#messages from Dad

[notbecauseofvictories]

I'm rewatching leverage out of nostalgia and some other emotion I haven't figured out yet, and I do think there's a story in "Maggie Ford Collins deals with having the most unhinged ex in her suburban book group, learns to hotwire a car, and gets her groove back, not in that particular order."

[doriana-gray-games]

My father wanted me to send this to you all

He said you needed more dad jokes.

He also wants to draw or smth for you all ❤️🥹

♥️🫖🌹 so, it’s not just Mrs Hudson that is cheering yall on 🥰

[jaguarys]

Anyways. The Sith are basically a parallel to any real conspiracy theory to me. The way that it warps your brain, recontextualizes every single part of your life, how it takes pain and twists into a weapon, everything. The way it preys on vulnerable people and gives them a reason for their suffering. The way it isolates. All of it is conspiracy theory (magic edition) to me. I'm normal about SW and sociology

[calypsolemon]

actually this drives me so crazy. can we think about what it means for a second that Lloyd is actually pretty damn hesitant to say he wants to see his father again? In comparison to Harumi, who enthusiastically declares that she'd do anything to see her parents again. I don't think thats a lie on her part - after all, this whole enterprise is essentially so she can resurrect someone she sees as a suitable parental figure. And later on, she's incredibly confident that one of her main similarities to Lloyd is that Lloyd is desperate to see his father again

Like she's not just referring to the love thing here, she's referring to the fact that she just stated literally 1 episode ago that she desperately desires to see her lost family again.

But Lloyd just doesn't really express that same confidence in desiring to see him again. And like, while you can take his response to Harumi's original question as mostly agreeing, to me it reads more like a measured non-answer. He talks about the relationship being unusual. He talks about missing him. He talks about being scared of what the SOG will bring back if they succeed.

Nothing in there is an affirmative that he actually WANTS to see his dad again, or that he would bring back his dad back himself if he had the chance. Food for thought.

[babymorte]

people expect you to stay around while they always put you last

[snarfflarf]

Asking BG3 characters to pick you up pads: Round 2

[corvidaedream]

its so funny the way my aunt talks about family to me sometimes, like "oh i was up at my brother's place in new hampshire last weekend, and i was talking to my sister-in-law amy"

like shes telling a friend or a colleague who is unfamiliar w these people

like yeah?? my parents' house? i know them, im quite familiar with your sister-in-law.

[bucephaly]

It's kinda shocking to me how few people seem to know how prevalent the 'my great grandmother was cherokee' myth is and how it's almost never actually true, especially when it comes with things like 'never signed up' or 'fell off the trail' or 'courthouse burned down destorying the documentation' etc etc.

People just don't even seem to know the history like.. when the Trail happened. My great great great grandfather was 2 years old during Removal in 1838, so peoples 'my great grandmother hid in the mountains!' is so clearly wrong. And we have rolls. From before and after removal, rolls done by cherokee nation and others by the government, rolls that were not stored in one random flammable courthouse. It's not difficult to find the actual evidence of ancestry.

And just.. there are lots of ways those family stories get started. It was a practice during the confederacy to claim cherokee ancestry to show one's family had 'deep roots in the south' that they were there before the cherokee were removed. Many people pretended to be cherokee and applied for the Guion-Miller payout just to try to steal money meant for cherokees - 2/3rds of the applicants were denied for having 0 proof of actual cherokee ancestry. [We even see lawyers advertising signing up for the Miller roll just to try to get free money.] And the myth even started in some families in the cherokee land lotteries, where the land stolen from us was raffled off, including the house and everything that was left behind when the cherokees were removed. We have seen people whose families just take these things stolen from the cherokee family and adopt them into their own family story, saying that they were cherokee themselves.

If you had some family story about being cherokee and you wanna have proof one way or the other, check out this Facebook group run by expert cherokee genealogists that do research for free. Just please read the rules fully and respect the researchers. They run thousands of people's ancestries a year and their average is only around 0.7% of lines they run actually end up having true cherokee ancestry.

[unicornachos2]

THE DEEP YEARNING. THE SHEER AMOUNT OF SPURNED LOVER IN THESE PAGES. Oh Fitz

[mxwhore]

[trans-ralsei]

okay i can't find that post any more

but i worry about the trans girls who have gaping holes where their personalities should be.

it takes a lot of effort for a person to sustain your continued spiritual and psychological existence. i've met these trans girls, and i've tried to help (or I think I've tried to help). but the deadliest part of this is that to build yourself up brick by brick requires you to fight against the currents that want you dead, that want you to be the empty husk of a human being.

that's why the whole please stay alive thing is such a resonating statement; you need to stay alive for your own sake.

in the home city that means trying to find your own shelter when rent can easily cost you a third of your wage and landlords fucking suck. that means looking for a job that won't fucking deadname or misgender you, that you can tolerate. that means surviving. that means leaving clingy and transphobic family behind and uprooting what the home city believes should be your entire support system. that means trying to live, to get to the point where you can get hormone therapy, hair removal, bottom surgery.

i can't promise that things will get better. but if you know someone like that. if you know a trans girl like that. please. keep them alive. and help them fight. help them be themselves, and grow and bloom again.

we don't have much in the home city, but there are resources. places. things that we are doing and building so that we don't lose people. allies that are fighting alongside us.

because we will win. and when we win, i hope we don't have to mourn.

[sunb0ts]

GOT THE JOB!!!!!!!!!!!!! 💥💥

[nots0nu]

Posted very sad (aka lazy) traditional art like. two days ago..have this to make up for that well I work on animations..

[pushing500]

A mod for tech that thr Jones boys might end up inventing(?) Is 'RT Solar Flare Shields' (And possibly RT Fuses to soak the Zzzzts!) I could see them developing the solar flare shield as a gift for Al so he doesn't deactivate everytime there's a glare.

Thank you for sharing your stories and art with us, I love these two misanthropic goobers. (And look forward to their family showing up eventually! I'm sure the reveal that the boys have been living on nutrient paste for however many years will be... interesting if any of the fam are culinaryily inclined XD)

Ooh, that does seem like something the Jones boys would invent for their android buddy!! Thank you for the excellent suggestion!

I'm so glad people are enjoying the story, and I hope you all continue to enjoy it. The Archonexus ending is aaages away, so we'll have these two misanthropic goobers hanging around for a while.

Funnily enough, Mechi's mum/mom/ma Squashbug has a burning passion for cooking and is something around level ten in cooking ability, along with the gourmand trait. I'm sure she'll have some very harsh words for her son and his newly discovered twin (and triplet, if we ever resurrect Lansa) once she makes it to Sparks.

Yamka and Lapu are probably putting up with a lot of fretting from her as they search the planet—she also has the neurotic trait, so she's especially anxious about her baby.

bonus drawing of baby Mechi helping his mama in the kitchen because I thought it'd be cute to draw ���️

[streets-in-paradise]

Hello there, just some lil questions I wanted to ask: what do you think about Odysseus? Since I am still unsure if he is a good guy after all…and what do you think about the wooden horse ?

Sending best wishes :)

Hi!

Overall? I do like Odysseus.

The question about if he is a good or bad guy? I feel it depends a lot of which Odysseus we are talking about. The many different adaptational Odysseus, one can argue, but I feel it's unfair measuring homeric Odysseus in a good vs bad measure. This is something you can't really make with any homeric figure, not only Odysseus.

One thing I enjoy of Troy (2004) is how in this analogy with modern imperialism it positions Odysseus as a cunning king that remains subservient to the imperial power in order to secure his land. Ithaca is in this kinda third world country position to an United States-coded Mycenae and that is very interesting to see.

However, there is also the fact that the dynamic of Odysseus and Agamemnon resembles Gandalf and Denethor in the Return of the King. He is the only one seeing the bigger picture while this armchair general calling himself " King of Kings" (the movie makes its own specifical use of this epithet from the Iliad) takes the worst choices ever. In the context of the film, with Agamemnon in the middle of a power driven mystic delirium oathing to Zeus he will sacrifice 40.000 greeks smashing the walls of Troy, you really can't blame the guy.

At that point of the film, Agamemnon is pretty much like grief over Boromir crazy Denethor about to burn Faramir alive, only he is about to get them all killed to destroy Troy in memory of Menelaus. Odysseus reacts as a way to preserve everyone, just as Gandalf sort of taking command in the Siege of Gondor. Arguably, Paris also attempts the same with Priam when he tells him not to accept the horse, but fails.

Speaking of Troy (2004) Odysseus? Yes, he is meant to be one of the good guys. The movie responsabilizes Agamemnon for him having to come up with the trojan horse and for the brutality displayed on the fall of Troy. It's not about power for him anymore, it has became a personal vengeance. He is, essentially, doing to that city for Menelaus exactly what Achilles did to the corpse of Hector over Patroclus.

Now, if we get in mythological territory, things get more complicated. This is why I feel you can't really judge him on good vs bad mentality. Homeric/ Trojan Cycle Odysseus is not a " did nothing wrong" neither a " figure of evil" character. He has both very redeemable and very loathsome moments.

For example, he is a devoted parent. Despite being far away from his boy, Telemachus is his life. While all the other heroes describe themselves in name of their parents, he adresses himself publicly as " the father of Telemachus". However, he is the direct responsible for the death of two kids: encouraged the sacrifice of Iphigenia, and in some versions, killed by his own hand the baby boy of Hector to stop him from growing and possibly seeking revenge for the atrocities commited.

I do feel blaming him for the trojan horse would be as ridiculous as the people who hate on Hector for killing Patroclus. It's an act of war in a war story, the guy did what Athena inspired him to do in order to win. However, the especially vile atrocities commited during the fall of Troy are another story. With the all white cast of the film the thing got a bit unnoticed, but Troy (2004) introduced the concept of the trojan war as the first genocide of the West against the East. As my very first introduction to the story, this idea kind of stayed with me.

I hate what the greeks did in Troy, but the story itself brings them their karma. Am I pissed off about Astyanax and Andromache? Absolutely, but the gods punished Odysseus for me with that trip back home and Pyrrhus got disowned by Peleus to later get killed by Orestes. Most of the greeks turned out cursed, and the trojans ended up founding Rome!! I have nothing left to hate, gods balanced the universe for me.

( If you like to see greek karma in action, like I do, I recommend the book " The Talisman of Troy " by Valerio Massimo Manfredi. Despite it takes the post war greek pov of a wide variety of characters, but mostly follows Diomedes, it is cathartic from the trojan one. The conversation stopping the Aeneas vs Diomedes duel in italy is delicious when it comes to trojan catharsis.)

When it comes to mythological Odysseus, I fall on a middle ground. I am against those fully negative " Odysseus was a cheater asshole" narratives represented by stuff like Madeline Miller's Circe. However, I am not as forgiving of the heaviest Odysseus' wrongs as, let's say, some sections of the Epic fanbase.

And btw, he was not a cheater. When the options are " sleep with this goddess or risk her wrath", there is nothing much the man could have done even if it happened twice. The only time he had the capacity to consent was when Nausicaa got infatuated with him, and he didn't sleep with her. I just say people who hate on Odysseus for " cheating " are looking at the wrong reasons lol.

Books Odysseus is a complicated man, but I enjoy his character too.

( all but the Telegony, in this blog we pretend the Telegony never existed. It's such an OOC trainwreck, even if it's ancient, I refuse to take it in consideration.)

[corvidaedream]

taking people's pizza delivery orders over the phone last night and i got this british guy on the phone who sounded exactly like the evil tiger from the jungle book and kept saying things like "marvelous" and "splendid" about things like the existence of mozzarella sticks and then when i took down his address for delivery it turns out he's my neighbor