#Hudson: 'if he's ancient that means I'm ancient...no.'

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Bankruptcy is very, very good

On THURSDAY (June 20) I'm live onstage in LOS ANGELES for a recording of the GO FACT YOURSELF podcast. On FRIDAY (June 21) I'm doing an ONLINE READING for the LOCUS AWARDS at 16hPT. On SATURDAY (June 22) I'll be in OAKLAND, CA for a panel and a keynote at the LOCUS AWARDS.

There's a truly comforting sociopathy snuggled inside capitalism ideology: if markets are systems for identifying and rewarding virtue, ability and value, then anyone who's failing in the system is actually unworthy, not unlucky; and that means the winners are not just lucky (and certainly not merely selfish), but actually the best and they owe nothing to their social inferiors apart from what their own charitable impulses dictate.

It's an economic wrapper around the old theological doctrine of providence, whereby God shows you whom he favors by giving them wealth and station, and marks out the wicked by miring them in poverty. And like the religious belief in providence, the capitalist belief in meritocracy is essential to resolving cognitive dissonance: it lets the fed winners feel morally justified in stepping over the starving losers.

The debate over merit and luck has been with us for millennia, and even the hereditary absolute monarchs of the Bronze Age had to find a way to resolve it. For the rulers of antiquity, the way to square that circle was jubilee.

Bronze Age jubilees were periodic celebrations in which all debts were canceled. Different kingdoms had different schedules for jubilees, but imagine some mix of "every x years" and "every time a new ruler takes the throne" and "every time something really portentous happens." To modern sensibilities, the idea that we would simply wipe away all debts every now and again is almost inconceivable. Why would any society practice jubilee? More importantly, how could a ruler get the wealthy creditor class to countenance a jubilee, rather than seeking a revolutionary overthrow?

The best answers to this question can be found in the scholarship of historian Michael Hudson, who has written extensively on the subject. Hudson doesn't just write for a scholarly audience, he's also a fantastic communicator with a real commitment to bringing his research to lay audiences:

https://michael-hudson.com/

Hudson's most famous saying is "debts that can't be paid, won't be paid." It's in this dense little nugget that we can find the answer the the riddle of jubilee:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/29/jubilance/#debt

Let's start with a simple model of debt and credit in an agricultural society. In agricultural societies, everything exists downstream of farming, which is the core activity of the civilization. If the farmers succeed, everyone can eat, and that means they can do all the other things, all the not-farming work of your society.

To farm successfully, you need credit. Farmers enter the growing season in need of inputs: seed, fertilizer, labor; they need still more labor during the harvest. Without some way to acquire these inputs before the farmer has a crop that can pay for them, there can be no crop.

No wonder, then, that the earliest "money" we have a record of is ancient Babylonian credit ledgers that record the debts of farmers who borrow against the next crop to pay for the materials and labor they'll need to grow it. Debt, not barter, is the true origin of money. The fairy tale that coin money arose spontaneously to help bartering marketgoers facilitate trade has no historical evidence, while Babylonian ledgers can be seen in person in museums all over the world.

Farming requires an enormous amount of skill, but even the most skillful farmer is a prisoner of luck. No matter how good you are at farming, no matter how hard you work, no matter how carefully you plan, you can still lose a harvest to blight, drought, storms or vermin.

So over time, every farmer loses a crop. When that happens, the farmer can't pay off their debts and must roll them over and pay them off with future harvests. That means that over time, the share of each harvest the farmer has claim to goes down. Thanks to compounding interest, no bumper crop can erase the debts of the bad harvests.

That means that, over time, "farmer" becomes a synonym for "debtor." Farmers' productive output is increasingly claimed by the rich and powerful. No matter how badly everyone needs food, the whims of the hereditary creditor class come to dictate the country's agricultural priorities. More ornamental flowers for the tables of the wealthy, fewer staple crops for the masses. "Creditor" and "debtor" no longer describe economic relations – they become hereditary castes.

That's where jubilee comes in. Without some way to interrupt this cycle of spiraling debt, society becomes so destabilized that the system collapses:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/08/jubilant/#construire-des-passerelles

In other words: debts that can't be paid, won't be paid. Either you wipe away the farmers' debts to the creditor class, or your society collapses, and with it, the political relations that made those debts payable.

Jubilee is long gone, but that doesn't mean that debts that can't be paid will get paid. Modern society has filled the jubilee gap with bankruptcy, a legal process for shriving a debtor of their debts.

Bankruptcy takes many forms. The most important split in bankruptcy types is between elite bankruptcy and the bankruptcy of the common person. The limited liability company was created to allow people with money to pool their funds to back corporations without being responsible for their debts. This "capital formation" is considered "efficient" by economists because it creates the backing for big, ambitious projects, from colonizing and extracting the wealth of distant lands (Hudson's Bay Company) to spinning up global manufacturing supply chains (Apple).

Limited liability means that companies can take on debt without exposing their investors to risks beyond their capital stake. If you buy $1,000 worth of Apple stock, that's all you stand to lose if Apple makes bad decisions. Apple may rack up billions in liabilities – say, by abusing its subcontractor workforce – but Apple's owners aren't on the hook for it.

Economists like this because it means that you can invest in Apple without having to be privy to its daily management decisions, which means that Apple can accumulate huge pools of capital, "lever them up" by borrowing even more, and then put all that money to work on R&D, product development, marketing, and, of course, "incentives" for key employees and managers.

But limited liability also does a lot of work in the political sphere. Once an individual crosses a certain wealth threshold, they become an LLC. Accountants and wealth managers and financial planners insist on this. For freelancers and other sole practitioners, the benefits of forming an LLC are modest – a few more tax write-offs and the ability to get a business credit-card with slightly superior perks.

But for the truly wealthy, transforming yourself into the "natural person" at the center of a vast pool of LLCs is essential because it allows you to accumulate and shed debts. You can secretly own rental properties and abuse your tenants, accumulate vast liabilities as local authorities pile fine upon fine, and then simply dispose of the LLC and its debts. Plan this gambit carefully enough and the debtor LLC will have no assets in its bankruptcy estate apart from the crumbling apartment building, and its most senior secured creditor will be another of your LLCs. This lets the slumlord move an apartment block from one pocket to another, leaving the debt behind.

For the corporate person, shedding debts through bankruptcy is an honorable practice. Far from being a source of shame, the well-timed, well-structured bankruptcy is just evidence of financial acumen. Think of the private equity looters who buy a company by borrowing against it, pay themselves a huge "special dividend," then wipe away the debt by taking the company bankrupt (which also lets them shed obligations to suppliers, workers, and especially, retirees and their pensions). As Trump (a serial bankrupt who has stiffed legions of contractors and creditors) would say, "That makes me smart."

The apotheosis of elite bankruptcy is found in massive corporate bankruptcies, in which a corporation kills and maims huge numbers of people, then maneuvers to get its case heard in one of three US federal courtrooms where specialist judges rubber-stamp "involuntary third-party releases" that wipe out the company's obligations to it victims for pennies on the dollar, while the company gets to keep billions:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/29/impunity-corrodes/#morally-bankrupt

This process was so flagrantly abused by companies like Johnson & Johnson (which spent years knowingly advising women to dust their vulvas with asbestos-tainted talc, creating an epidemic of grotesque and lethal genital cancers) that it is finally generating some scrutiny and pushback:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/01/j-and-j-jk/#risible-gambit

But the precarious state of elite bankruptcies has more to do with the personal corruption of the small cabal of judges who run the system than public outrage over their rulings; like that one judge in Texas who was secretly fucking the lawyer whose clients he was also handing hundreds of millions of dollars to:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/16/texas-two-step/#david-jones

Certainly, we don't hear much about the "moral hazard" of allowing the Sackler opioid family to keep as much as ten billion dollars in the family's offshore accounts while walking away from the victims of their drug-pushing empire, no matter what bizarre tricks they deploy in pulling off the stunt:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/11/justice-delayed/#justice-redeemed

But when it comes to canceling the debts of normal people, the "moral hazard" is front and center. If you're a person who borrowed $79k in student loans, paid back $190k and still owe $236k, we can't cancel your debt, because of the message that would send to other people who want to (checks notes) get an education:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/04/kawaski-trawick/#strike-debt

The anti-jubilee side also wants us to think of the poor creditors: who would loan money to the next generation of students if student debt cancellation was a possibility? Of course, these are federally guaranteed loans, risk-free, free money for people who already have money, a kind of UBI for the people who need it least. The idea that this credit pool would dry up if you were limited to only collecting the debts that can be paid – rather than insisting that debts that can't be paid still be paid – elevates the hereditary creditor class to a kind of fragile, easily frightened, endangered species.

But the most powerful arguments against bankruptcy are rooted in the idea of providence. In an efficient market, anyone who goes bankrupt was necessarily reckless. They were entrusted with credit they weren't entitled to, because they lacked the intrinsic merit that would let them manage that credit wisely. Letting them walk away from their debts means that they will never learn from their mistakes, and that their fellow born-to-be-poors will learn the wrong thing from those debts: that there's an easy life in borrowing, spending, and discharging your debts in bankruptcy.

As it happens, this is an empirically testable proposition. If this view of personal bankruptcy as a personal failure is correct, then people who go bankrupt and live to borrow again should end up bankrupt again, too. On the other hand, if we accept the jubilee view – that debt is the result of accumulated misfortunes, often including the misfortune of birth into poor station – then bankruptcy represents a second chance with an opportunity to dodge misfortune.

In a new study from IZA Institute of Labor Economics's Gustaf Bruze, Alexander Kjær Hilsløv and Jonas Maibom, we get just such an empirical analysis. It's called "The Long-Run Effects of Individual Debt Relief," and it examines the lives of people for a full quarter-century after a bankruptcy:

https://docs.iza.org/dp17047.pdf

The study follows Danish bankruptcies following the introduction of continental Europe's first modern bankruptcy system, which Denmark instituted in 1984. Prior to that, the Danes – like most of Europe – did not allow for a discharge of personal debt through bankruptcy. Instead, a debtor who went bankrupt would be expected to have about 20% of their lifetime wages garnished to pay back their creditors, until the debts were repaid or they died (whichever came first).

After 1984, Denmark bankruptcy system imported features of US/UK/Commonwealth bankruptcy, including the ability to restructure and discharge your debts. Not everyone is eligible for this kind of bankruptcy: there's a bureaucratic system that verifies that people seeking bankruptcy discharge don't have a lot of assets that could go to their creditors.

But for the (un)lucky people who qualify for bankruptcy discharges, there's a fascinating natural experiment in which the fortunes of people who see debt relief can be compared to bankrupt people who couldn't get their debts wiped out.

It turns out that the Bronze Age has a thing or two to teach us. Here's the headline finding: people who discharge their debts in bankruptcy experience "a large increase in earned income, employment, assets, real estate, secured debt, home ownership, and wealth that persists for more than 25 years after a court ruling."

After people are given the benefits of bankruptcy, they are less likely to rely on public benefits. They get better jobs. Their families live better lives. Their creditors get some of their money back (which is all they can realistically expect, since "debts that can't be paid, won't be paid").

As Jason Kilborn writes for Credit Slips, "the benefits of debt relief are not only substantial but robust, as debtors learn their lesson (if there was one to learn) about managing their finances, and they capitalize (literally) on their fresh start."

Score one for the luck-based theory of wealth, and minus one for the providential meritocracy hypothesis.

Americans should take note of these findings. After all, Danes are insulated from the leading American cause of bankruptcy: medical debts. In America, breaking a bone or getting cancer or even kidney stone can wipe out a lifetime of hard work, careful planning and prudential spending. The US refuses to seriously grapple with this problem. The best we can come up with is the (welcome, but tiny) step of banning credit bureaux from trashing your credit score because of your medical debt:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/06/11/fact-sheet-vice-president-harris-announces-proposal-to-prohibit-medical-bills-from-being-included-on-credit-reports-and-calls-on-states-and-localities-to-take-further-actions-to-reduce-medical-debt/

Millennia ago, everyone understood that debts that can't be paid, won't be paid, and they created a system for discharging debts and freeing productive people from the tyranny of accumulated liabilities, to the benefit of all. Dismantling that system required us to invent an elaborate theological system and dress it up in economic language.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/17/lovilee-jubilee/#debts-that-cant-be-paid-wont-be-paid

[alicepao13]

Hudson and Rex S03E03 - Into the Wild

I really like this episode. Then again, I found most S3 episodes very interesting. Also, Charlie!whump.

Second episode with Kendra. Bring back Kendra!

Joe: "It's not every day that we find an ancient mummy". Ancient? Hardly.

I can't with them thinking that a 1700s body would be considered ancient.

Not awkward at all.

Is everyone using Rex as a conduit to tell things about each other?

Kendra: *looking at Charlie* "I miss [Rex's] visits". That's bullshit. She misses her fuck buddy. And Sarah can tell there's something going on, judging by her awkward attempts to change the subject.

"Rex has a mind of his own". I wonder how that goes over with the police complaints.

Every day, opting out of civilization becomes more and more attractive, actually. It's just that the alternative is usually worse.

Charlie explains his new brilliant idea of going to find the camp of survivalists. Sarah has already started worrying.

I know they shuffled the episodes again. There is no way anyone would put a scene of a new house without explaining whose it is and without having a scene inside. Ugh, they're so bad at continuity.

Yay for casual clothes.

See, this is actually good "Visit Newfoundland" promotion. Looking at whoever approved that S6 premiere.

I can almost make out Jesse's email. Also, this is an iPhone.

No! Our beautiful, beautiful car!

Rex is barking out of his mind. Do you mind paying him a bit of attention?

He left a note on the car and moved in deeper. Great.

"Do you know any good jokes?" No, Charlie. Resist the temptation.

"Alright, I got one". Sigh.

Okay, so I never noticed the actual scene where he used a battery to light the fire because that's always where the subtitles are but now I have no subtitles on.

"Charlie's in trouble again, isn't he?" "Ah, shit, here we go again."

And then she insists on going to the search, because what if Charlie needs medical attention? Also, it's Sarah who suggests Kendra. I'm not sure if she's feeling jealous of her at all at this point, probably not, but in any case she's doing what's best for Charlie.

If I'd fallen asleep like that, I don't think I'd be able to get up again.

He gave Rex the last of the water! Oh, and then he drank the remains from his hand. Look, I've never had pets, so I'll just say ew.

Charlie: "Rex, you're going the wrong way, pal". Rex: "No, you are".

See, he told you so.

Is this the dumbest way I've seen a main character get injured? Well, no. But it's pretty high on the list. Also, I think someone in the trailer department noticed that as well, so they edited the trailer to make us think that he falls after getting shot. I mean, you can definitely not show in the trailer that he slips and falls lol

"Are you fucking kidding me right now?!?!"

"Charlie, if you died, I swear to god..."

I'm sure Kendra has already figured out something's going on with Charlie and Sarah. First of all, she knew that Sarah would want to go with her to search for him. I'm assuming there were a lot more of those looks those two give each other. You know, all these things that we don't get to watch.

Rough wakeup call. Here's what you get for making Rex worry.

"It's your dog that saved you." "Yeah, it's an ongoing theme of my life."

This is the nth time someone takes Charlie's gun.

Some girl talk. Or Charlie-talk. Kendra definitely doesn't mind sharing the exact status of the friends-with-benefits situation they had going on after Charlie's divorce, which, judging by the way she says at the start that she hasn't seen him in a while, has already ended. And probably because Charlie has already caught feelings for Sarah.

See? The woods are dangerous.

Poor Sarah, she always has to worry with that man.

"Rex, take the high ground, partner." "No, I'm too cute to get shot."

The plan is to keep him talking until someone saves Charlie.

Flying doggo! And Charlie punching the guy because Sarah had arrived and, well, he has to show off.

"I hope we didn't worry you too much?" "Not at all. I knew it wasn't anything Rex couldn't handle". From their looks, I feel like this is one more case where she's using Rex to refer to Charlie, but I firmly believe that she should actually be talking about Rex.

Stop smiling and start apologizing for worrying the lady.

Some Jesse hero-worship to Charlie.

As I said, they get invited to all the coolest memorials.

And scored some new bling.

[the-fourth-knower]

Tears of the Kingdom, a theme theory: Sheikah, Hyrule, Ganondorf, and You

So for anyone who's played Breath of the Wild, we all know about the SHeikah. The ancient Sheikah specifically. Their shrines, their towers, equipment, hell we eve start the game inside a Shiekah shrine of sorts - the Shrine of Resurrection.

Fast forward to Tears of the Kingdom, and the Ancient sheikah tech is Gone. Kaput. The towers, shrines, all of it. And it's a noticable absence as well, as you trek out to places where those used to be and they are no longer there.

But why is that? Where did they go, what happened?

I'm not going to attempt to answer that.

Instead, I'm going to discuss what thematically it might mean instead. And that is one thing.

Moving On.

The technology of the Ancient Sheikah had one goal in mind, ultimately: Stop Calamity Ganon. Which it ultimately did. Which means it is time to move on.

Hyrule was devastated, ruined from top to bottom in the Calamity. But not eradicated - the people survived. And under Zelda, they move forwards to a new, brighter future. The past fading into the background, or being retooled into new creations under Purah's leadership. Things are bright, hopeful.

And then there's Link. AKA the player as well, though Link is decidedly his own character and not an insert. Link, who went through the shrines. Who found the towers. Who saved the Divine Beasts. Who (potentially) went through two elaborate Sheikah trials. Who remembers the Champions personally.

What does he think of all this? Does he miss the Sheikah stuff that decorated Hyrule, making for useful landmarks. Does he shrug it off and adapt to the new reality, one that he presumably experienced as it happened. Does he recall his time with the Champions in the past, even as most of them continue to fade into history?

If he has any real issues with it, he does not say them. Because he is as dedicated to helping Hyrule rebuild and move on from the tragedy of the past.

Enter Ganondorf.

Here we have the opposite side - Ganondorf is a man stuck in the past. He yearns for the Hyrule and world he knew, the one where courage was blazing wherever you looked, where people did not call their 'spinelessness' as a 'desire for peace' (these are actually in some of the dubs, it's pretty hardcore).

From the start, he is disgusted with Rauru's and Sonia's new land - one where people live in peace harmony, not battling to establish their superiority and crushing their opposition.

Even here, we see moving on being a theme. Rauru, with Sonia and Mineru by his side, seeks to build a new future. A new kingdom, where the people of what will be Hyrule are not eternally struggling against each other. Which also makes me wonder just what Hryule was like before then and what was going on - gives more about Rauru, Sonia, Mineru, and the others Nintendo, pls

This is anathema to Ganondorf - seeming to go against everything he believes in. And so he seeks to destroy it, to 'reshape the world as it was meant to be.' Once again, the arrogance and entitlement of Ganondorf drives him - he is entitled to the world and power because he is Ganondorf, Sorcerer King of the Gerudo.

Fast forward to the present, and he still has not given p that goal. No matter how much time has passed, he will return the world to what it was before Rauru and the Zonai - except worse, now, because he will fill the land with monsters and demons, with him at their head as the Demon King.

Is it little surprise then that the main villain is someone who refuses to move on? Someone who rejects both the Hyrule of Rauru and later the Hyrule of Zelda in favor of his own, twisted world view. Who is on the opposite end of the spectrum as Rauru in regards to what it means to be a king and to possess power.

Moving on, progress, Not letting yourself be stuck in the past. These are all part of the themes of Tears. We see it through out the game, notably in Hudson's quest line where he must come to terms with his daughter leaving. And like the chad he is, Hudson allows his daughter her long awaited chance to connect with her mother's people. Rather than trying to keep her in Tarrey Town. He and Rhondson then prepare for a new beginning in their lives.

The Ancient Sheikah have faded into the background as their descendants take up the torch, creating new things. And indeed, if my own thoughts that the Ancient Sheikah tech is based off Zonai tech, it's effectively a full circle going on.

In effect, the game is focusing on moving on, and using the past to help do that rather than working against it. With a main villain who refuses to move on and seeks to return to the past as he viewed it. A collective versus the individual type of deal.

(That said I'm 95% sure there will be a DLC that features Ancient Sheikah in some way. Maz Koshia is still out there, and we have no idea what happened to the Divine Beasts.)

[nearly-deactivated-elby]

As someone who is a Chinese Christian (specifically a Hong Konger), I feel like implying that Christians are unequivocally persecuted by the state is inaccurate, because the current situation is that Christians have basically been split into two camps; what do I mean?

In addition to any denominational divides existing already, christians have to choose between worshipping at churches existing under the auspices of the state, or unofficial congregations, commonly termed "house churches". Churches, if they submit to the state-controlled organizations, are generally allowed to exist. To corroborate my point, I have pictures of churches (ft. a mosque) I took last year, in the city of Hangzhou.

(I'll be putting the rest of my essay under a very long description. TL;DR: The Catholic and Protestant Churches in Modern China are accepted as long as they stay loyal to the country. This sounds really bad on paper, but is generally in line with other patriotic Christian movements out there, like the Aglipayan Church, the Japanese no-church movement, and the phenomenon where US flags are displayed as if equal to the Bible)

In order, the pictures are of:

Christ's Church, Tianshui Subdistrict. Commonly called the Tianshui Church ("Heaven Water Church"). According to the Hangzhou Municipal Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs, it is one of the earliest churches in Hangzhou, and one of five churches open to the public. Used to be a church of the American Presbyterian Mission, South

A brief sign commemorating the missionary John Leighton Stuart. He's most known for being a founder of Yenching University. The text reads, "John Leighton Stuart (1876-1962), [was born to] missionary parents in Hangzhou, China. [I'm sorry I didn't capture the rest of the text] missionary of American Presbytery (sic.) Church [..] As the President of Benching University [...] made outstanding contributions to the d[evelopment of] modern education in China. In 1946 he[...] the US Ambassador to China. In August [.. he emigrated from] China for the United States [...]" China has a complicated relationship with missionaries. On one hand they're the tools of the imperialists; on the other hand they were instrumental in the narrative of the "New China" of the CPC. Fun fact, Christ's Church is a tourist spot due to association with Leighton Stuart; the trees he planted there are listed as part of the "Famous Woods and Ancient Trees" by the Hangzhou Municipal Bureau of garden and cultural relics

The Hangzhou Catholic Church, dedicated to the Immaculate Conception.

The Gulou (Drum Tower) Church, located near a tourist spot, the Drum Tower. One of the first churches to be re-opened after the Cultural Revolution. Demolished in 1998, but reconstructed in 2002. Used to be a church of the American Presbyterian Mission, North; still associated with Presbyterians globally. Read more here.

Two crucifixes I got at street market in Hangzhou. The one on the right has Chinese Buddhist charms.

Chongyi Church. One of the biggest churches in Hangzhou, and progenitor of the Three-Self Patriotic Movement. Founded by James Hudson Taylor, now known as the founder of the China Inland Mission. The next few pictures come from this church as well. Fun fact, the Beatitudes are stamped on their doors.

Pillars of Chongyi Church. This specific picture depicts the Three Marys and John the Apostle underneath the cross. Not shown in the picture, but it is paired with another pillar/mural depicting the vision of Jacob's Ladder

A billboard of Chongyi Church. The board is titled with the phrase "Love the country (China) and religion (Christianity); serve society", and has different pamphlets placed on it. From left to right: a. A broadsheet detailing the core vales of socialism. Under the title and slogan ("When the people have faith, only then will the country have power"): Prosperity, Democracy, Civilization, Harmony, Freedom, Equality, Justice, Rule of Law, Patriotism, Honor of Work, Sincerity, Friendliness b. a series of pamphlets detailing dire safety protocols, and a series of pictures promoting Chonyi Church's fire safety training c. A poster saying "Make Religion Sinicised and Make the administration of Religious Affairs modernized. The windows of the city" d. Another poster, "Keep on the Sinicisation of religion in our nation (China). Actively lead in the process of mutual acclimation between religion and socialism e. A series of broadsheets denouncing different new religious movements --- the Church of Almighty God, Yiguandao (Buddhist-based salvationist religion) and Guan Yin Citta Dharma Door. On the bottom left is an illustrated guide against cults f. more fire safety pamphlets

John 7:37 --- Jesus said, "Whoever is thirsty should come to me." situated above a water fountain. I know, clever wordplay.

An introduction to the Phoenix Mosque.

Some Catholic merch I got while I was there: a crucifix, the Divine Mercy and an image of the Holy Family.

So Christianity in China isn't hidden. In fact, there are literal websites advocating for church infrastructure, and generally Christianity is a working religious minority up north, beloved for its contributions to the modernization of China, and abhorred when it supported "feudal society" (generally defined as anything the CPC considers regressive).

HOWEVER.

Only three Christian organizations are allowed to legally exist in China: The Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (Catholicism), the China Christian Council (non-denomination Prot) and the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (Non-denominational Protestantism). Both of these exist under the government. Thus, an issue arises: For the Catholics, the dilemma is that the episcopate of Patriotic Catholicism is not directly under the Pope---the bishops are chosen by the State. Meanwhile, the China Christian Council and Three-Self Patriotic Movement (known as "the Two Organisations/Churches") are seen as a communist plot by some Christians, and is so mistrusted.

It is to note that theologically, nothing too suspect is preached from the pulpit. Granted, I've only been to the official churches twice, but their sermons and homilies are pretty standard. No one randomly praises Chairman Xi in churches; I'm pretty sure official Chinese Masses still recognise Leo XIV as Pope; at most Chinese flags are seen flying OUTSIDE the church, unlike some churches over the Pacific...

Also, despite being officially non-denominational, the TSPM is not actually that united. When every single Protestant Church ever was told to unite in the late 1950s under “self-governance, self-support, and self-propagation" (hence Three-Self; and the aversion to missionary activity mentioned above), they didn't actually abandon their specific denominational viewpoints. While officially TSPM, former Anglican Churches still reek of Anglicanism, former Presbyterian churches still reek of Presbyterianism, etc. I remember one time I was visiting a church in another area of China, and it turned out to be a Sabbatarian church who called every other Christian apostates. Fun times. This hasn't stopped the Three-Self church to say that it has succeeded in uniting all denominations though.

Their current shtick is to "sinicise" Christianity, to make it more relevant to the local populace via comparisons with Confucianism and Taoism; this started with the missionaries, mind you, who translated Confucian filial piety into "honor thy father and mother", Taoist Tao into "In the Beginning was the Word", Buddhist compassion into "most compassionate God", etc.

But anyway, I digress.

For valid reasons (the state not even pretending to be Christian, as an example), some Christians don't trust the Patriotic movements that emerged from the CPC. So they worship congregationally and underground. This is the rise of the house churches. These were the people who were not allowed to independently own property and hence, they often met in secret private houses. Their members and leaders also were frequently harassed by local government officials. Commonly, some of them were imprisoned and brainwashed through labor camps, especially during the Cultural Revolution. Due to being, well, illegal, documentation of them should be sparse. In addition, due to their non-registered nature, it's very easy to confuse them with actual heretical cults that also emerged from post-Reform and Opening Up China (such as the Church of Almighty God, in which Jesus reincarnated as a woman). Thus I can't comment on them. What I do know is that the government is still definitely going to crack down on them.

Honestly, otherwise, Christianity in the mainland is seen as one of the minority religions that exist (along with Islam). Its presence is felt though, and articles document how people mourned after churches were burnt down (somehow):

(it's in Chinese, so I can't help you there)

More terminally online Chinese people help me elaborate. Correct me too, if I'm wrong.

Honestly, imo the Patriotic Churches aren't the worst thing to exist. At least Christians are given some freedom to worship in peace. And yet, the patriotism will probably leave a sour taste in people's mouths. But globally, national flags are displayed in churches globally, like the Aglipayan Church of the Philippines, and most egregiously the United States, whom some believers see as a second Zion. At least our brothers up north are compelled to honor the state with the faith. Why do we, free as we are, still venerate the country inside our churches?

So yeah. Christians aren't always persecuted, generally the unregistered ones are, we should still pray for them, and look out for similar tendencies that we fall to in our freedoms.

God have mercy on us.

Pray for our brothers and sisters in China

1 billion bibles burned. Churches torn down. Men, and women thrown into “transformational camps” with no trial, no jury, no escape. Tortured, damaged and missing organs. But take heart for they have Spirit and Faith, memorizing whole books of the Bible, evangelizing in whispers, baptisms underground. Pray for them. Remember them. For the Lord of Heaven hears their cries and sees them when the world, the media refuses to look.

[russianshavefun]

Joseph Brodsky. "With death not all things end."

Today is the 26th anniversary of Brodsky's death.

Joseph Brodsky (24 May 1940 – 28 January 1996)

Joseph Brodsky was born in 1940, in Leningrad, and began writing poetry when he was eighteen. Anna Akhmatova soon recognized in the young poet the most gifted lyric voice of his generation.

From March 1964 until November 1965, Brodsky lived in exile in the Arkhangelsk region of northern Russia; he had been sentenced to five years in exile at hard labor for "social parasitism," but did not serve out his term.

On June 4, 1972, Joseph Brodsky became an involuntary exile from his native country.

After brief stays in Vienna and London, he came to the United States. He has been Poet-in-Residence and Visiting Professor at the University of Michigan, Queens College, Smith College, Columbia University, and Cambridge University in England.

Brodsky passionately loved Venice. He came here seventeen times and always in winter.

He wrote a postcard essay to this city, "Watermark".

Brodsky's short book is an autobiographical essay, a kind of poetry in prose, recounting Brodsky's relationship with Venice. In about half a hundred short chapters, each devoted to a different episode from the author's visits to the city (or his thoughts), he describes its atmosphere. "It is all written in short, closed passages, where in each passage one picture or one feeling is described. And these are pictures either from his various impressions of Venice (where he visited every winter) or his ideas of Venice as they were before emigration. People connected with Venice in one way or another (there, in Italy or in Russia) and people with whom he may not have seen in Venice himself, but who, before him, without him, besides him, had been to Venice, or wrote about Venice.

Joseph Brodsky died in New York on the night of January 28. According to medical experts, his heart stopped suddenly - a heart attack, the fifth in a row. Brodsky's first burial was temporary - the body in a coffin lined with zinc was placed in a crypt at the Church of the Holy Trinity on the banks of the Hudson.

According to the poet's widow Maria (née Sozzani, an Italian aristocrat with Russian roots): "The idea of a funeral in Venice was suggested by a friend. It was the city that, apart from St. Petersburg, Joseph loved most of all.

On June 21, 1997, Brodsky's body was reburied in the San Michele cemetery.

On the back of the monument is an inscription in Latin - a line from the ancient Roman poet Propertius' elegy, which means: "With death not all things end."

On Brodsky's grave visitors leave poems, letters, pebbles, photographs, pencils, and cigarettes - as we know, Joseph was a heavy smoker.

Postscriptum

What a pity, that what your existance has become for me,

is not the same as

what my existance has become for you.

...And again, on an empty lot

I'm launching into the wire cosmos

my copper penny, decorated with the emblem,

in a desperate attempt to glorify

the moment of the link...Alas,

all that a man, who isn't able to replace the world

with himself, can generally do

Is to rotate the chipped disk of a payphone

Like a table during a seance,

Until a ghost responds with an echo

To the last yells of the buzzer in the night.

[notwiselybuttoowell]

We're Stewards of Our Land: The Rise of Female Farmers

'I was always fascinated by getting things out of the ground’

Sinead Fenton

Grows vegetables and edible flowers at Aweside Farm, East Sussex

Sinead Fenton is on an early lunch break, hiding from the sun. “It’s ridiculously intense, so I think we’re going to call it a day and crack back on in the evening,” she says. Fenton and her partner, Adam Smith, have been putting in beds and getting ahead on groundwork for next year. This year, there will be no commercial crops on the couple’s 4.5-acre plot.

They signed the papers on their farm last November and moved onto the land in March. Around the time they needed to make decisions about how they’d manage their first harvest, lockdown happened. With restaurants and florists – their main clients – out of action for the foreseeable future, they made the decision not to sow seeds but concentrate on opening up the land. “We were going to do it over three or four years, so we’re squeezing three years of work into this year, so we can focus on growing next year,” Fenton says.

She and Smith cut their scythes at Audacious Veg, a 0.1-acre plot in Hainault, at the end of the Central Line between Essex and London. Shortly after volunteering at the allotment in 2017, they heard the project was about to finish: “Naively, with about three weeks’ worth of growing experience, we decided that we’d take it on and get the produce to chefs.”

Smith worked in insurance accounting and while Fenton most recently worked in software and food policy, her background was in geology. “I came at farming from an activist point of view,” she says. “I was always fascinated by getting things out of the ground, but that is a destructive industry. Farming is nicer because I can do something for the system instead of taking everything from it.”

There was a lot of insecurity around the project. Land is contentious, especially in London, and land law is difficult and expensive to negotiate for those with no farming background. “Adam and I are both from cities – I’m from London, he’s from Essex. We’re from low-income families, and we had no access to farms growing up,” Fenton explains. “It’s basically impossible to get on the land, because it’s so expensive, or passed down through generations.”

They got the land for Aweside through the Ecological Land Co-op, which buys fields designated by Defra as only being good for arable crops, then splits them up to create smallholdings. Aweside is neighbours with a veg-box scheme, and waiting for others who’ll transform what once was a 20-acre maize field into a cluster of small farms rich with biodiversity. Now Fenton and Smith have a 150-year lease, and no worries that what they create will be taken away.

It’s not yet a permanent home. Fenton says they’ll be living in a caravan for a few years: “Another part of land law in the UK that makes land inaccessible is that if you want to live on your land you have to go through five years of proving your business is profitable, viable and that there is a functional need for you to live there.” Having livestock is an easy way to pass the test, but because Aweside is a vegan farm, Fenton and Smith need to cultivate and show they use every bit of plot.

It’s daunting but Fenton is excited about having a blank slate to work with. “There’s so much more to food than what supermarkets tell us to eat,” she says, explaining that they’ll grow varieties at risk of extinction, or that aren’t commonly grown in a mass market food system. “Seed diversity and plant genetics are serious issues.”

The three principles the couple work to are: more flowers, more trees, thriving soil. They’re working no-dig, putting compost directly on the ground and letting the soil life mix everything over time. They’re pesticide-free and are counting on the fact that the more diversity they have in the system, especially with a high proportion of flowers to pollinators and insects, the fewer problems they’ll face.

“Socially, economically and environmentally, something needs to change. Things have been done the same way by the same people for a long time,” says Fenton of the farming industry’s need for greater diversity. “I learned to grow on an allotment site where there are lots of different things growing at once. Bringing that approach into sites like this is needed – the industry needs it to keep itself relevant.”

'I'm hoping this will be seen as quite a cool career… even if it’s not’

Abi Aspen Glencross

Head of grains at Duchess Farms, Hertfordshire

It was, Abi Aspen Glencross was well aware, an odd, even inopportune time to launch a crowdfunding campaign. In June, with the country still locked down, Duchess Farms asked for support to buy dehulling, cleaning and milling equipment. The Hertfordshire farm needed about £16,000, and the money would go towards boosting the production of ancient and heritage grains for making flour.

“A lot of crowdfunders have been for charity or ‘please keep our restaurant open’,” says the 28-year-old Glencross, head of grains – or “senior flour nerd” – at Duchess Farms since 2019. “We felt a bit bad, but we lost a lot of our business overnight when all the restaurants closed and we were like: ‘God, we hope we don’t go under.’ It was quite a scary time for everyone.”

Still, if we have learned one thing from Covid-19, when times are hard, British people get baking. Perhaps inspired by countrywide shortages of flour, maybe invigorated by a new interest in left-field, older wheats such as einkorn and emmer, Duchess Farms sprinted to its target. “We’ve just done some ordering of equipment this morning,” says Aspen, when we speak in July. “It’s been a tough time for everyone but it has cascaded into some beautiful things and we’re just so thankful.”

Glencross’s path to farming was circuitous. She studied chemical engineering, but while her classmates were heading off for jobs at ExxonMobil and Procter & Gamble, she was more of “a hippy at heart”. She decided she wanted to learn more about soil and its role in food production. This led her to Blue Hill Stone Barns, Dan Barber’s pioneering farm-to-table restaurant in the Hudson Valley, north of New York. She spent four months working on the farm and in the bakery, receiving a crash course in ancient grains – an obsession of Barber’s. But the moment Glencross knew she herself wanted to farm came in 2016 in a field in Hertfordshire. She was with John Cherry, who was showing her around Weston Park Farms, 2,500 acres of land he maintains with minimal fertiliser use and zero tillage.

“We were walking around the fields of wheat and I just said: ‘Where does all this go? There’s so much of it,’” Glencross says. “And John goes: ‘Oh probably for animal feed. It’s a consistent market, they’ll take it, it’s easy, even if we don’t earn that much money from it.’ And I was like: ‘This is crazy.’ And that was the beginning of me getting on this grain bender because I was like: ‘Why can’t we grow these grains organically and not feed them to animals?’ So I realised I’d have to start a business, because there were not very many people doing that.”

Heritage grains can be harder to produce in vast quantities – einkorn, especially, is “a bitch to harvest” – but they do have advantages over conventional wheats. They typically have deep roots and grow tall, which means they shade out weeds and do not require chemical sprays. The end product is more nutritious and then there’s the taste. Since 2017, Glencross has run a roving supper club called the Sustainable Food Story with Sadhbh Moore, and Duchess Farms has worked closely with bakeries such as E5 Bakehouse in east London and Gail’s, and restaurants including Doug McMaster’s Silo. “Heritage grains are delicious: when you stop growing for yield and you start growing for quality the flavour is insane,” says Glencross.

Learning to farm from scratch has not been straightforward, but you sense that’s a big part of the appeal for Glencross. “There’s all these decisions the farmer makes throughout the year and why he sprays and why he doesn’t,” she says. “You realise that most people get up, sit at a computer all day and if they press the wrong button, they just delete it. When you’re a farmer, you plant at the wrong time of year and tomorrow it washes away your whole crop.”

Glencross acknowledges that it is almost unprecedented for women to run arable farms. She struggles to name a single other example in the UK. She also notes wryly that men dominate all the farming conferences, saying: “They have a wife but it’s always the men who have written the book and given the presentation.”

With more role models, Glencross hopes things will change. “I’m not cool in any way, but I’m a reasonably young lady,” she says, laughing. “And so when people say: ‘What do you do? Oh, you’re a farmer. Maybe I could do that …’ So I’m hoping that it might become seen as quite a desirable, almost cool career.” A pause: “Even if it’s very much not cool.” 

[no-side-us]

Letters From Watson Liveblog - Jan. 13

The Musgrave Ritual, Part 3 of 3

"But, Fortunately, Musgrave, who had begun to appreciate the meaning of my proceedings, and who was now as excited as myself, took out his manuscript to check my calculation."

I have this mental image of the two of them running around the estate like little boys looking for hidden treasure, which in a way is what they're doing.

"In this space lay a large and heavy flagstone with a rusted iron ring in the centre to which a thick shepherd's-check muffler was attached."

The "muffler" refers to a sort of thick scarf, and the "shepherd's-check" refers to the sort of plaid pattern design on it.

...but his height, his dress, and his hair were all sufficient to show my client, when we had drawn the body up, that it was indeed his missing butler. He had been dead some days...

What a gruesome end, starving to death in a dark, damp, and dirty hole with nothing but your thoughts to occupy you. I think this is one of the more horrific things to happen in a Sherlock Holmes story.

"...this case the matter was simplified by Brunton's intelligence being quite first-rate, so that it was unnecessary to make any allowance for the personal equation, as the astronomers have dubbed it."

At least he'll be remembered as a pretty smart guy, all things considered. I mean credit where it's due, he was the first to figure out the ritual.

"What smouldering fire of vengeance had suddenly sprung into flame in this passionate Celtic woman's soul when she saw the man who had wronged her--wronged her, perhaps, far more than we suspected--in her power?"

But he was also a real "Don Juan", a womanizer, which was the ironic twist of fate that doomed him in the end.

I also find it funny how Brunton has been sort of compared to Holmes' throughout this story. Someone else pointed out how Brunton, like Holmes, also speaks multiple languages, plays different instruments, etc. And in today's letter Holmes even compliments his intelligence. But the stark difference between them was their attitudes towards women, which was what led to Brunton's demise.

"'What is it, then?' he gasped in astonishment. 'It is nothing less than the ancient crown of the kings of England.'"

Neat, artifacts of historical importance!

I have to imagine that even though nothing really exciting happened, this was one of Sherlock's first big cases, as in the one which put him on the map so to speak, based solely on the fact that he found such an important artifact.

"Of the woman nothing was ever heard, and the probability is that she got away out of England and carried herself and the memory of her crime to some land beyond the seas."

This is the second story so far where Sherlock surmises that the "killer," so to speak, escapes justice. In the Gloria Scott, Sherlock thought it likely that Beddoes killed Hudson and left the country. Now here, he guesses that Rachel did basically the same thing. I assume fleeing the country back then was much easier and more common than it is today for how often we've seen it done.

"In my next letter I look forward to telling you about the tale of ‘The Speckled Band’."

And I look forward to reading a mystery that Watson gets to be a part of. I found these early cases fun to read, but I'm eager to read a classic Sherlock Holmes mystery with the two of them doing it together.

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3

[ys405-mdxillustration3]

Chris Marker: San Soleil (Sunless) 1983

Two weeks ago I was put into a new group for a new task on Primary Research; to select a documentary film from the links which our lecture, Samantha sent us on email. After selecting a documentary film our groups will have to debate about it on group chat through Instagram and write about it in our blogs. The group I had to be put in were Emma, Valerie and Amy. Since we have been paired up we were allowed to watch the film together or independently before we could have a discussion about. I did not mind being put into groups, however I was not able to watch the film amongst my class peers as much I prefer doing it independently due to the fact I have assignments to catch up to as I lack behind time management.

Meanwhile I had a look through and watched some of the videos to see of which one would be useful and educative until I chose San Soleil (Sunless), directed by Chris Marker in 1983 filmed at various locations from Japan to Iceland to Africa which includes elements of global studies through society, beliefs, history, environment, culture and arts. It, also happens to be one of Samantha’s favourite films. I thought this would be something to do because I feel like I should learn more history and geography properly which I never learnt from school; and I am inspired between the cultural influence of Africa and Japan. Then I began to watch it; not properly because I left it on while I was doing a bit of research of the film and telling the others on group chat about it. Also I had work to catch up before the end of my deadline. They allowed me to watch the documentary independently, whereas others had the same problem as me. The next week after on an evening night I tried to watch the film properly but I was falling asleep due to being preoccupied with my other assignments throughout the week. Moving on to the week of the presence I am in now I managed to watch the film last night while I was working on my other assignment for Core Projects: FMP (Final Major Project), I did not see everything on screen but I have been listening through my earphones of what the narrator was saying. I learnt that the film was 105 minutes which was two hours long, thankfully it did not put me asleep again like last week. There were a few things I remember from the documentary film: a cat temple, people on the train, the narrator mentioning about young girls attempting to be married early, deliveries on the boat deck, Japanese horror films, a reference from Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo, two different festivals between Africa and Japan; and the narrator amongst her children in the camera from the beginning and end.

Today I have just set up two of my posts so I can try to write about the film and the fun activity I had this morning until I had a meeting with one of my study skills tutor, Caroline, in the afternoon. We, both had a recap on the brief amongst the video until I learnt that I am suppose to select a scene from the film and make statement about it. The questions are I am suppose answer were:

How was the community, society, culture and subculture were represented; was it positive or negative?

Was it ethical?

Did the Filmmaker have a relationship to this community already?

Does it appear they did enough “fieldwork” in advance of it being made?

How is the film written about and edited?

What year it made and how does this perhaps show how the social politics or even human rights has changed?

I knew I was suppose to write a statement about it but I was not sure if I should answer those questions from which Samantha sent us on email. It is because I have my own way of answering them different and I would be easier to explain. However, there is also the three questions from a book, How to write about Contemporary Art which was shown on the key text of the brief. The three questions are:

What is it? (What does it look like? How is it made? What happened?)

What might the work mean? (How does the form or event carry meaning?)

Why does this matter to the world at large? (What, finally, does this artwork or experience contribute—if anything—to the world? Or, to put it bluntly: so what?)

However I did mentioned of when the film was made, who directed it, where was it set and what the documentary was about. I will see if I can try to answer the questions from what Samantha sent us. If not I would rather stick to the other one which helped me to answer properly.

There was one of the scenes I liked was a cat temple in Tokyo, Japan. The temple was called Gotokuji Temple it looked very interesting as it had to be the first time to see a temple of cats. While it was being filmed it shows an old couple leaving items to their idols when they were praying until I learnt that the narrator mentioned about someone’s cat had gone missing and nobody knows of what has happened to it. Could the pet have been stolen, run away or dead? Since the visual imagery showed up after I saw the couple praying it reminded me of Hindu temples that truly have a way of praying and believing in many gods, whereas Japan is different. Mostly cats statures in temples. There are some rumours that tell the legends about the origins of cat charm. During the ancient period from Edo, an anachronistic lord from Hikone, passed by a temple and spotted a cat as it was summoning him to come inside. Then followed it as he went into the temple until a huge thunderstorm struck and the lord thanked the cat for saving his life instead of being left outside to be struck by thunder. He starting collecting many funds to restore and declare the temple as his own by family name for generations and named it, Gotokuji. As years passed on, people would come by to the temple to leave figurines of Maneki-neko as a sign for their of gratitude while praying. Also Maneki-neko was considered an infamous model; and mascot from Hikone City, Hiko-nyan. As a matter of fact cats are Japan’s populated and favourite animals, therefore I am into cats as much as people too. However I do have two cats from home; one is a Nebelung and the other is a Bombay, their names are Storm and Sheba.

Overall, listening through the documentary as I worked around late in the evening there were some things I was not aware of which relates to Samantha’s questions, despite of myself finding difficult to answer them about the community, society, culture and subculture being positive or negative between the areas from Africa and Japan, the filmmaker having a good relationship to the communities and everything. All I know is that the film was very ethical and well done in a way that has been filmed in many countries from around the mid-80s (1983) as we are learning some facts of philosophy, cultural arts and other minority backgrounds so we want the world to decolonise to show equal views through race, gender, religion and sexuality. What could have been better next time if I could just set up a timetable to do a 45 minutes studies on Contextual Studies, then move on to the other assignment for Core Projects after a 15 minute break so I can improve my time management which I usually do before the pandemic happened.

References

Accessed Date: 16/05/2021

Shoko, (2014), “Gotokuji Temple - Cats, Cats, Cats, and…Cats?”, Tofugu, 7 May. Available at:

https://www.tofugu.com/travel/gotokuji-temple/

Accessed Date: 15/05/2021

Williams, G, 2014, How to write about Contemporary Art: The three jobs of communicative art-writing, Thames & Hudson, Limited, pp 9-10

https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/mdx/detail.action?docID=5878108

Accessed Date: 14/05/2021

San Soleil (1983). (Online). Directed by Chris Marker. Japan, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, Iceland, Paris, and San Francisco. (N.D) Available on The Criterion Collection, Kanopy:

https://eur02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fmdx.kanopy.com%2Ffrontpage&data=04%7C01%7CYS405%40live.mdx.ac.uk%7C40d5db07d7ae46be094d08d90bba3f97%7C38e37b88a3a148cf9f056537427fed24%7C0%7C0%7C637553716825118115%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=fGV5EAVVkxDIQRVJBjEvMPVcc9icV2qgXsvKfVH2Fg4%3D&reserved=0

[alicepao13]

Hudson and Rex S02E08 - Game of Bones

LARP episodes should be boring. This episode wasn't boring to me. It kind of got burned with repetition but it's an okay episode.

"Are you wounded? I have my healing salts". I don't think this can be fixed with healing salts, buddy.

Obligatory "I hate that they've never done a Halloween episode" comment. Or Christmas. Or really anything aside from a Mardi Gras episode, which... You're not New Orleans or Rio de Janeiro, okay? Why would you choose Mardi Gras instead of Halloween, and for a creepy serial killer episode too? Never mind, I'll expand when we get to S04E15.

Rex: I'm doing my fucking job, pay attention!

We're already past the point where Charlie should wonder, "Why am I getting all these weird cases all of a sudden?"

Jesse is loving this one.

"Without getting into specifics about Half-things or Borgs" "Halflings and Orcs?" lmao

Hallelujah, he finally noticed that Rex is not looking for a bone to chew on.

"He's not a dog, he's my partner" is way less ridiculous than the one time we had a dog on NCIS that was in the Navy, and Gibbs was like, "That's not a dog. That's a Marine", all serious and stone-faced. Believe me. I mean, I get it, they are super helpful, and can often do what humans in law enforcement cannot (for example, bite suspects). But those lines...

Tell him! Also, I think S2 is the season where Charlie brought Sarah the most coffees. Unless it's S5. I've already missed some of these exchanges so I can't check.

Billie the Reaper from Supernatural!

I'm going to assume that the Lodbrock was something this show came up with.

Geeky excitement.

Classic "trying to hide ancient artifacts to avoid losing the land or to avoid stalling construction" case. This isn't sarcastic. I'm Greek, we find ancient stuff everywhere.

What even. Put that tongue inside.

Huh, they had the sword actually buried inside the pillar when Charlie broke it with the hammer. I mean, you can totally add it later.

me: Oh no, no, no, don't you dare raise that sword in the air!

I haven't watched Merlin's Apprentice. Is this a reference? Did they ever find the Excalibur there?

Yes, of course it's a great idea to parade a priceless ancient artifact for the purpose of causing shock and awe when arresting a killer.

This is such a Scooby Doo moment lol

Why didn't you guys dress up? Come on!

Thank you, Jesse. And Rex.

Nice song in the end.

[esquimaltnanaimo]

Royal Rescue Ch.5 - Reunion

"124… the heck? CHLOE?!"

The approaching engine screeched to a stop next to Ellie, slowly ambling forward alongside Chloe. They were another GP9, just like Chloe and 119, but they were numbered 135 and painted with a red circle logo and "SRY Rail Link", instead of Chloe's white stripes and E&N logo. As soon as the islander Geep saw them, she immediately forgot about the situation. "Ohmygosh, Sis!!" she chimed, smiling brightly. "Gosh, it's been--" "Sis, what the hell are you doing back here?" asked 135 suddenly, cutting Chloe off.

"…Jeez, nice welcome party," said Chloe, smiling at her sister engine jokingly. "A-are you friend or foe?" squeaked Ellie, from behind. 135 didn't hear her. "OK… sorry, sorry," said 135. "It's great to see you, Chlo, but… seriously, you gotta get back to the Island. How'd you even get here?" "Ferry," said Chloe simply. She took a breath to continue, but 135 cut her off again. "OK, obviously, ferry. That was a dumb question," said the SRY Geep. "But seriously, you gotta get out of here. You aren't registered to Southern anymore, and 119's gonna shove you around if you try to move from the shop." "119… Carla, Jules, she has a name," said Chloe, in an accusatory tone. "What's up with her, anyway?"

Jules…? thought Ellie.

135 sighed. "Chloe, that isn't Carla anymore." "She's a cyborg… isn't she?" asked Ellie, quietly. Chloe opened her mouth to speak, but 135 finally noticed Ellie before she could. She rolled backwards to see the smaller engine. "…Jeez, I didn't even notice the switcher," they said. "Sorry I just blew right past you. What's your name?" "H-hi," squeaked Ellie nervously. "I'm Ellie. I'm not even Canadian…" 135 chuckled. "Julie," she said with a smile, "but you can call me Jules. And don't sweat the non-Canadian thing, none of us are. Save for the switchers. And the SDs, but they're assholes." "Okay," replied Ellie quietly. She wasn't really sure what else to say, as Julie rolled forward again to continue talking to her sister.

"Anyway, Chloe," began Julie. "About 119. Long story short, just… things have gone totally off the rails here since you left in '04." "What… happened?" asked Chloe, worried. Duncan looked sad. "Presumably some real bad shit," he put in. Julie sighed and said, "OK, everyone, this is gonna get really heavy. You might want your handbrakes on." Ellie looked worried. "Sh-should I be human for this, Duncan?" "No… that might freak people out. And draw more attention." "Wait, what?" asked Julie, looking surprised. "…It's a joke," said Ellie, quickly. She gave a half-fake-sounding laugh, hoping she'd save face. "Yep. Inside joke," added Duncan.

Julie looked confused, but she decided to not ask questions. "…OK, whatever," she said, looking to her sister. "Anyway… Chloe, you remember our switchers, right? The 900's?" Ellie perked up at the word 'switcher', looking terrified. "Of… course I remember them," replied Chloe. "Well… we're down one." "Oh, gosh… Sold?" "No. Killed." "What??" Ellie's engine backfired. "Wh-what??" she squeaked. "Oh my gosh… Was there a derailment? Were they… What did I miss??" stammered Chloe. "Well, you saw the slug coupled to 119, didn't you?" asked Carla, serious. "The what…?"

Ellie froze, putting two and two together about the strange car coupled to the cyborg Geep. "Slug…? Diesel tender… Switcher trucks… switcher…" Julie stopped, and was about to ask if Ellie was alright before she was cut off by the sound of the little switcher throwing up. Both Geep sisters winced. "Jeez… Are you OK?" Julie finally asked, after a moment. Ellie was still recovering, so Duncan stepped in. "She's… from preservation. We're totally out of the loop…" he explained, rubbing Ellie's side as dark brown engine oil spread across her pilot. Julie felt awful. "…Yikes, I'm sorry. I should've warned you." "It's… ugh." croaked Ellie, tears rolling down her face. "That's so inhumane!" she cried, sobbing. "That poor engine… Oh, Watty Piper, if I ever get out of here, I'm going to pray every Sunday like a good little diesel…" "…Don't mind her," said Duncan, apologetically. "She's still pretty young minded." Julie cracked a small smile at Ellie's praying, then sighed. "It's OK," she said.

Duncan proceeded to look for some shop towels to clean the oil off of Ellie's pilot, while Carla continued her explanation to her sister.

"So…" began Chloe, quietly. "Who was it…? The… slug." "Tamara," replied Julie. "The one the managers bought surplus from the pulp mill in Squamish." "Great rails above… That's so awful." Duncan had found some towels, and climbed back up onto Ellie's front platform. "I'm sorry for your loss, Julie," he said. "Thanks," replied the SRY engine. "We're pretty much used to it at this point, but… thanks." Ellie was repeating something quietly to herself, while Duncan cleaned up the mess on her pilot. "Still… it's fucked up," he said. "I'm afraid it… gets worse, actually." replied Julie. "How could it possibly get worse?" asked Chloe, in disbelief. "Don't say that," said Ellie, quietly. "When you say that, it gets even more worse."

Julie went on. "Well… You guys saw 119. Before Carla was sent off for her… rebuild, I guess, she was derated to a master engine." "Master engine?" asked Chloe. "It means…" began Julie, sighing. "It means she's perma-coupled to the slug out there, and half her generator's energy goes to the slug's traction motors. It's called 'master and slave' by the railway. 119's the master, and the slug is the slave." Chloe recoiled in horror. "That's disgusting!! What an awful name… so half her power's getting sucked off by… Tamara's body?" "Basically." Chloe was horrified. "I'm… at a loss for words," she said. Ellie sobbed. "…If it makes you feel any better," said Julie, "Carla doesn't feel it. She's gone." "Oh, right… the rebuild…" "Yeah. It's why we call that thing 119 instead of our sister's name." "R-right…"

"Anyway, speaking of… Before Carla got sent away, when she first got mated to the slug, she was still herself," continued Julie. Chloe looked worried. "And…?" "Well… She started complaining about hearing voices, and… how she couldn't get the slug to pull all the time, and how she didn't want to be a master, so…" As Julie trailed off, the only sound was Ellie retching again. Duncan rubbed the side of the little switcher's hood, trying to help her feel better. Chloe and her sister looked at each other, then back at her. "…I know I asked before, but are you OK?" asked Julie, concerned. "I'm sorry… this is just so gross to me," said Ellie weakly. "And she heard a voice of the fallen… that's…" she trailed off, shivering in fear and horror. "That's what the rest of us thought, anyway," said Julie, sighing. "We never really got a chance to find out for sure, before… well…" Chloe shuddered, remembering what Jordan had told her before she left the island with Ellie. "Her rebuild... the ECO program?” "Yup." said Julie simply.

The three engines were silent. 119 came into view again, continuing to shunt freight cars in the yard robotically, with the slug engine that used to be Tamara coupled to its rear.

Chloe looked at 119's face. She looked at the blush marks on its cheeks just like her own, the once-bright, unblinking eyes, the number boards, the paint patch over where "CARLA" used to be written… and remembered.

She remembered back before she moved to the Island, when she still belonged to SRY. She remembered how often she would team up with Carla, and how well they worked as a team on light transfers and industry runs.

She remembered Montana, the day all the Rail Link engines got their five-chime horns, and how Carla picked the wrong one just because she liked the sound better.

She remembered when she was still in Burlington Northern green, sitting nervously in the repair shop as her high short hood was chopped down, with Carla being there through the whole process to comfort her.

She remembered when she met Carla for the first time, both sisters fresh from the factory, coupled face to face as helpers on a Northern Pacific heavy freight train.

"Sis…"

"…Yeah?" said Julie, looking at Chloe, who was silently watching 119. "…I'm sorry I left." Julie recoiled. "Don't you dare," she scolded. "You're E&N now, you belong there. And it wasn't your choice, either way." "Still," began Chloe, but she trailed off. "Think about it, Chlo," cut in Duncan. "What if it was you who got rebuilt like 119?" Chloe blinked. "I'd… rather not." "Duncan!" cried Ellie, starting to tear up again. "Don't say that…" "Yeah, that wasn't cool to bring up," agreed Julie. Duncan felt awful, and apologized, while Chloe was silent again. She was thinking about a lot of things at once. "I miss home," said Ellie suddenly, quietly. "I just wanna save Gloria and get back home to where I can't get turned into a slug, or a re-power, or… put in a museum…" "Save-- what?" asked Julie. She looked to Chloe. "OK, let's drop the horrific explanations--" "Please," replied her twin. "…Yeah, let's do that. What's going on? Save Gloria?" Chloe looked at her sister, serious. "It's why I came back," she said, sounding determined as she remembered her and Ellie's mission. "We're going to save an engine." Ellie perked up. "Gloria, the last running Royal Hudson," she added. Julie blinked, and immediately looked doubtful. "You're joking, right? She's all the way in Squamish." "We're not kidding," chided Duncan. "And… how in the hell do you plan to do that, exactly? You'd have to go through the city, and there's at least three yards between here and the outskirts!" "Illusions," said Ellie, simply. And with that, she shut her eyes and focused, just as Julie looked back to ask her what she meant. Her eyes met not a small bright-blue switcher, but an even smaller, black, ancient-looking steam engine.

Julie's jaw almost hit her pilot. Chloe giggled as Ellie quickly changed back, and Duncan breathed a silent sigh of relief about how Ellie could still focus and hold an illusion spell even when she was distressed. After a moment of speechlessness on Julie's part, Chloe began to explain briefly. "Duncan gave us magic crystals that we can use to disguise ourselves as different engines," she said. "Like, ones that wouldn't get caught." "And, record for most words I've never heard together in a sentence, broken," deadpanned Julie. "No words." Chloe couldn't help but giggle some more. "By the way!" added Ellie, feeling a lot better now that they had changed subject. "You know the joke I made about turning human earlier?" "…It wasn't a joke, was it-" began Julie, but she was cut off by the switcher, who now stood behind Chloe as a short, blonde, soft-looking human girl, wearing a blue jersey emblazoned with a large white "2", a pair of dusty jeans, and heavy-duty work boots. "It wasn't a joke!" she chimed with a big smile, doing a small 'ta-da' pose between the rails.

Julie now truly had no words. "I know, right?" laughed Chloe, again seeing her sister's expression. "OK, so… you have magic illusions and transformation powers now, OK. I'm guessing you can do the same stuff, huh Chloe?" "Yup! I'm not as good at it yet, but I can do it!" replied Chloe, shutting her eyes and preparing to use her crystal as well. Julie made a strange sound. "N-no, that's OK! I'm gonna save the questions, that's enough weirdness for one lifetime. Day. I mean day." "…You OK, sis?" "Yeah, fine, just… Suddenly my sister and her new friend-" "Cousin!" corrected Ellie cheerfully. "…Cousin have magical transformation powers," said Julie. "It's weird, and it's a lot to process. And on top of that, you're going to rescue a steam engine? What're you even rescuing her from?" "Becoming stationary," explained Duncan, standing next to Ellie. "Like, no steam, ever again." "Oh god, they're de-comming her?" asked Julie, gaining a look of fright. "Isn't she in pretty much perfect condition?" "It's what she said in her letter to Jordan…" said Chloe, sadly. "Yeah. Perfect shape or not, it's what the museum people want to do," said Duncan. "But we're gonna… 'borrow' Gloria. Forever. Like, forever-forever, so they can't do it," added Ellie, in a determined tone. Julie looked thoughtful. She hadn't thought her sister and the newcomers were serious at first. "…Well, jeez. Crisis all of a sudden," she said. She felt bad for doubting her sister, but decided to move on rather than apologize. "Do you guys need some help?" she continued. "I can round up the others, and we might be able to get you across town on a transfer or something…" "Wait. You guys still do the Downtown run?" asked Chloe, surprised. "I thought that ended before I left." "It started back up after CN reopened the Burrard Inlet line. We run stacks to Port Metro and back here now." Chloe looked confused. "…Stacks? Containers? Gosh, things have changed." Julie laughed. "It has been a while since you've been here, huh?" she teased. "Yeah, we started running stack trains. Trading tonnage with CP and CN, mostly." "Ahh, gotcha," said Chloe. "Well… Gosh, if you could get us across the city on one of those, it'd make the first part of our trip a whole lot easier." "Well, I'll talk to the others and see what we can do," said Julie. She looked out of the shed, spying 119 again. She frowned, then looked back to her non-rebuilt sister. "Sis, Ellie, Duncan, you three stay here, okay?" She was met with agreement from all three other parties. "Like, seriously, don't bother leaving. 119's still out there, it'll just come and shove you right back in if you even try to turn a wheel. I'll see if someone else can come and see you, and maybe keep watch." "You're the best, Jules… Thanks," said Chloe. "'Course, sis," replied Julie, as she started to roll forward out of the shop building. She stopped short and looked back at her sister. "Oh, and…" "Yeah?" The mainland Geep smiled. "Good to see you again, Chlo. Seriously, it is." The island Geep smiled right back. "Same to you, Jules… I'm glad you're doing OK." "That's a word for it," chuckled Julie, as she revved up her engine and rolled away, into the yard.

Chloe sighed as her sister left, smiling to herself. Ellie, on the other hand, was remembering the conversation at length and looked distraught. "…I need marshmallows," she said, quietly, and Duncan began to rifle through his messenger bag. Ellie's stomach gurgled after a moment, prompting her to look worried. "Or… m-maybe not," she said, and Duncan stopped. The comparatively enormous GP9 looked back at the human couple. "You okay, you two?" she asked, concerned. "I'm shocked, honestly," said Duncan. He didn't show it, but he was still trying to process all he'd seen and heard. Ellie, meanwhile, approached Duncan and pulled out a bright blue The Little Engine that Could plush from his messenger bag. Hugging it closely, she quickly, wordlessly climbed up onto Chloe's pilot. "Ellie? What are you…" began Chloe, surprised, as her cousin laid down on the cold metal and curled up into a ball in front of her face, shaking like a leaf.

The big Geep sighed gently, unable to really do anything to comfort her cousin. Fortunately, Duncan was on the scene and climbed up after his girlfriend, sitting next to her and gently stroking her back.

Silence reigned once more, for what felt like a long time.

--

(mun’s note: i moved chloe’s memory lane trip to this chapter! it was more fitting here, i thought. sorry this took so long, btw! it was a lot of stuff to edit XD)

[hvdscns]

He grinned at the younger mentor, holding up his mini me with pride, "It's me! Why didn't I see these when they were new?" he sighed in wonder, he might've liked these, tiny dagger aside. It was cute, harmless. Unoffensive, almost. He sat down beside Link, before pretending to look hurt at her ancient commenting, "What are you saying ancient?" he replied. "I found it in a shop, as I was shopping."

Link looked up from her ipad, where she had a spreadsheet of people who she’d secured money from and the stipulations on when she could use it. “just before the finale, nano only, 200 dollars” from the latest capitolite. if he made it, she’d call the phone number up. he’d make it, he had to.

the voice had her looking up, eyes focused on the man and then the bobblehead. “it’s you.” she said, smiling slowly. it was funny, light, unimportant. she liked it. “where did you even find one of those? it looks ancient.”

[npmeanderingway]

Beset by raccoons, tick skittishness, and escape from the Bible Belt!

I am going to try and post more often as these long posts are probably boring, sorry! (Though I doubt anyone reads these anymore- partly due to tumblrs awful interface and partly due to my rambley-ness).

Story time- laid down to sleep in my tent in a fairly secluded area in a state park. Suddenly hear a large dog sniffing around- where did that come from? And then a very-non-dog paw is pushed against my tent. I yell, sit up, and whatever it was runs away. I can still hear things moving around nearby and inspection of my tent shows four little claw holes. Hmm.. I figure probably raccoon but so weird that their sniffing noises are so very loud.

I wait a minute or two and sure enough, two raccoons come out of the undergrowth and bee line for my tent again. They should not be so bold! Someone has obviously been feeding them. I have no food in my tent but I do have toiletries (toothpaste and deodarent, etc). I yell at them to scare them off and lay back down. They come back AGAIN. Tenacious buggers.

So I packed up and put everything in my car and slept in it for the night. In my car I actually do have food and had to have the windows rolled down so I didn't sweat myself a puddle, so the raccoons came back. They pawed around and climbed on my car at least three times that they woke me up for. Persistent bastardos!

Hah, I can now say I have likely become a strong voiced advocate for DONT FEED WILDLIFE!

Tick skittishness :(

Found a very large dog tick crawling on my leg whilst relaxing at a picnic table in Missouri. Mentioned it to a ranger and he said they've had more tick reports this year than in the last 3 to 4 combined! Yeesh

That coupled with a woman I met at Zion, who was from Maine, telling me the tick density was so high this year their high school canceled their senior outting for the first time in over two decades made me go down a rabbit hole of tick news and stats. This year is bad! 1/2 of ticks collected in the Hudson Valley carried Lyme disease and in one county (Orange County) 8 out of 10 ticks were carriers. Tick densities (the number of ticks found in a given area they raked nets through) are waaay up and some places are recommending being covered head to toe before hiking. All natural areas in New England recommend performing full tick searches of yourself after all hikes. That sounds very uncomfortable and/or stressful. I am debating whether Acadia can be relaxing with those prohibitions in mind. :( I have a few days to decided but I may postpone Acadia until I can come back during non-prime-tick-season.

Escape from the Bible Belt! Hahaha I am so glad to be in Ohio. Driving through the small rural towns feels like I am in upstate New York already. Greenery, winding roads, small ancient cemeteries, and all towns seem to have been built from the same starting mold. In the center of each is usually a very large roundabout that's big enough to encompass a quarter to half acre of land. On that plot of land are several tall trees, a manicured lawn, and either a gazebo or a war memorial obelisk or both. It occurs everywhere and has a distinct New England rural flair.

Driving through and stopping in the Bible Belt gave new meaning to the term. Technically I grew up within it (I think?) but we never had declarations of "Fetal Life Sanctuary County" (what does that sanctimonious BS even mean), and while every twentieth billboard might have had some religious element, literally every third billboard I passed was some anti-abortion rant or church/jesus saves/you'll burn advertisement. Ohio is a nice change of pace from that, whew.

I'm continuing to move eastward and will soon be all the way to New York. That is crazy! I've almost driven across the US.

[nathaniacolver]

sidon!!!!!!! bro got purifying powers now

bruh idk where toto lake is .......maybe down the waterfall??

bruh screw the zora rn imma go explore akkala actually

hudson construction site!!!!!

BRO the steering thing makes everything so much easier oh my goodness the devs said "let's make this easy on them and hard on us"

beep beep the bus is coming through!!!

BRO IT'S KOLTIN okay hold on a sec while i go deal some drugs

got the moblin mask now, exciting, AND some mystic armor!!!

(can you get negative rupees in this game?????........hm/mmm)

gonna get the tower.......in just a sec.......there's a shrine

BRO this shrine is so hard. i've died like 10 times

okay so i've resorted to just hiding behind the wall so the constructs can't see me, and then just letting the homing constructs do their thing. so far so good

iOH frick the constructs booted them off the side

idk they are still dealing damage so idk

it's been like 5 whole minutes but i am not letting naked link die again

wait did they flip over on their own????? bruh

FINALLY I'M EDONEEE

CANNON SHIELD LET'S GOOOOO

oh okay so another stable. nice. oh yeah someone gave me a sleepover card!!!!! so cute of her

bro i just chucked this cucco into the well and the other one laid an egg. idk what that means about mating rituals but whatever

speaking of.........are cucco genderless??? asexual?????? bruh

one shot the thing????? girl............okay i'll come back later

cucco prophetess????? okay go off queen

bro WHAT why can't i let tulin help me

okay getting to the top of the stable took me like 10 tries and the logs took me 1. what does that mean

YIGA CLAN CUCCO LOLLLLLLLLLLL BRO. BRO.

not penn being like "i didn't think cuccos could talk.........(they are lower-intelligence aves)"

okay let me actually go get the tower for real now

floating over to sky islands.......as per usual .........

oop flux construct IIs are a bittttt harder than Is. let's get that old map though

bro i need to get all the vows asap so that they all help me fight bc having ghost warriors on your side is op and tulin keeps critting this construct

YO I JUST CAUGHT ONE OF THE STAR FRAGMENTS THAT DIVE WITH YOU FEOM THE SKY LET'S GOOOOOOOOOO

another day another shrine (i think that's literally the rate that i do them in in-game)

oh so THAY'S what sneakstrike is. wow learned something new....okay now I can put these yiga swords to good use

shooting a brightbloom into the chasm and chasing after it

FKAJFKSJFWJFKKEJF FRICJJJJJKKKKKK BRO THERE'S A MASSIVE FROG THING IN AJKALA CHASM DO NOT FO IN THERE I REPAT DO NOT GO IN THERE

octorok lake......what is this rock puke in the middle .....

haha meant rock pile but that's fine too

what is the point of making the fight music play when wolves are around? they don't even attack you really....

me meeting up at every stable with penn........he's luckily he's a rito that flies or else i'd be suspicious as to how he always is there before me

*sighs* yes.........i'll go fight the monsters on that dreaded spiral thing

MALANYA'S A BOY NOW????? WAIT WAS HE ALWAYS??????

Ohhhhhhhh different beach......oh bruh so i have to go on those pirate ships????

JENGA SHRINE?????????

bro so i got the 2 chests and then i just made the Jenga tower slightly topple and i just caught the ball with ultrahand.

wait lol you didn't even have to Jenga it.......lol

bro this dude's name is "traveler???" ......yeah i don't believe that

WAIT.........frog statues.........

BRO DID THE YIGA CLAN TAKE OFER THE ANCIENT TECH LAB??????

okay lemma save real quick

wait they were so easy to beat up with my 36 damage captain III spear......🙈🙈

but does this REALLY mean i'm allowed to go inside now.....

THERE'S A CIVILIAN IMPRISONED HERE????? konba baby i'll make sure nothing happens to you

ooh traveling medallion???? okay gotta report back to robbie

i finally saw that pic of link that everyone's been posting lol

now tell me why i gotta use ascend in this tower bc they blocked off the stairs.....

is this frog looking somewhere important

bro okay so if i return can i fight the yiga again????

why is this fairy- oh it's the male malanya

BRO YOU JNOW HOW MANY TIMES BEEDLE EAS SERLING ENDURA CARROTS AND I NEEVR BOUGHT ONE?????

tried to float up to the upper maze but my time rune was not long enough i guess :/

Boujee!!!! show me the way

LOL I MEANT BLUPEE XD

BRO THERE WAS ANOTHERRRRR BLACKKKKKK HORRIBLIN ARE YOU SERIOUS? bro i almost peed my pants QUICK EAT SOMETHINF and a blue one.....this must be a GOOD good cave

BRO THE LIKE LIKE JUST ATE TULIN?????!!!??!?!???!? ARE YOU OKAY BUD

A BLACK HINIX????????? OH BRO NOT RIGHT NOW NOT RIGHT NOW I'LL COME BACK AT THE END OF THE CAVE SHEESH

okay again my construct III spear took care of the hinox so easy

DIAMONDS HAVE 25 FUSE ATTACK POWER?????

dang this cave is LONG it went all the way to the island

BRO NOT GLOOM HANDS NOPE. UEETING MYSELF DOWN THE HOLE

bro this cave is so lonnggggggggggg gotta go do the shrine now

oh nvm console is low battery. okay gonna go watch some cleaning vids for a bit

need to live tweet my playing of totk but don't wanna be annoying on my irl so i'll just do it here. this is the first bit:

BEWARE: TOTK SPOILERS BELOW

"i know i'll be ok with you link" okay they are IN LOVE

WHERE IS LINK IN THE CUTSCENE. THEY HAVE TO SHOW HIM IN THE NEXT 10 SECONDS OR I WILL FRET

ZONAI????!!?!!?!??!?!?! (Listen i forgot the gameplay trailer)

me walking at a respectable pace as to not leave zelda's side

BABE THERE'S TOO MUCH MALICE HERE WHY ARE WE STILL GOING

just talked to zelda and she was like "i'm so excited!!!!" GIRL DO YOU NOT HAVE AN OUNCE OF SELF-PRESERVATION

swinging the sword swinging the sword

WAIT WHY DO I HAVE 30 HEARTS WHYYYYYYY DO I HAVE 30 HEARTS

THEY JUST ADDED AN INSTRUMENT OR TWO OH FRICK AND IT'S GETTING LOUDER oh i already love the sound engineering

GLOWY SPIRAL????

DON'T PICK UP THE TEAR BABY oh frick oh frick

OH THAT'S WHY I HAD 30. FOR THE DRAMA

CAN'T LOOK AT MY TYPING I'M WATCHING THE CHTSCENE

OH FRICK IT JUST SHATTERED OH FRICK

gamer lean on x games mode rn

mans said screw it i'm out. fly you fools

BRO I WAS TYPING THE ABOVE WHEN HE LUNGED AND I GOT SO NERVOUS THAT I'D HAVE TO FIGHT FJSKDKJSJDAHHDLADG THE JOYCONS ARE FLOPPING AROUNS ON MY ARMS

THAT TEAR BETTER PROTECT HER I HOPE THAT'S WHAT THAT GLOWY YELLOW WAS

BRO WHAT. THE BLUE GLOWING IS GOOD. this is so anakin skywalker of him btw

baby don't you worry i'm gonna make link level up so fast so he can come and get you

oop naked link again AND HIS SHORTS ARE SHORTER????

nice mani link

A MAN'S VOICE???????? WHO IS IT WHY DOES EVERYONE KNOW THEIR NAMES

okay so The Voice just gives him an arm. okay

the malice or whatever stopping just at the triforce is Symbolic, i think

is it really a master sword or is it a master Dagger

i rly be taking screenshots of everything like i'm a tourist

okay green hand thing go off!!! oop give it a high five and it turns blue and goes behind you as a save point

*taking notes* okay cogs are cogging.......gears are gearing..........

now why the frick did it have me dive like that. what was The Reason

i Forgor that link can tread water indefinitely. swimming king

not me searching every nook and cranny like there's gonna be secrets in this Cave

PANTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ARCHAIC PANTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

wait i put them on and now he looks like a gladiator.......cardboard skirt & Jesus sandals........ok shirtless king

oop just noticed his hair animations & the layers are CRAZY but it lookin good

wait so they was underground......and now in the sky...................i have Theories

they said aerial view shot once again but i mean AERIAL

ope no climbing, you're already too high in the sky

the lighting looks SO GOOD!

it's so silent up here i love it.

the MUSIC AHHHH

WAIT EVERYTHING'S AN ISLAND???? OH WE WAY THE FRICK UP IN THE SKY LINK. HOW CAN YOU BREATHE THAT THIN AIR

this game is making me fall In Love. with Silence

TREE BRANCH YES THE WORLD IS HEALING

apples. i could Cry

is that a broom?????

wait so the soldiers are bad and the stewards are good. it's just like real life!

why do i have the feeling that this is a /different/ princess zelda that left this to him.......oh nvm it's just the purah pad. what happened to the sheikah slate???

is link gonna look at pics on it and get emo

wait so. garden of time (ok Christianity reference). so zelda has lived through some trash already and is like poor link in the past. let's give him this

aw it's lonely :(

YES WE'RE GETTING ZELDA RIGHT AWAY I COULD CRY

ooh the purah pad looks slick (i'm so sorry but why does that sound like a tampon brand LIKEEEEE)

high five!!! oh wait high fives have OTHER FUNCTIONS???!?!

now why did the bridge have to do all that fancy stuff. (ik it's for stability or whatever don't @ me engineers)l

just smashed some pots. link's Primeval Urge

ok so linear path for Diving. got it.

that's a hot-footed frog.......................i could cry. i AM crying

picked up a rock. now i just have to see some Chickens

there are Grates in the ground and you can peek below. idk why i like that so much.

i am hunting these ostriches like i might die

THAT GUY SNUCK UP ON ME SO SILENTLY. I DECIDED I HATE FLOATING MACHINE ENEMIES (don't worry i was fine)

why did i try to light a frog on fire

[thoughts-in-a-moon-crater]

(this whole ordeal got me analyzing things shot by shot whenever possible now... so as i'm rewatching things,)

9. in TSiP, there's a TON of light purple/lilac overlays anytime there's john and sherlock. reminds me of the theme colour for john and mary's wedding in TSo3. seems to me the colour of wedding/reunion/celebration has been established and laid bare in the first episode of john/sherlock first meeting... mrs hudson wore a purple dress top like the bridesmaids when she welcomes the two the first time. what could this be suggesting? :)

10. in TBB sherlock accesses john's laptop to use the email (although he has his own laptop and phone... wonder why he actually uses john's laptop). anyway, john quickly snatches back his laptop while sherlock is in the middle of typing an email, which means he has not logged out, which means unless sherlock 'logs out of all devices' through his laptop/phone/other device, john would have access to his emails (and in this modern day, that also means ALL connected accounts). remember, earlier sherlock also (very gently and sweetly, tho i may be biased) let john to use his card for shopping, which john takes out of sherlock's wallet himself. maybeeee it's me but it seems to me by the SECOND episode sherlock and john have practically established trust and laid bare their vulnerability (at least very much for sherlock but not so much for john as sherlock actually goes out on his own way to pry into john's privacy). then we have the 'he's my friend/colleague' at the bank and 'that (a date) was what i was suggesting'. i find this funny because earlier in TSiP sherlock pretty much reads that john is flirting with him with his 'married to my work' comment but then afterwards he consistently tries to get closer almost flirting (and attached) to john and then sulks his way out in TGG when he has a little 'domestic' with john over the solar system or something (which is also absurd in my view because as much as sherlock doesn't care about the solar system, his laptop wallpaper as he googles the ancient vases IS A BLUE-RED GRADIENT OF A GALAXY, ALMOST AS IF JOHN (who is always associated with blue-red for some reason even on his wedding flower brooches....) IS SHERLOCK'S UNIVERSE. HUH). maybe when i have the energy i'll edit this out with snapshots but i just need to point out how sherlock's blue night pajama dress thingy(?) is slightly off his left shoulder when he gets up from the couch to see john leaving from the window... and THEN by the end of the episode we have a 'you... ripping my clothes off in a darkened swimming pool people might talk' pose....... okay what a parallel here. but sherlock doesn't care what people think, except what john thinks. whaaat is going onnnnn

also if i could give some emotional context... i am VERY open about stuff like my mental health etc but when one of my colleagues offered to share with me a subscription account, i haven't gotten back to them and probably never will because that feels too vulnerable to me and i am not ready to be attached that way with someone i don't trust enough to accept me for what i am, genuinely, no matter how much they said they will, not without specifics. that's how unguarded yet guarded i am and so i relate to both john and sherlock's personal level of privacy

11. also, i've always noticed this red thread sewn on the upper left side of sherlock's coat. what i've heard so far (at least from watching anime), a red string sorts of symbolizes a soulmate connection. and that string is placed near his heart? i wonder if there's something worth looking into this one, still.

12. also in TSiB,

john: (after obviously adjusting his pose to get a better angle at sherlock's crotch... in Queen's...) are you wearing any pants?

sherlock: no

john: okay

sherlock: ...

john: ...

sherlock and john: (catches each other's eye contact and bursts out laughing, john never asking sherlock to put his pants on, just a "sherlock forgot his pants" remark)

also john about irene being naked in front of sherlock in her own home: OH GOD ABOVE WTH PUT SOMETHING ON PLEASE HERE'S A NAPKIN

13. in TLD, sherlock says he has planted the recording device into john's stick for 3 weeks now. wonder if the recorder has some sort of a wireless transfer ability that would allow sherlock to basically eavesdrop him throughout the 3 weeks (which is also about a month according to mary - but for john it's "ages" :p). if the recorder does, then sherlock would've known which warehouse john's headed, and might... have been wanting to see john actually? but then it seems like between the revelation of the location and when john arrives there it doesn't seem like there's enough time for sherlock to build up 'shezza', or does he? another thing would be made easier (tho is already possible since sherlock can always deduce things away, especially when he knows john quite intimately) is all his plans 2 weeks prior to the grand entrance at the 'therapist's' place. just a fun thought!

so... johnlock.

my conclusion that is built (and is still building on) a mishmash of theories i've been reading (thanks tjlc-iers) is pretty simple. take note that i'm competently Bad at social cues and subtexts, due to neglect as a child or being autistic - one could wonder, but the point remains. anyway, i've taken interest in the literary analysis somehow (not complaining) and here's what i've got and getting behind so far, without claiming any of this to be the absolute truth:

1. johnlock is real, but they're taking it slow. i love me some slow burns and mutual pining so i'll forgive moffatiss for the agony they're putting me through. it's a cross i'll have to bear

2. mrs hudson is an unrepentant shipper

3. so is mary. i think mary is somewhat an anti-hero, a lil villainous but only coz she's a badass. i think she truly does love john but she also knows that john also loves sherlock, and is fond of teasing john about it. i think mary chooses to take the bullet for sherlock NOT because she wants john to hate him, but because she was prepared (with the video and all) and has got nothing to lose. the video serves as a great evidence to me that mary loves john and wants him to be happy, happier than their married life, and she knows john can have that with sherlock. "i know what you could become" sounds to me what a johnlock shipper would say

4. season 4 wasn't terrible or beyond repair, but it IS beyond me. it's a breakthrough, probably EMP, it was draggy at first and very hard to follow with all the moving out of focus thingy going on throughout the season, it's not taken the usual fast-paced beat for the most part (at least it doesn't feel that way to me). i've only watched it once though, i still don't have the courage to sit through it all again. the emotional mess.

5. i believe in sherlock's second 'i love you' to be about him noticing john's reflection on the black screen of the countdown timer

6. and please can we talk more about the canonly mentioned: that john and sherlock do love each other 'the most in this world', tho they always clump that statement together with another person (i.e. mary), probably just to make it less obvious and focused??

7. i googled the baker street flat's front and it doesn't seem that the windows of the attic (probably where the never-shown john's room is) are similar to that of attic-like room where sherlock meets ella to figure out what to 'do' with john, but isn't it intriguing that out of ALL possible settings for a therapy room, this one sherlock's in resembles an attic?? someone's who's better at subtexts please figure this out for me