I'm voyaging too

we will need the foundation as much as the dome for those worlds to come true

[voyaging-too]

My name is Lurk, I’m a woman from Hungary, I’m in my thirties, I’m a history nerd who doesn’t yet know nearly enough about history. I have to read a balanced diet of both SFF and literary fiction otherwise I get sad.

I post about random fannish things, my current obsessions are The Locked Tomb and the Friends at the Table podcast, and I’m never not into Tolkien and LeGuin.

I have an AO3.

[voyaging-too]

Hey Egyptologists of tumblr, has any of you made the obvious joke about Shoshenq Redemption yet? If not, you're welcome.

[arthistoryanimalia]

Jamie Wyeth (American, b. 1946) Portrait of Pig, 1970, oil on canvas seen at Brandywine Museum of Art

life-size portrait of Den Den, who became a beloved family pet 🥰

Jamie & Den Den c. 1970 by Peter Ralston

interview quote from Irish Edition (1996 date is either an error or may have been referring to another painting of Den Den)

[arthistoryanimalia]

Resharing for #NationalPigDay 🐖

[whitepeopletwitter]

[arthistoryanimalia]

Happy #WorldAnimalDay!

Suzuki Kiitsu (1796 - 1858) One Hundred Birds and One Hundred Animals Japan, Edo period, 1843 pair of hanging scrolls; ink, color, & gold pigment on silk From “The Life of Animals in Japanese Art” exhibition at National Gallery of Art (2019)

“Native birds and animals appear alongside an elephant, a camel, and other exotic species. A mythical phoenix perches on the mountain in the scroll at right, while a kirin flies through clouds in the one at left. A sacred animal with the horns of a dragon and the legs of a deer, the kirin is said to materialize when saints or benevolent rulers appear. With real and fantastic creatures coexisting in harmony amid blossoming plants from all four seasons, these scrolls suggest a Buddhist paradise.”

[arthistoryanimalia]

Resharing for #WorldWildlifeDay

[leeline]

you gotta tell your cats theyre small. they dont know. you gotta tell em

[amnhnyc]

Today’s Caturday mood? The Pallas’ cat (Otocolobus manul). During the day, this fluffy feline sleeps or hides, preferring to hunt under the cover of darkness. This species, which inhabits parts of Central Asia, lives a primarily solitary life and only seeks out company during mating season. A female Pallas’ cat produces a litter of one to six kittens, and by just 5 months old, they disperse to set out on their own.

Photo: pelican, CC BY-SA 2.0, flickr

[willgrahamscock]

Oh here we go. What new fucking gender is that flag in your bio

THE HUNGARIAN FLAG???

[willgrahamscock]

happy pride hungary

[voyaging-too]

Happy Pride Hungary!!

[voyaging-too]

I'm really interested in how Percival Everett handles Jim's POV in his rewrite of Huckleberry Finn, because a lot of interesting ambiguity is already there in the original.

Sure, sometimes Jim *is* written as stupid, in an unambiguously racist way. But sometimes the joke is that Huck thinks Jim is stupid (or ignorant or superstitious) but the narration reveals that Huck is being stupid, and just as superstitious as the guy he's making fun of.

And sometimes it's really open to interpretation. Almost every time Huck tries to bullshit, it's unclear whether he successfully fooled a gullible Jim, or if Jim's fully aware that he's being bullshitted. And if Jim lets him get away with it, why? Is he placating a potential threat, since Huck could give him up as a runaway at any point? Is he humouring someone he sees as a child? Is he intentionally trolling Huck back by yes-anding his outrageous bullshit, and having fun with it?

[voyaging-too]

Some more explanation as to why my eye starts twitching when someone argues that all career politicians are equally evil and corrupt, and our only hope is in outsiders (Hungarian edition.)

One of the means and one of the costs of TISZA beating Orbán was completely dissociating themselves from all other opposition parties. They weren't just different from other opposition parties because they were right of the left-wing ones and left of the far-right ones, they were different because all previous attempts at opposition were Bad whereas they were Good. TISZA talked shit about their potential allies, often unfairly, and it made them popular, and it helped them win the election, but it's still bullshit, and it makes me think:

Some people hated the left-wing opposition for valid reasons: some parties and individuals were indeed stupid, ineffectual, cowardly, or downright corrupt.

Some people hated the left-wing opposition because despite hating the conservative ruling party, they swallowed 98% of its propaganda. People parroted conservative fake news talking points verbatim, while insisting that they were being progressive and intelligent.

Some people hated the left-wing opposition because they couldn't distinguish the party that hurt them from the party that was powerless to protect them. Just being present in the parliament while the bad things happened made them tainted and complicit, even if they fought tooth and nail against the whichever bad thing. It doesn't matter that the ruling party has a supermajority, the failure to stop them makes the opposition worthless. They only deserve our vote in the future if they can magically transcend the problem of not having our vote now. Their weakness is disgusting, contemptible, incomprehensible, why didn't they win, they must be losing on purpose because they're evil. They're just as bad, or worse, than the party doing 100% of the actual harm. (And more elaborate and legitimate-sounding political arguments that boil down to this.)

It does not escape my notice that this is uncomfortably applicable to the shit people say about the Democrats. When I see criticism of democrats on my dash, it's an even mix of genuine concerns, obvious Republican propaganda wearing a leftist hat, and a compulsion to blame Democrats for things that were literally, factually, legally, entirely done by Republicans. Including fucking Dobbs. Anyway.

[amnhnyc]

Happy Caturday! Meet the sand cat (Felis margarita). This small, solitary feline inhabits arid regions—including Africa’s Sahara Desert and parts of Asia. Built for desert life, the thick soles of this cat’s paws allow it to walk on scorching sand during the day and cold sand at night. In parts of its range, daytime temperatures can soar up to 124°F (51°C) and then plummet to 31°F (-0.5°C) by night. The sand cat is also a “fearless snake hunter” known to pursue snakes (even venomous vipers) for a meal.  Photo: Cloudtail the Snow Leopard, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0, flickr

[bowelfly]

normal shrew activities

[cannibalchicken]

Woah , my garage dog has arrived ,

[binturong-of-the-day]

The binturong of annoying mama

[creepymutelilbugger]

[sighinastorm]

uh, source?

[frowningfox]

Source:

[stephenroot]

idk at the end if the day maybe I really am just a curmudgeon but you simply will never convince me that mayor, senator, governor, or president are entry level jobs that can be done well with zero government or policy experience and the tremendous arrogance it takes to think they can should be disqualifying in and of itself.

[voyaging-too]

Here's another important thing about the party that finally beat Orbán.

They present themselves as outsiders to politics, and to some extent they won because they presented themselves as outsiders to politics, untainted, pure, new, unlike the parliamentary opposition that has become tainted in the eyes of many voters by engaging in the political process at all. And that's not wholly untrue, a lot of TISZA MPs are truly brand new to politics. But it is largely untrue.

TISZA has political and civil service insiders in key positions, and in large part they won because their leader, Péter Magyar is an insider, an insider's insider. He won because he had an insider's skills, and an insider's deeply cynical attitude. He won because he had spent two decades as a Fidesz vassal. He won because he had an insider's connections, and enough leaks and whistleblowers to staff an army. He won because he had intimate knowledge of their corrupt lying bullshit, and he himself was at least somewhat in on it. He won because his former comrades were confused by one of their own jumping ship. Maybe this could have been won by an actual outsider, but I doubt it. Considering the level of surveillance and character assassination leveraged against him, I'm not sure this could have been even survived by an outsider.

Anyway, my point is, I keep seeing people falling in love with outsider politicians both on the left and the right, people showing up from nowhere promising to drain the swamp, promising to be wholly unlike those horrid career politicians who have been doing this work for decades. And some of them might be legit forces for good, this is not a blanket condemnation. But always be skeptical of the "pure untainted political newcomer" rhetoric, and remain open towards, uh, fairly horribly tainted insiders, they can be very very useful if their goals temporarily align with yours.