it really do be like that

Order your tests when you can.

Wear a respirator, support your community, contact your government officials. Spread the word not the disease.

the desire to pronounce words as they are said in their source language for the sake of accuracy vs the desire to not sound like a complete tool

ASL Translation for Season 2 of The Dragon Prince

[I am Deaf and a fluent ASL signer.]

My ASL translation for Season One is here.

My ASL translation for Season Three is here.

S2: EP 4

SCENE AT THE BREACH

[General Amaya is standing atop the wall, watching the border through a monocular. She narrows her eyes, and turns to the solider standing behind her.]

“I see elves at the border.” [points in the direction of the border]

Soldier: “General Amaya, we’ve searched everywhere and there’s been no sign of the elves. I think it’s safe to conclude that the outpost on the Xadian side remains secret.” [Points] There, look! The signal! The outpost is secure.”

[Amaya turns & looks again through the monocular. She narrows her eyes, and turns back to the soldier.]

“No, something’s wrong. Set up a search party.”

AMBUSH SCENE AT THE OUTPOST

[The outpost soldier subtly signs “danger” to warn Amaya.]

S2: EP 5

THE PREPARATION SCENE BEFORE GOING TO KILL THE MAGMA TITAN

[Amaya nudges Sarai] “Haha that’s signing, get it?” [Sarai laughs in response]

This is in reference to Harrow’s hand gestures. Harrow is not using sign language, but Amaya was making the joke to Sarai that Harrow was “signing” because he was gesturing a lot, & perhaps also bc sometimes hand gestures can be mistaken for sign language.

EDIT: It’s been brought to my attention that there are some people who think that this joke was in fact a dirty one such as the “that’s what she said” type. I would like to clarify.

Honestly, if you do not know ASL then I would ask for you to please refrain from making assumptions. What she signed in that particular scene is a bit difficult to translate to English. It’s important to remember that ASL is a separate language with its own linguistic rules. ASL can’t really be translated to English perfectly– it’s meant to be a visual language, not written/spoken. Amaya’s exact signing was this: [nudges Sarai] “ha ha, that[’s] sign[ing]” Then here she uses a hand sign that means “oh I see” (typically used to show that you’re paying attention/listening), but could also convey “ah! oh i see” (picture a light bulb turning on, like you’ve understood something), etc. The emotion that is conveyed via that hand sign depends on the facial expressions used.

So: “ha ha, that[’s] sign[ing] oh-i-see”.

For it to make sense in English, I put down “get it?”.

In other words, it’s like she jokingly said “Haha, I see he’s signing!”.

It’s clear that she was making a joke about Harrow gesticulating. Amaya, as a Deaf person, is very visual. She relies on her eyes (and her hands) all the time. So naturally, Harrow using large hand gestures would stand out to her.

S2: EP 6

SCENE AFTER THE MAGMA TITAN‘S DEFEAT

[Sarai rushes to Amaya & catches her before she falls to the ground.]

A: “How do I look?”  [points at the new scar on her face]  {alternatively: “How does my face look?”}

S: “Not great, but you should see the other guy.”

my arch nemesis cynthia is, of course, at the bank, because we both were sent like clockwork to pick up the checks of our husbands. she is wearing a lovely long green gown, which i know was on behalf of me, because, as my husband will tell you, our house abhors green and glamour. already the tellers look at each other under their little hats, for they love our tirades, i’m sure, although not more than i hate them. 

“oh, is that your knitting?” my arch nemesis cynthia peers her eyes at my hands. “is it some kind of… sock?” everyone knows she and i used to be close before we were married and our husbands, smartly so, have introduced us to the idea of true vengeance.

“it is a scarf,” i say. i want to tell her that when the time comes and the world gets cold it will go over my mouth and i will breathe warm air and it will fill my lungs and i will be able to run around with my love even in the dark night. “it is not,” i say, “over surprising that you should be caught unawares of a scarf,” i say, “as i’m sure enjoying winter festivities are too beneath the handsome qualities your husband prefers.” pompous ass.

the tellers pass each other eyes for now it has started and they are delighted.

my arch nemesis cynthia thrusts out her hand. a white bottle. “rat poison,” she says. “i would expect the whole town knows about your little problem.” stage whisper. “such a shame, my dear.” then she rustles her long green skirts - which i know she wore on behalf of me - and she shimmies herself out of the room like royalty. oh, she floats everywhere she goes, beautiful black hair behind her. the bottle in my palm is cold. i will devise how to get her back starting first thing tomorrow.

the week, as always, is a long week, for there is much to make and do and knit and be. my husband comes home and i love him for who he is; for he never comes home without checking the state of the house up and down. he is the kind who loves his home so completely and sets each room like a stage for a great band to come playing. i am too ashamed to tell him why so many of the rats go missing, only make him a stew the next morning to celebrate. his favorite, although not mine, i’m afraid. plenty left over.

my arch nemesis today - of course - in a green the color of rotting. a bruise is uncarefully covered on her cheekbone, so striking against all of her dainty. her husband would say it was for her ungraceful nature, and i know mine would agree. i strike first, already delighted by my master plan, shoving over our best picnic basket tied with a bow. “i made you and yours a stew,” i say, “for beneath all that you carry” all that horrible wealth of your husband  “it seems you’re getting rather skinny.” i can’t resist one last comment. “i am worried you’re about to waste to nothing.”

She plucks it out of my hand. “yes, if it weren’t for you and your husband’s dwindling wealth,” her sarcasm is biting, “i’m sure i will be nothing in, oh, 5 weeks time.” she arches a brow. “so long from now.”

“i am counting the days,” i tell her. her lips purse. the tellers behind me make a choked titter. perhaps, by their estimation, i have won this round quite completely. i go home to my husband smiling. he asks where i have been and i tell him i’ve been at the bank, but he checks anyway because i like to get up to tricks and he doesn’t like to fall for it. it is a good game we play. at night, when he is asleep, i am so in love that i must convince myself to pull the covers over my nose and practice breathing. how silly to wake him up for a young girl’s feelings. 

the first week of five: she gives me a solid, ugly ring that requires three knuckles to hold. “i feel so badly for your status, and i must remember to practice charity,” she says. “it such a small thing, but do be careful amongst all that thin pine furnishing of your house, which dents so easily.” my husband appears at the bank’s front door. just checking. so lovely to be picked up by him. at night, in a rage, i try it - beneath the table bends easily. i scuff out the scratch with walnut before my husband can see. i pull the covers over my face in bed and breathe.

the second week: i wear her ugly ring and give her more stew, this time hearty with meat. her dress is a meadow. my heart each time it sees her collapses on itself. she hands me clothes for my husband, since his wealth continues to go missing, and the charity of her heart is so loving. i am so ashamed i bury them far by the old tree, where all my shames go hiding. again, the covers. it, by now, helps me sleep. i have gotten so good at it that i can simply shimmy my shoulders to be perfectly toasty and buried.

the third week: she asks how comes my knitting. i tell her it’s nearly complete. she asks how comes my husband, whom she must know has been ill recently, and who is doing quite badly. i go home to him, shaking. even sick he is a good housekeeper, who comes home examining for dust and dinge so i do not fall behind on my chores. who checks to be sure i spoke to only him and no one more, for fear a man might snatch me. tell me, who else has a man so involved, in this day and age?

the fourth week she is envy green. i shove a whole heaping of stew at her, for now her husband has gotten it. i say it will return him to spirits, she laughs, a sudden, beautiful sound, even in the quiet of a bank. everyone stares. maybe it is the stress that is making her quite improper. i feel the same way. so much is happening and it always seems she knows. she says she heard he has left me nothing in the will, which everyone already knows. she says she doubts either of us can dig upwards from the hole we’re both in. i look at the bruise on her nose. i tell her to mind her own husband, and be careful where she goes.

the fifth week: so final. her, garishly lime green. and i in black, to pick up a check that hardly seems the effort. it will be enough to cover my husband’s funeral. she smiles at me and hands me a silver bottle. she says quietly: now that i am destitute, there is one thing for it all, and everyone would understand quite completely. it would be quiet, and quick, and complete.

it is the night of the new moon, so dark no man can see in it. i receive notice her husband has died, and i am sorry to say i find a terrible joy in it. the air has changed cold. i have left a note asking to be buried in my scarf, the last thing i have made on this earth. i go through each perfect room, but there is nothing else to take with me, for the house has always been his and his alone, and now aches to be gone of him. i would not serve as a good tender for it. having spent so many nights watched carefully, the silly girlish freedom i’d gain would surely set the house ablaze.

i follow her instructions. quick, quiet, complete.

the horrible rustling is what does it. like a million green skirts. and then it is dark, and i am in my own coffin, eerie with pine. my head hurts but i must be quick and quiet. they have listened and buried me with my scarf. i shimmy my shoulders just-so and get it over my face. bring my arms up, ugly ring heavy, and begin to hit as hard as i can, over and over, the thin wood of my husband’s favorite furniture, the cretin. it would be pine, of course - he left me no money to be buried in any nicer recourse.

the wood splits so horribly, and then it is very hard to breathe, harder than under the covers, and i have to remind myself to be patient and continue to dig upwards, while my throat closes and my heart beats so loudly and the whole thing is so heavy it is a universe. the shifting of gravedirt is loud, and loud, and i feel i will be turned into a worm, and i fear everyone has forgotten about me, or i have gotten the timing wrong, or i will really die down here in the dirt and the cold

but then her hand, and my hand, and we are both digging towards each other, and she lifts me so easily from the ground like a plucked turnip and holds me against her, us both panting and muddied. we can only stay like this for so long, here in my pauper grave, and then we are both running to the old tree where we met, and unburying a second thing; my lovely box of shame, and men’s clothes, and all of my husband’s dwindling fortune i have slowly been squirrelling away.

my love and angel cynthia, who has black hair like a curtain and a mind so fast i sometimes am in frank awe at it, who is, even now and dirty and raw: even now the only sun in my life.

like this, i a man in an almost-dawn, and us cleaned by the river, and her smiling so widely, and only a faint bruise on her, and our pasts behind us in ugly garish colors. and her delicate hand and beautiful nose and when i finally get to kiss her it feels like green feels; my favorite color, all warm and nature and sunny grace and grass and lying awake so filled with love it makes you shake.

i hold her, and she holds me, and our future is a love like a dream unburied.

two guys having a conversation about their friend who uses any pronouns but they're very clearly trying to outdo each other in obscurity with each pronoun used

Spain by Vicente Fraga

Love is in the Air by Hugo von Schreck

[id: two images of brown bears standing in front of a pool of water! in the first image they’re both drinking water! they are both reflected in the water. in the second image they are pushing their noses together like they’re kissing!! the water is a vaguely dark green and the bears are standing on very green grass. end id!]

This year, on the 31 March, we lost Gilbert Baker, gay artist and creator of the gay pride flag. Today we would celebrate his 66th birthday. Let’s remember him as the wonderful person he was.

i just want to add to this post that the last update made to the official pride flag by Glibert Baker before he passed away was THIS:

the new lavender stripe at the very top was added to represent DIVERSITY and as far as i am aware, was added in retaliation against trump’s presidency. i’ve not seen many people use this version, and it deserves to be known.

having a shower stool is the best because not only can i sit and stare at the wall for an hour in my towel after my shower, but i can sit and stare at the wall in the shower too

in my sophomore year of college this guy made these items which quickly became a craze across campus. i myself bought one of his sweaters, which says “GOOD AND DEAD” across the chest and “ARM PAIN” along the sleeves. he showed up at 11 pm on a bicycle to deliver the goods in the dead of winter, wearing a metal t-shirt tucked into khakis. his facebook screen name is an indecipherable series of symbols. i have no authentic way to credit him but i want to share his art with you.

this is kind of old but i have so many drawings of this fucking Guy.

“I never understood the phrase; ‘Like a deer in the headlights’, until she looked me in the eyes for the first time.”

first day as a second century warlord i have my men tie branches to their horses’ tails to stir up dust and make it look like there’s a lot of us but i forget it just rained so there isn’t any dust and the enemy can clearly see there’s like twenty of us all spread out in a line

second day as a second century warlord i bribe a bunch of kids to start singing a nursery rhyme i carefully crafted to spread misinformation and further my strategic ends but they change the lyrics to be about poop and the enemy isn’t misdirected at all

third day as a second century warlord i lure my enemy into a narrow valley and send a team of archers to shoot them from the high ground but there was a feral hog napping on the trail up to the overlook and they couldn’t decide whether to try and shoot it or just go around and by the time the hog woke up and left on its own the enemy had already passed safely below

fourth day as a second century warlord we attempt to join a battle on the side of the guy we want to ally with but he and the guy he’s fighting have really similar names and it’s finally dusty and i misread the standards and attack the wrong guy. so now we’re stuck with this total loser of a liege lord, because how the fuck do you explain that after a battle?

fifth day as a second century warlord and some sort of wizard wanders into camp, my loser liege lord wants to execute him for being a wizard but i convince him to let the wizard stay, because i want to do more weather-based strategies and i’m pretty sure having a camp wizard can help with that. after the welcome to the team banquet the wizard steals half the treasury and my liege lord’s wife and leaves

sixth day as a second century warlord my loser liege lord sends me to reinforce a city he’s taken, but in the confusion of leaving i forgot to take the token that would have gotten us into the city, so my men have to wait outside the city walls for like eight hours while i ride back to get it

seventh day as a second century warlord and my loser liege lord finally joins me in the city, it turns out he’s actually a pretty cool guy, and he isn’t even that mad at me for letting the wizard steal his wife. i decide to shoot my shot but i’m really nervous and keep on stalling because what if i mess up our relationship and by extension jeopardize the security of my men, and eventually he just says goodnight and goes back to his room, where an assassin is in the process of setting up to kill him

eighth day as a second century warlord and my loser liege lord tells me to fake defect to his rival warlord, the one i originally wanted to ally with, to find out if he was the one who sent the assassin and why. but my whole way over to the rival warlord i’m worried that this has something to do with the wizard thing or how awkward i made it last night

ninth day as a second century warlord i try to tactfully ask my fake liege lord if he sent the assassin to kill my loser liege lord and it turns out the idea of using assassins never occurred to him, but now that i’ve suggested it he’s really into it. in order to save my loser liege lord i volunteer to be the one to kill him

tenth day as a second century warlord on my way back to my loser liege lord’s city i realize i won’t be able to collect my men from my fake liege lord until i bring back my loser liege lord’s head. this would have been a great thing to think of before i got myself in this situation. i go back to my loser liege lord and ask him to rescue my men, and he tells me that if he could sack my fake liege lord’s camp he already would have. that doesn’t change the fact that my men are still trapped. they’re prisoners, even. i go back to my room to sulk

eleventh day as a second century warlord i find a little caged pigeon in the rafters of my loser liege lord’s room and deduce it belonged to the assassin. without asking permission or telling my loser liege lord goodbye i let the pigeon loose and follow it north. don’t ask what i was doing in my loser liege lord’s room. it’s not important

twelfth day as a second century warlord i disguise myself as a wizard and enter the camp of the coalition leader the pigeon led me to. in the middle of my little sleight of hand performance i make eye contact with the coalition leader’s second-in-command. IT’S THE WIZARD THAT STOLE MY LOSER LIEGE LORD’S WIFE. after the banquet i corner the fake wizard and ask him what the fuck is going on and he just says “wouldn’t you like to know” and leaves. i don’t know what to say to that so i just let him go

thirteenth day as a second century warlord i’m honestly so sick of not knowing what’s going on, so i adjust my wizard costume to passably disguise myself as a woman and break into the women’s area of the camp, where sure enough my loser liege lord’s wife is. i ask her what she’s doing here and she tells me the fake wizard overheard her singing a poem she overheard on the street, not knowing it contains the coalition leader’s formation’s weaknesses. the fake wizard kidnapped her and assigned an assassin to kill her husband before they figured out the poem’s significance. she shares the first couplet with me but i’m discovered and thrown out before she can share any more. she doesn’t need to. through a bizarre coincidence of homophones, it’s the poop version of my misinformation nursery rhyme

fourteenth day as a second century warlord i go back to my loser liege lord and tell him everything, urging him to join with my fake liege lord to attack the coalition leader according to the weaknesses in the nursery rhyme. he tells me frankly that he doesn’t trust me anymore. i ask him to execute me if that’s really true, because i can’t bear to live if i can’t protect him and i can’t protect my men. he agrees to attack the coalition leader

fifteenth day as a second century warlord. due to the information in the nursery rhyme, and thanks to my loser liege lord reminding me of the weather conditions multiple times while planning our battle strategy, our alliance carries the day. my loser liege lord gets his wife back. my men tell me that our fake liege lord actually treated them really well and they’d like to stay with him if i don’t mind. i do mind, now that neither the men i love nor the man i love have any use for me, but i don’t tell them that

sixteenth day as a second century warlord i’m preparing to leave to i don’t know where, maybe to try to become a wizard for real, when my loser liege lord stops me and asks me where i’m going. he says he had hoped i would continue to work as his advisor. i was unaware i was his advisor in the first place. i agree, and he tells me he’s truly honored to have me in his service at last. he has known i am a rare and talented man with a strategic intelligence far above his ever since the day he witnessed me tying branches to my horses’ tails in six inches of mud, and could not for the life of him figure out why

MAG 4: Page Turner

shoutout to the hotties with chronic pain and fatigue 💖💞💝💘💕💗

I've really grown to dislike how most of the people approach s5 Jon (and Martin) time travels back to season one AUs. Because it can be sum up as "no one likes season one Jon, he's so stuck up and grumpy and repressed opposed to future Jon who is much more chill and more fun".

Because I don't think Sasha or Tim disliked s1 Jon? All their conversations seemed always quite friendly and relaxed? They throw him a birthday party. And Jon liked them and thought highly of them as well he asked for them to be transfered to Archives. He understandably disliked only Martin for lack of skills he should have had but did not.

All the negative feeling Sasha and Tim had against him came literally from them thinking Sasha should have been given the position of Head Archivist but that's it. They were even not so much annoyed with Jon but with Elias here honestly.

I would like to see some take when they are all weirded out by s5 Jon. I want season one archival crew bond over how they think s5 Jon is secretive and says ominous stuff all the time (And if s5 Martin is present as well I want them to be annoyed with his bitchy attitude.) Because s5 Jon and Martin could not anymore see the world through lenses on normal human and they would be all "We know what is best for you" while s1 crew would be more "No you don't. Not if you refuse to give us proper explanation. Stop acting like you know better, stop acting as we cannot take care of ourselves."

this podcast has had me in a chokehold since the end of october and i could not be happier about it