Two cake theory also means your small underrated fic can be someone’s comfort fic

i am about to bestow upon you the secret butter technique. i am sorry, but it is french. i am sorry again, this only works with cow butter. i am certain plant based butters wouldn’t work, and alternative animal butters may or may not work

has this ever been you: you have a nicely steamed vegetable, or maybe you want to make the best butter noodles, but you know that if you put butter on those it’ll just melt and you end with kind of greasy noodles or vegetables? don’t you wish it was instead a luscious buttery glaze?

introducing: beurre monté

you will take a small sauce pan, and begin heating it with 1-2 tablespoons of water (use very little water) and bring it to a hard simmer or boil

turn the heat down slightly, and add Butter. how much? however much you dare. (start with 3-4 tablespoons and go from there)

you are going to either whisk Aggressively or you can pick up the saucepan, still holding it over the heat, and swirl aggressively so the butter is skating around the sides of the pan

done correctly, you will have liquid butter that is still emulsified. you have made Butter Sauce. season it with a little salt, and toss whatever you want in it.

if you’re butter splits, i’m sorry. you didn’t agitate it enough to maintain the emulsion, and now you have melted butter.

you can use this knowledge to make other sauces by swapping out the water for another liquid. white wine becomes beurre blanc. red wine is beurre rogue.

you want to CUM? sweat minced shallot in a tiny bit of butter, add white wine and cook it out until it’s reduced by about half. then whisk butter in hard. a few flecks of minced thyme or fennel frond stirred thru, and you eat that with a nice seared fish? or scallop? or even shrimp? wow. you will Nut

your boxed mac and cheese game can also be elevated by cooking your pasta and making a beurre monté first, tossing your pasta in that and adding the cheese packet. wow. hey; you’ll cum

go forth now with this butter secret

five notes?? this is why i don’t tell you all anything

May the muses be with you this weekend my writer, vidder, podficcer and artist friends!

★ 【ひとみん】 「 お菓子をくれなきゃ神隠しするぞ！！ 」 ☆ ✔ republished w/permission ⊳ ⊳ follow me on instagram

i know we all laugh (mostly fondly) about the paper-thin plots in porn that only exist to make the sex happen, but i was reading some old stargate fic over the weekend, and i really think we're sleeping on the paper-thin hurt/comfort plot that only exists to force the characters to FEEL THINGS.

like, is this scenario realistic? no. does it make any rational sense? no. does it provide a built-in excuse for a character to collapse, bloody and disoriented, into the arms of his beloved/friend/partner? obviously, that's the whole point of this exercise.

i love it. it's my favorite thing in the world.

"Taking care of you"

I never actually thought about what happens with person’s body when they are bedridden, but then I saw how my great-aunt took care of her husband and wow that was touching!! To put so much effort in someone who can’t even respond because you love then so deeply.. that's how I understand it and I hope it shows in this comics<3

gender? hardly know 'er

me: "I worked myself to illness for financial reasons -- it was one time and it's done, recovery has been slow.

me: "One thing really hitting me is my voice changed, I lost use of much of it and it's very low and gravely. That's recovered, but it is lingering in my laugh.

me: "Having a low, gravely laugh is... mesmerizing, I love it, and the complete opposite of much of my--" (vague hand gestures, high pitched and annoyed and joyful tone) "--journey.

me: "Which makes no sense. At all. To my stated and discovered goals."

therapist, writing out 'check zillo prices for vacation homes in warm climate' and 'this bitch is crazy': "Maybe this is part of your journey?"

me:

here is what I have learned on a long and expensive gender study that has at least partially funded my therapist's vacation home

and so I share with you because i'm mad my therapist's vacation home is going to be nicer than my singular home (laugh)

(this is a joke only, I'm not mad at costs, it's just how machinery works)

(moving on)

via

As always when I Go Off On These Rants I end with:

This is not me being so smart and experienced. It's a combination of therapy and weird life experiences that I'm finding myself in as a middle age queer weirdo who came out of the closet in their late 30s after finally starting to accept and question in their early to mid 30s.

Go forth

Find yourself

Enjoy yourself

I hope your life is wonderful and rich and full of complexity and wonder

That's the entire point of things :)

Black movies that are not about trauma, slavery, or being accepted by white people >>>>>>

i made a letterboxd list for this actually

HOMIE TYYYYYY

do NOT be normal about aragorn around me ‘oh he’s such a badass he killed so many orcs’ yeah idc i’m here to talk about him all alone sewing up holes in his socks next to a campfire in his ranger days singing elven songs from his childhood and he sort of has a terrible singing voice but the ents love it and then later when he joins the fellowship and everyone’s up late singing goofy songs he’s so happy to have a chorus with him now and his voice keeps breaking and boromir is laughing so hard at him that he’s crying but not in a mean way and aragorn knows so he just sings louder and worse and he thinks he could get used to this

TIME TO EXPLAIN MY USERNAME

When they are being chased by nazgul, he is waffling over using the bridge openly, in cause it is a trap, and he decides they’re going to trust it because he finds a pretty rock. Which he calls an elf-stone, like the name he’ll eventually take, but obviously this is not THE elf-stone.

And Glorfindel had cleared that bridge earlier. And he was like “hmmm what symbol can I leave that Estel would definitely notice, and make known to him the way I’d safe? I know! A pretty rock! Estel loves cool rocks.”

And literally this was not an agreed upon symbol, Aragorn just goes “An Elf stone! These are good luck!”

And I am now convinced that little Estel growing up in Rivendell, would bring Elrond or his mom or any elf who he wanted to make friends with a rock he found that he thought was neat.

And of course, all of the elves are like “oh no, it’s cute!” Because here is this solemn little boy who wants to share the things he likes with them, and Elf children are rare at this point on middle earth, so all of these ancient elves are like. These garden stones. Are treasures.

And Elrond encourages his hobby, and helps teach him about types of rock and geology, because he is absolutely the Learning is Fun! Dad, but also he’s the heir to the Kings of the Noldor on middle earth, married to the niece of Felegund, who lived among the Gwaith i Mirdain for a while. Knowing about all types of rocks is probably, like, the Noldor equivalent of learning about all sorts of animals in kindergarten.

And because he absolutely unknowingly has the entire valley wrapped around his finger, elves start hiding interesting rocks around Rivendell. And uncut semi precious stones.

And Estel brings them to Elrond to help him look up in a book, and the Lord of Rivendell has to look at a young boy with a straight face and say, yes, it’s possible for raw emeralds to show up on the banks of the Bruinen, elves live here, lots of special things pop up around elves.

And so he calls them elf-stones, and is very happy with his little collection, and he shows all his friends who are all very impressed, some of them are rare and some are just odd shapes, or an interesting pattern, and not all of them got left around by elves in the longest Easter egg hunt of all time.

So Estel grows up, and becomes chieftain of the Dunedain, and has to leave his collection behind because he can hardly carry around a bunch of rocks as a Ranger, but sometimes he’ll bring one back when he visits, because collecting rocks and sharing them with his friends is a very happy memory for him, though what he finds is rarely as nice as the ones he’d find in Rivendell.

And all this to say, Glorfindel, who was absolutely one of the elves who hid rocks for Aragorn, is thinking of what to leave as a sign that won’t be too obvious, but he will definitely notice… and well, Glorfindel is also a Noldo, and he has a green stone in his pocket that DEFINITELY doesn’t belong among the stones on the bank here, but Aragorn will be sure to spot it and know a friend was near.

I have not decided if Aragorn legit still believes cool rocks pop up around elves, or is looking for any sign and it’s the only bright happy thing in a desperate world, but he totally got the message either way.

And that’s my Aragorn’s rock collection headcanon.

Arwen loves his rock collection btw. The first present he gives her when he has nothing and falls for her in Lothlorien is the small stone he’d carried in his pocket for miles.

He tells her how he started picking them up and giving them away as a child, and how now he only lets himself carry one he finds on his journeys. And so if he finds another he likes he has to choose between them. But because of that each stone is both a memory of his journey, and a reminder of his homecoming.

And she looks at this smooth white river stone- she is also a Noldo, this is a completely valueless piece of impure sedimentary quartz and calcium carbonate- in the palm of her hand. It came out of the pocket of this greasy man who called her her great-great grandmother’s name completely unironically, and looks into his hopeful grey eyes and just thinks “goddamnit I’m going to marry this poetic idiot and be so fucking happy.”

She gives him the most important stone of his collection, THE elf-stone, (at least she tells her grandmother she wants him to have it), and it’s slightly important to his fate or something, and he literally names himself after it so it’s kind of a big deal but he still insists completely straight faced that the one he gave her was better.

That's so sweet.

The eight year old girl I used to be, who first read LOTR and *remembers that scene*, is holding up her arms and weeping in delight.

@cafffine

We are of one mind, let me show you my Aragorn-repairs-his-socks-headcanon art from 2017:

Also that is such a cool headcanon, yes Aragorn and rock collection.

One way that I think she could drive Yoda absolutely nuts, is that she would be just the kind of ideologically confrontational, the exact kind of unyielding in the face of Jedi Wisdom^TM that Yoda would be expecting a fight.

The last few Darksiders we see in his universe are so easy to provoque into going for their lightsabers (and she can’t be of the Light Side, can she?)

He wants it to come to a fight, because she’s not letting him bulldoze or derail  her, and she’s raising a lot of deeply uncomfortable points and she won’t escalate into a fight.

…and he can’t stay the reasonable wise elder in the face of rampaging evil if he’s the one to start it. So he can’t.

So he has to debate with the….. witch.

#When’s the last time Yoda had to debate someone?

#someone that he hadn’t taught in the creche

#someone who wasn’t awed by him

#someone who’s unimpressed by his bullshit but also not an enemy

#so he can’t dismiss her

This is everything I want tbh.

fialleril: #yoda hasn’t been challenged in literally centuries#he’s that very worst kind of person in power#the kind that’s complacent and genuinely believes they’re doing what’s best for everyone#the kind of powerful person granny weatherwax despises most tbh#this would be glorious

I have just listened to a podcast series where two glorious nerds dissect the Star Wars prequels in painstaking detail, and based on the prequels, this characterization of Yoda is EXACTLY correct.

can you imagine Granny Weatherwax allowing EMPEROR GODDAMN PALPATINE to come to power can you imagine a single universe where she would meet him and not IMMEDIATELY see through him THAT’S CORRECT YOU CANNOT 

Oh but she’d let him think his plans were going off without a hitch. She’d let him think he had her completely duped. She’d let him think he knew her every thought and motivation. She might even let him think he’d tricked her into supporting him. Right up until the very end.

“I ain’t been Sithed. You’ve been Weatherwaxed.”

“Do or do not,” Yoda said. “There is no try.”

“Hmph.” The old woman across from him, withered from age and skinny as a garden rake, crossed her arms. “Seems to me that a body that ain’t tryin’ ain’t learning. And thems that don’t learn, don’t grow.”

Yoda blinked. “Try one does, and fail. Frustrations this leads to. Hate. The dark side.”

“Only if one is sillier than Magrat around a baby bird,” muttered the old woman to herself. She shook her head. “You try, you fail, you try again. You try better and fail better and you learn. And learnin’ never led to any darkness. That comes from selfishness, from removing yerself.”

“The Jedi must be removed.”

“Or your wand gets wilted?” The old woman sighed and stood. She was dressed like a crow, a scruffy, dusty crow in mismatched black. With piercing blue eyes she looked at his Jedi robes. “Seems to me that the best fix for your problem is get up and get yer hands dirty. Nothing wrong ever came from doing a little honest work.”

“Yes. Work hard a Jedi must. Serve the order.”

“Serve the people. Order finds its own way or it don’t, it makes no never mind. You’ve got to look to the small things.”

“Think of the many, a Jedi must!” Yoda felt the old temptation to fall into anger. The dark side tempted him as he stood against this woman, dressed like no Sith or Jedi he’d ever known.

She lifted her chin. “Thinking of the many is what lost you the galaxy. You took children and stripped them of the first thing they ever loved. Told them never to hold to anyone. You can’t protect what you can’t love.”

“A distraction, love is. Leads the mind from the ways of the Force it will.”

“If your Force requires you to leave all you love, and love only yourself, it’s no force of good at all.” She pulled a shawl of faded black around her shoulders. “Now, I suppose you ought to try learnin’ now. Perhaps after you do some tryin’ you’ll grow up a little.”

Yoda stood, leaning on his cane. “When nine hundred years you reach-”

“I won’t reach ninety and I’ll still be wiser than you!” the old woman snapped. 

Only practice calmed the inner rage that he was close to succumbing too. “Wisdom you speak, perhaps. A name you have?”

“Granny,” she said. “Thems that knows me well call me Granny Weatherwax.”

Having read this, I can now die happy.

Now I want to see Tiffany Aching meet Yoda and have Strong Words with him.

The Queen herself, wreathed in flames. 🔥

fanghua, gift-giving.

we had to find out from yi-ge and shunxi's conversation in behind-the-scenes footage that li lianhua's fur cloak was a gift from fang duobing and last week, from iqiyi's graphics of props, that fang duobing's jade flute was a gift from li lianhua. what else is there about fanghua we’re not allowed to know about!

cheng yi: "[li lianhua] is rich for once! finally, it's his turn to be rich! yet, it was thanks to someone else 😂 (to zeng shunxi) this fur cloak is yours, you know that? you can't even bear to wear it yourself. you gave it to me."

the fur cloak that makes xiaohua look like a polar bear was a gift from xiaobao after all:

importantly, this is the fur cloak xiaohua carries with him to the very end.

personally, i see both xiaohua and xiaobao as incredibly and admirably well-adjusted individuals i aspire to be. together, their relationship is less about the "redeeming each other" trope. to me, fanghua is more like, xiaohua met someone who brings an extra layer of warmth to his skin, until one day he realizes he is here for good, like a blanket he never wants to return. we get this personified in xiaobao's fur cloak xiaohua keeps to the end despite letting go of all other mortal possessions on the beach, how wonderful is that.

李蓮花贈與方多病的玉笛 (the jade flute li lianhua gifted fang duobing).

xiaobao's jade flute he carries with him at his waist being a gift from xiaohua feels so much like the classic 定情信物 (token of love) and breakup trope 😭

personally, i love both options whether the jade flute is xiaobao's own or if it was a gift from xiaohua. before, i was thinking the jade flute as a personal item of xiaobao's could be a symbol of his free nature, in that yes, he's entering the jianghu to be a formal detective who (truly) embodies li xiangyi's ideals, but he also would enjoy a carefree life endlessly travelling with li lianhua. so, breaking that in tears in their big fight could represent him trying to be firm on returning to the detective route and wondering if he was so naive enough to give his heart out to someone and picturing settling down into a quiet life with that person (before they make up).

but now, as a gift from xiaohua, it's completely that classic 定情信物. it re-frames the first little break-up in such an amusing way. they "break up," and xiaobao goes off flaunting the gift xiaohua gave him and touches it to his skin in front of everyone, like he's waiting for xiaohua to admit he still cares about him. because what was that jade flute gift if not proof that he saw him as a close companion? 😤

from xiaohua's smiles and clearly showing interest in xiaobao's antics, he knows exactly what xiaobao is doing 😂

isn't it also such a nostalgic, amusing, and charming little classic story to have a rich young master who has a lot of money of his own he can spend with a wave of a hand but walks around everywhere with a small gift he holds close more than anything because it’s from someone he likes? with both the showing off and carrying it everywhere he goes, truly — xiaohua knows exactly what xiaobao has been doing.