nireidi

[nireidi]

Tumblr really stumbled into a beautiful feature with the whole "tags are separated from the main post" (as they should be, they're metadata) + "tags can be as long as entire tweets" thing. They make a really nice form of textual subvocalization/whisper mode/aside/whatever (they're flexible!).

I keep finding myself wanting to make such asides on other sites and find myself subtly irritated that I can't. I wanna elaborate in a way that is diminished compared to the main post!

[nireidi]

[nireidi]

Reread Equal Rites recently. I used to think it was about feminism and little girls getting the same opportunities as little boys. Which, it isn't not about that. But ALSO.

It's about an intersex kid.

It's about a little girl born with a staff.

And that's Not Right.

The adults in the room- her father, the 'medical professional'- attempt to remove the staff, by blade and by fire. The fresh little baby SCREAMS. So they agree to pretend it doesn't exist. She'll probably grow up just a regular little girl.

right?

But just around the onset of puberty..... it becomes apparent, not to her, but to the adults, that she's not going to be Regular.

The medical professional tries again to rectify matters. She tries to destroy the staff while the girl is unconscious. The girl screams. The adults give in. They aren't monsters.... but life will be so much harder, so much less foreseen, for this strange little girl....

They try to raise her 'right'.

If she won't be a conventional woman... maybe an unconventional woman. A Powerful woman- in the way that women can be powerful. Are permitted to be powerful.

But she's not a woman- she's a child. What will she be, when she's grown? A Witch. A Wizard. She can't be either. She can't be neither.

(The term 'warlock' is repeatedly invoked and scoffed. The etymology of 'warlock' is 'breaker of oaths'. Counter to the covenant. Rulebreaker.)

Right.

[nireidi]

we are so back

[nireidi]

i love the term "joshing." it's slang, meaning to joke or tease playfully. "i'm just joshing you." who is this notorious josh. who joshed so much that the whole concept got named after him

[nireidi]

I’m gnashing my teeth like a child of Cain

If this is a prison I’m willing to bite my own chain

[nireidi]

Murderbot tv show deviates a little from the books: annoying, does not please me, not sure this show is worth it.

Murderbot tv show wandering far away from book canon and having SecUnit bully Mensah into vivisectioning it: now we're talking.

[nireidi]

New favorite Disney princess is Vetinari. Talking with rats as he grooms himself in the mirror. Incredible.

[nireidi]

when I was a little kid at some point I got upset with my parents because I didn't have a crucifix in my bedroom and they did- I was like why do YOU get to be safe from vampires??? you're okay with me getting my blood sucked???? so we took a little trip to the catholic store but the one closest to us was run by a group of nuns that had been moved here from romania. I got a little baby pink cross and this sweet old nun was like 'aww, is this a baptism gift?' and I was like no. I need to be protected from vampires. and she immediately got SO serious and was like 'this is the best one we've got, you'll definitely be safe' and since she was literally from vampire land I was convinced she was like, van helsing. like the whole time my parents had been laughing about how cute my fear was but she literally Knew dracula and was taking my concerns seriously I held this over my parents for so long lmfao

[nireidi]

having anti punitive justice morals sucks because you want to say "man that guy sucks he should get hit with hammers until he dies" but you also want to make it clear you don't think anyone should be put in charge of the 'hit people with hammers until they die" machine.

[nireidi]

picturing griddlehark college/otherwise normal aus is so fucking funny. like. you meet this lesbian couple, right. one of them is on a full sports scholarship, she's big, beefy, a little lacking in social skills but obviously happy to try. she swears every other sentence, has a poster of megan fox in transformers in her bedroom like a 13 year old boy. she's got an anime girl phone background. she wears a black choker all the time which does NOT match her otherwise purely sun's-out-guns-out-paired-with-cargo-shorts type wardrobe.

the other one is a full head shorter than her and shaped like a stick, wears exclusively big, shapeless cardigans and skirts that reach her ankles, will not speak to anyone but the beefcake in full sentences if she can avoid it, and visibly has not slept in a week. the one time you convince her to speak, she ends up insulting you in the most unnecessarily graphic and specific terms you have ever heard, gives you a look which singlehandedly curdles every ounce of self-esteem you've ever possessed, and immediately returns her attention to studying.

one day, you finally work up the courage to ask how the fuck they met and why they're dating. they tell you that they both grew up in a small-town christian cult which the stick figure's parents actually led, beat the shit out of each other daily for their entire childhoods, and finally resolved their differences in their late teens and immediately ran away together. the stick figure twitches up a sleeve of her oversize black cardigan to reveal a bracelet made of the beefcake's baby teeth that she personally knocked out of her skull. the beefcake smiles at her like this is the height of romance. the only issue they will acknowledge in their relationship is that when she was little, the stick figure fell madly in love with a painting of the virgin mary and has never quite recovered. they've been married for 3 years. they are 20 years old.

also the beefcake wears the choker because the stick figure said "no" to dog collars in public.

[nireidi]

Discworld movie where every character is played by a Muppet except for the only human, Nobby Nobbs,

[nireidi]

Some PTerry quotes that feel especially salient at the moment:

"He asked you to shoot at people who weren’t shooting back,” growled Vimes, striding forward, “That makes him insane, wouldn’t you say?”

“They are throwing stones, Sarge,” said Colon.

“So? Stay out of range. They’ll get tired before we do."

- Night Watch

Odd thing, ain't it... you meet people one at a time, they seem decent, they got brains that work, and then they get together and you hear the voice of the people. And it snarls.

- Jingo

It always embarrassed Samuel Vimes when civilians tried to speak to him in what they thought was “policeman.” If it came to that, he hated thinking of them as civilians. What was a policeman, if not a civilian with a uniform and a badge? But they tended to use the term these days as a way of describing people who were not policemen. It was a dangerous habit: once policemen stopped being civilians the only other thing they could be was soldiers.

- Snuff

The poor devils. They thought a king would make them free.

- Feet of Clay

Beating people up in little rooms…he knew where that led. And if you did it for a good reason, you’d do it for a bad one. You couldn’t say “we’re the good guys” and do bad-guy things. Sometimes the watching watchman inside every good copper’s head could use an extra pair of eyes.

- Thud!

[nireidi]

I wonder if the Patrician ever realized that by pinning on the lilac that he was creating a situation where a very exclusive club not only included both Havelock Vetinari and Nobby Nobbs as members, but also one in which they were equals.

[nireidi]

Vimes, in the morning: good lord, I’m a godsdamned manager, I miss being just a plain old copper just walking the beat

Vimes, a day later and thirty years earlier: immediately institutes a prisoner tracking system with associated signed paperwork, assesses promotion potential for every employee, determines which underperformers get put on a PIP and which get shown the door immediately, provides one-on-one mentoring with his younger self and particularly focuses on communication coaching, slots himself into the chain of authority to protect employees and higher leadership from each other, and institutes accountability policies with documented checks

and that’s BEFORE steering the organization through an existential crisis in the following days. Yeah Manager Vimes, I see you, I see how much you ~hate this

[nireidi]

Opening narration: Flurgles are weird little guys and everyone hates them.

Sam Vimes: I hate those bloody Flurgles, shifty little bastards the lot of them.

<some plot events later>

Sam Vimes: if you say one bad word about Flurgles I will kill you; straight up, you'll be dead.

[nireidi]

oof. no need to call me out so hard with this Pterry