclear, due to the fact that other than the power source, your still just boiling water so everything else is the same.
They couldn’t get the ok to refit the coal plants tho, because the coal power plants were too radioactive to pass nuclear power plant standards.
THE COAL PLANTS WERE TOO RADIOACTIVE TO BE TURNED INTO NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS.
reminder to worldbuilders: don't get caught up in things that aren't important to the story you're writing, like plot and characters! instead, try to focus on what readers actually care about: detailed plate tectonics
Why is the mountain range square. How did the mountain range form. Why is there one singular volcano in the center. Why does it act like a composite volcano but have magma that acts like it’s from a shield. If it’s hotspot based volcanic activity why is there only one volcano.
And then the misty mountains!!!! Why isn’t there a rain shadow!! And why is there a FOREST where the rain shadow should be!!!!!!!!
Wind blows clouds in from the sea, but mountains are so tall the clouds can't get past 'em, so you get deserts on the windward side of mountain ranges because clouds can't get there to water the land, or do so only very rarely.
this is because, as clouds are forced upwards by rising land, they cool and dump their rain. so the side of the mountain facing the ocean (or an inland sea, or a great lake) gets all the rain as the clouds are squeezed out, and the opposite side gets nothing.
my favorite thing is the american great lake snowbelts! so, the 'flow' of weather across north america, in very general terms, blows from the northwest on down south and east to the gulf of mexico.
so the wind is blowing from west to east, and in the winter it's a dryer wind than in the summer because it's colder. but after blowing across a great lake for a hundred miles, the wind is wet again. and that wet turns into snow. so for all of these lakes, the big cities are on the west side, not the east sides, because the east sides absolutely suck to live on.
the sole exception is buffalo, NY, which literally has to be there because, unfortunately, that's where all the important canal stuff between lake ontario and lake erie is happening.
also this always strikes me as cool, check out where cleveland is:
it's right at the edge of that snowbelt. and you see way more cities west of it than east, too.
#but again. mordor looks like that becaue sauron made it#and he's an ass
On a Watsonian level, sure.
On a Doylistic level, Mordor looks like that because plate tectonics was a fringe, ludicrous, laughable theory that nobody outside serious geology nerds had ever heard of until scientists proved seafloor spreading in the early 1960s. The first edition of the LotR trilogy was published in 54-55. We literally did not know that plate tectonics was real until almost a decade after the book was published, so obviously, it was not something Tolkien could have been considering as he made his maps.
I don't know enough meteorological history to know when white people figured out about rain shadows and added it to geology classes, or what would have been taught about volcanoes and such. But any education Tolkien got on the subject would have been in childhood/adolescence; his college education focused on the liberal arts, not the sciences, and his professional study was linguistics and the middle ages. So anything Medieval and earlier European authors wrote about he had a pretty good chance of knowing about. But not much exposure to modern science. So his science knowledge was probably limited to "what English schools taught at the turn of the 20th Century."
I mean, it's true he didn't know about plate tectonics, but he did know what mountains look like, and that it's not normally That. And it wasn't his style to break that kind of norm without cause.
LotR has recurring themes of the reckless imposition of one's will on the natural world creating ugliness, an order you thought was inherently an improvement that in fact is inferior to what you have displaced. (Typified by reckless tree-felling; a reflection of the despoiling of the English countryside and the world by Progress.)
Mordor is a rectangle because Sauron is an asshole.
#the rain shadow thing otoh was undoubtedly total ignorance#but those mountains were made as the fortress of a demigod#too steeped in evil to understand beauty#it's *supposed* to look like something that Shouldn't Exist#like quite often this is something that happens in worldbuilding yes#things are arranged Wrong because a person doesn't grasp the underlying logic#but mordor is a bad example for the same reason it's an obvious one#it's So Very Wrong because it was designed to be wrong#to give you a bad feeling with how much it shouldn't look like that#if he just wanted it unapproachable on all sides it could've been in a caldera formation it didn't *need* corners#the corners were a choice#tolkien's job involved lots of looking at maps and things okay#meanwhile people whose lives revolved around the weather generally knew where the rain happened#long before it was formalized into 'rain shadow effect'#people not having The Science doesn't mean they don't have eyes and brains
I wrote an entire paper in college analyzing the geology of the Misty Mountains and to a lesser extent the White Mountains (the Misty Mountains are easier because we get a cross-section via Moria). One thing I discovered that still knocks me for a loop when I think about it is:
Moria is the only place in Middle-Earth where mithril is found, right? That's kind of a big deal. So, why? What makes that location so special? Is it just random?
I found a paper that had just been published *that year*, 2011 or 2012 as I was writing it, that studied the locations of precious-metals mines in the Pyrenees, the similarly long skinny mountain chain that divides Spain and France. This paper discovered that where there was a bend in the mountain chain, from one of the continental plates having an awkward corner in it that got subducted under the other plate, that had dug deeper into the mantle and caused precious-metal-bearing ores to flow up to the surface in ways they didn't do anywhere else in the Pyrenees.
There's a conversation in The Fellowship of the Ring where one of the hobbits -- I don't have my copy handy or I'd get the direct quote -- asks why they can see the Misty Mountains ahead of them at one point if they're still heading south from Rivendell, and it's explained that south of Caradhras (which you may recall is the surface mountain under which Moria runs) the mountain chain bends and runs southwest instead of due south for a while.
Tolkien had absolutely no way to know *why* this particular feature of a mountain range was associated with intrusions of rare and unique metal ores, but he had gone backpacking in mountains enough to know How Things Should Look.
(And as prev excellently points out, when Jirt made screwed-up geology it was very much on purpose. Mordor shouldn't be square! Mount Doom shouldn't be doing any of the things it does! A composite volcano shouldn't even have especially hot lava! Even the Gulf of Udun, the circular feature at the upper left corner of the square, shouldn't be like that -- perfectly round features should be impact craters or calderas, not The Mountains Just Do This In A Suspiciously Convenient Way. These are all the way they are because Sauron forced them to be, in defiance of the laws of nature. Remember, he's akin to Balrogs and was a Maia of Aulë -- he's a volcano spirit in many ways.)
Square mountains on maps ARE realism. Specifically fantasy/scifi maps done in the style of hand-drawn maps made by cartographers all the way up to the early 19th century. Also it bears mentioning that ALL flat maps are distorted A LOT because they're 2D reptesentations of a 3D object, so Mordor's mountains will not be square on a spherical surface. But more importantly, humans are DOGSHIT at navigation without tools, and thus it's REALLY hard to make a flat paper map that's accurate AT ALL without air travel and especially GPS. (I specify bc there are maps out there made by Pacific Islanders and other peoples that are not made of paper and are not geologically accurate but are extremely useful and accurate for local navigation)
I would like to present my favorite examples, because it's not some one-off paper map scrawled by some poor sucker in ten seconds, these were made my famed cartographer Muhammad Al-Idrisi, who made some of the most accurate maps of his time, with at least one made from woven silver and commissioned by royalty.
12th Century map of the world:
Alexandria and it's lighthouse (South is 'up' on this map):
And my favorite, Tabula Rogeriana. A map of the globe:
You can read more about Al-Idrisi here!
Look at those Shapes! What is Japan doing! The Black Sea! Here you can see Italy apparently went through her Sock Puppet stage before becoming the lovely Boot as we know her today!
Mordor's square mountains make sense. Shit I wouldn't be surprised if Tolkien drew his maps 'wrong' intentionally to have the vibe of historical maps. We also do not understand plate tectonics, not to the degree some people seem to think. We understand a lot more than we did 500 years ago fo sho, but science is not set in stone (no I'm not sorry for that, it was intentional) it's set in something more akin to clay, which can then be changed and molded based on new input from continued study.
As such I'm going to include some of my favorite totally natural geologic formations on just this one singular planet, the first one is less than an hour's drive from me!
Visit the post for more.
The Richat Structure in Mauritania is not what you think it is.
Below, another case of plain rocks fooling us overripe apes into thinking we found a manmade wall or road!
Sometimes called the Bimini Wall, Bimini Road is an underwater rock formation near North Bimini in the Bahamas, measuring 0.8 km (0.50 mi)-l
The Pamukkale travertines are limestone slopes and thermal water pools that have attracted visitors since before the days of Ancient Greece,
It isn't shown here, but Pammukale's springs also build walls. Like...just straight up vertical walls. Water builds walls. 'Nature doesn't build walls!' have I got news for you.
Death Valley National Park is a strange place by any standard. Famously known for being the hottest place on earth, Death Valley also sits a
Not playe tectonics, but the Sailing Stones baffled us for years and the go-to argument has been 'Nature doesn't make lines like that!' Except we discovered it does!
Also, for anyone out there who's sitting smugly thinking 'well yeah but natural processes can't do [thing]! Gotcha!'
Physicist Francis Perrin sat at a nuclearfuel-processing plant down in the south of France, thinking to himself: “This cannot be possible.”
Nature beat us to nuclear reactors. By several billion years.
If rocks can unintentionally create what we see as one of our most complex and intricate machines, it can probably make square mountains. And even if it didn't, humans without access to the right tools to compensate for our absolutely god awful sense of direction and scale will draw square mountains and fucked up geography. Or, yknow, Sauron.
“scientists don’t want you know” is a phrase that always cracks me up because if you actually meet a scientist they will be shaking and crying like an overstimulated chihuahua with the need to let you know
