A Dragon's Hoard

Just a place I can collect all the things my weird brain finds pretty and/or funny. Hence the hoard.

[hedgehogoftime]

Other Greek Heroes and whether they'd look back at Eurydice

Heracles: No, he wouldn't look back. Partly because he's smart enough to know it wouldn't change anything, and partially because he knows the Gods well enough that Hades keeps his word. Eurydice gets out and they high five. Unfortunately he misjudges the strength of his high five and Eurydice spends her first couple of weeks back to life with her arm in a cast.

Jason: Oh yeah. This dumbass looks behind him before he leaves Hades throne room and then loudly insists that NO HE DIDN'T HE TOTALLY DIDN'T AND IS HE DID IT WASN'T HIS FAULT IT'S EURYDICE'S FAULT! Eurydice is just like "maybe I'm better off here."

Perseus: Nope. He's a good boi who pays attention and blindfolds himself to make sure he doesn't, feeling his way along the path to make sure he doesn't trip. It takes him longer to get out, but they DO get out.

Theseus: Actually they do get out. Not because Theseus is smart enough to not look back or anything but because he's too self important to look back. The moment she steps outside the Underworld, Eurydice is running at top speed and Theseus never bothers to check to see if she's still following.

Odysseus: He cheats, using a polished mirror to keep track of her through the reflection the way Perseus kept track of Medusa. Unfortunately because he thought he outsmarted the system he fails to look where he's going, looses his footing, the mirror, and accidentally looks back anyway. Too clever for his own good, he was the architect of his own failure.

Achilles: He doesn't even bother asking. Full fire in his fury he fights Hades, wins, and takes Euridyice away his own way. Unfortunately, he can only bring her back as a shade without the Lord of the Dead's permission. It only brings him greater sorrow.

[echo-loves-flowerboy]

Medea: She thinks Hades is lying and Eurydice isn’t behind her but doesn’t look back because if she gets out of the underworld without Eurydice she has grounds to complain to the gods that Hades broke his vow and start the 900bc equivalent if a fraud lawsuit. The whole way she plots her revenge only to reach the surface and be genuinely surprised (and a little bit disappointed) that Eury is actually there.

Atalanta: She learned from the apple-race-incident. Looking back will only slow her down. She bolts back up to the surface in record time only to actually manage to loose Eurydice on the way. Whoops.

Ariadne: Her sentimental ass looks back, sorry Eurydice, it was in the name of love.

Penelope: They make it out. Penelope trusted her allegedly dead husband to come back for 10 years she can trust that a silent ghost is behind her for 2 hours. Persephone could walk up with her the whole way telling her ‘actually you should turn around she’s not there’ and she still wouldn’t.

[depsidase]

[dare-to-dm]

There was this one time I scratched up my cornea real bad and had to go to the hospital. Dealing with medical bureaucracy is always very frustrating to me, and that combined with the pain had me in a very bad mood. I was even crying.

I had to wait quite a while for the doctor to see me, but fortunately the nurse who was helping me had an excellent bedside manner and went out of her way to distract me. She expertly did this by getting me talking about books I'd read recently.

I went all in on criticizing the last book I'd read. I don't remember what it was, but I really hadn't liked it, and I denigrated it as "Misery Porn". And she was like "Hmm, that sounds interesting, tell me more". So I gave a general plot synopsis. As I was telling her that most of the characters were immigrant miners, she interrupted me to say "That's interesting, I didn't realize that there were mines in Missouri".

And at that moment time stopped for me and I realized that the entire time I'd been talking about the book, she'd been assuming I was talking about porn set in Missouri. I had just assumed that she had understood from context that when I said "Misery Porn", I meant "A story that is gratuitously depressing so that readers will think it's deeper than it really is".

Rather than being disappointed in our miscommunication, I was instead impressed with the level on non judgement she was showing me. Having a whole ass cheerful conversation about Missouri themed porn just to help a patient. I think about her all the time.

[dare-to-dm]

There have now been many responses to this post, but they all boil down to just 3 categories.

Nerds (affectionate): Actually, Missouri has many lead mines.

Health care professionals: This is just what working with patients is like.

Missourians: Missouri mentioned!

[imsobadatnicknames2]

I've made this exact post like 3 different times atp but. It's endlessly funny when people (especially tech company people) treat Asimov's three laws as a legit proposed framework for Artificial Intelligence safety when like. Nearly every single Asimov story they're featured in involves something going wrong as a result of a robot trying to follow three three laws in a situation that makes execution of the laws ambiguous or contradictory. They're not a guideline for legit AI programming they're a plot device designed to cause problems due to interacting in weird ways with complicated hypothetical situations!

[rathayibacter]

we've implemented the safety standards from the award-winning These Are Insufficient Safety Standards series of novels!

[liberalsarecool]

Data centers have a very limited lifespan but their consequences will be felt for generations.

[toastbutteregg]

[atomiclace]

these are my mutuals. they know who they are

[lostinhistory]

Solid life advice from Sue the T. Rex.

[valtsv]

what doesn't kill you gives you an extensive vocabulary and niche knowledge set that nevertheless fails to accurately account for what happened

[json-derulo]

Whenever they gave us one of those "read through ALL the instructions before you begin!" trick assignments in school where the steps lead you on an increasingly ridiculous goose chase until the final one tells you to just put your name on the paper and turn it in without doing anything else, I was always like, "Okay, but what's the point? Surely the REAL world won't be anything like this." And then I grew up and discovered that not only is the real world often exactly like that, some people won't even read the first line of the instructions even if they make perfect sense. And these people are called "co-workers"

[aximili]

tbh the fact that cats purr was an unnecessary bonus we don't always acknowledge. they're already cute and baby and little and soft and make silly noises and do funny shit. but they also like to cuddle and make a soothing pleasant noise to indicate they are happy when they cuddle you? huge. huge for the human race.

[faceless-crowd]

Mafia boss smoking a cigar: Why’d you gotta squeal, Squealin’ Stephen? I trusted you. Now I gotta send my best goons to show you what happens when you cross the Big Boss…

Guy tied up in chair: uh…theres just one guy over there.

Mafia boss: Yeah. That’s Lil’ Tony. He’s got one of dem conditions where he’s got multiple mooks n’ his head. But when Big Tony fronts you’re gonna be in big trouble.

Lil’ Tony: We actually all agree we’re gonna kick your ass.

[flowerbleedme]

it's not frequent enough to be considered a meme or a trend, but I like how every so often this site gets a new "woke mafia boss" variation.

[nexeliam]

Sacrifice for human kind

[ofstormsandfire]

I have also realized that I entirely forgot to make my usual "hey I wrote a thing!" promo post for the latest bullshit from @spinanotherstory and I. Whoops. There'll be more of it later today but in the meantime: yes it's more vampires. Yes it's more AU bullshit involving Assassin's Creed and vampires. And if you liked our non-vampire fic The Best Among Us, you might be quite interested in this one, too...

idealism sits in prison, chivalry fell on his sword

It would've been all too easy for Lucita de Aragón to cut ties with her ghoul for, unknowingly or not, working with Templars. And perhaps in another version of events, that's exactly what happened. But in this lifetime, she doesn't abandon Shay after saving his life. It's something that'll work out much better for more than just the two of them, in the long run—not that anyone knows that yet.

By the time this post is up, there might even be a second chapter up too ;)

[asynca]

Write that one-shot. Those 3 chapters will be the best 10 chapters you ever wrote

[polarity-disturbed]

Being able to draw older people as attractive without reducing or erasing the visual signs of aging, and in fact showing that they're attractive because of those signs, is an artistic skill that should be valued so much more. Honestly, it should earn you an immediate fortune because holy fuck is it a rare commodity. There are so many artists who seem to think attractiveness and aging exist in opposition to each other, so they smooth every wrinkle, erase every crease, and de-age the character until they're basically thirty with silver hair. But when an artist can look at crow's feet, smile lines, weathered skin, deep-set wrinkles, and all the little traces of a life well lived and say, "No, that's what makes them beautiful," that's a level of artistic observation and care I wish we celebrated more often.

[zeiinoviah]

the downtown coterie