Luvers

Rereading the Lord of the Rings series recently, and it's so fascinating to me how much the series is a denial of the typical juvenile power-fantasy that is associated with the fantasy genre.

Like, the power-fantasy is the temptation the Ring uses against people It tempts Boromir with becoming the "one true king" that could save his people with fantastic power. It tempts Sam with being the savior of Middle Earth and turning the ruin that is Mordor into a great garden. It tempts Gandalf and Galadriel with being the messianic figure of legend who brings salvation to Middle Earth and great glory to herself.

The things the Ring tempts people with are becoming the typical protagonists of fantasy stories that we expect to see. and over and over we see that accepting that role, that fantasy of being the benevolent all-powerful hero, is a bad thing. LotR is about how power, even power wielded with benevolent intent, is corrupting.

And its so fascinating how so much of modern fantasy buys into the very fantasy LotR denies. Most modern fantasy is about being that Heroic power-fantasy. About good amassing power to rival evil. But LotR dares not to. It dares to be honest that there is no world where anyone amasses that power and remains good.

I guess that's one of the reasons its so compelling.

there's no greater betrayal than finally starting to read a book you've had sitting for months on your shelf or your desk or your nightstand and then finding out it's bad. like. i gave you a fucking home.

"Ridiculous"

There were probably some medieval asexuals that were absolutely insufferable on their moral high horse about it. Like "this modesty shit easy - I haven't lusted over any man ever in my life and only fuck my husband out of duty from God and only so that we have children. I am so much better than any of you hoes."

And some other local goodwife would get sick of this and go "well obviously you don't have time for cock, Maergaret, since you're always too fucking busy choking on your own vanity and pride!" and have a smackfight that progresses into a full-on two-woman brawl in the town square. People gather around to watch this until a clergyman shows up to remind everyone that not only is this kind of brawl between good christians definitely a sin, it's also a sin for everyone who's watching to place bets on who's going to win.

it's kind of crazy climate change has occurred at such a remarkable pace that I and everyone else around my age can remember a completely different climate in our childhoods. I truly watched winter gradually disappear in my life.

"You're too young to remember this, but there used to be so many insects outside that you would have to clean them off the windshield after a long car ride" is the kind of sentence that would have been in a cheesy scifi short story earlier in my life, perhaps submitted to a literary magazine and accepted to show support for its environmentalist message - now it's something I've said in earnest.

I still think about during my last semester of undergrad I took comparative religion as an elective and this was during covid and a bad wildfire season so everybody around me was losing their jobs, homes, health. And one day during Zoom class someone explained the word “yeet” to my comparative religion professor as the opposite of yoink

And without any hesitation she said “Ah, so the lord yeetith and the lord yoinkith away”

And when I tell you that kept me going for at least a week

today i learned how they vaccinate sheep and OH MJY TGOD

gotta put the sheep in the sheep chute to shoot the sheep

never have I ever seen a creature so passively Not Having A Good Time before

When a lamb is stuck it'll just Sit There. They won't struggle unless they think they can get away.

#these poor things!#there HAS to be a better way

Poor things? They're fine. This is like a baby in a car seat. The sheep are not in pain, they are not overly uncomfortable, they are not unusually scared. They probably are a bit annoyed. But this setup isn't hurting them or straining their bodies in any way. It's shaped specifically to hold their limbs out of the way without hurting their back, hips or shoulders. It's 'plastic cone on a cat with stitches' level of inconvenient, for a handful of seconds, and it's certainly much safer and easier than the other method (trying to restrain the lamb on the ground with your arms and knees while carefully giving it a delicate vaccination).

Similar concept: Babies getting x-rayed

This is giving off "piping bag of mouse" post vibes

Going to add tiny birds being weighed to the post

First of all dang I wish my school farm had one of those, we gotta flip the sheep and hope they sit there nicely for us (spoilers, the lambs absolutely Do Not, and it's not fun for anyone lmao)

Second of all this gives me an excuse to share one of my favorite innovations that has come across my targeted ads in the past few months

They call it the Deck Chair for Sheep

She's literally just vibing getting her nails done

Chillin.

Bonus:

Big Chungus

I think I’m going to think about this youtube comment forever

If a worker who isn't the owner says ANYTHING similar to "I'm not really supposed to do this but-" and then does something that helps you, under no circumstances inform the business, including through reviews. You tell them that the worker was polite, professional, the very model of customer service and why you like to go there. You do not breathe a word of the rulebreaking.

"Girl" is completely removed from the concept of Being Female in my mind at this point it's barely even connected to femininity girl is about the vibe. Girl is a mindset

[Image ID: Tumblr tags reding: #'dude'ification #linguistically i mean #girl is just some guy to me /End ID]

Different pov🤷‍♀️

randomly remembering the time in 2012 when everyone kept saying the world was going to end at midday that day and like, i didnt really believe it, but i didnt want to be a complete fool if i was wrong, so i excused myself from class to go sit the field and perfectly timed the beat drop to a skrillex song just in case something happened. and im just. retroactively amused by the idea of ushering in the appocalypse with skrillex. most 2012 thing you could possibly do.

2024 is the year we stop “consuming” and go back to “reading/watching/listening to/playing” things

Suddenly struck with a need to explain to you how boat pronouns work (I work in the marine industry).

When you're talking about the design of the boat, you say "it".

When the boat is still being built, your say "it".

When the boat is nearing completion, you can say "it" or "she".

When the boat is floating in the water you probably say "she", unless there is still a lot of work to be done (e.g. no engine yet) then you say "it".

When the boat is officially launched and operating, you say "she". If you continue to say "it" at this point you are not incorrect but suspiciously untraditional. You are not playing the game.

If you are referring to a boat you don't really know anything about you may say "it" ("there's a big boat, it's coming this way"). But if you know its name, it's probably "she" ("there's the Waverley, she's on her way to Greenock").

If you are talking about boats in general, you say "it" ("when a boat is hit by a wave it heels over")

If you speak about a boat in complimentary terms, it's "she" ("she's a grand boat"). If you are being disparaging it may be it, but not necessarily ("it's as ugly as sin", "she's a grotty old tub").

If she has a boy's name, she's still she. "Boy James", "King Edward", "Sir David Attenborough"? The pronoun is she.

If it's a dumb barge (no engine), you say it. But if it's a rowing boat (no engine), you say she.

I hope this has cleared things up so that you may not be in danger of misgendering floating objects.

Tea Party - Sketchbook

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