#LA CRAWFISH

[m0ney]

LACR 23ss｡･ﾟﾟ･♡

[rastronomicals]

12:47 AM EDT March 25, 2024:

Pussy Galore - "Crawfish" From the album Historia De La Musica Rock (May 1990)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm

¡Bravo!

[direwombat]

It's a damn shame Montana is landlocked because jacob deserves to see syb tear into lobsters and crabs and crawdads with her bare hands I think he'd enjoy that

[godallaswriter]

Alexandria Adventure: Savor the Flavor of Cajun Country

[spectralreplica]

But do you think the plan will work?

Oumota: tarot reading edition! I had this idea during Oumota Week and just got around to finishing it now 😔. At first I thought about giving Sun to Kaito and Moon to Kokichi (a la Reversed Sun by grayimperia), but I think it works better to have them both in each card, to highlight the parallels. (If you want more explanation of my design thoughts, I'll put it under a cut at the end.)

General tarot meanings:

The Sun: happiness, confidence, success, optimism, innocence/childhood, inspiring others, internal motivation, truth

The Moon: illusion, imagination, uncertainty, secrets, confusion, intuition/the subconscious, fears influencing you, insecurity

The Star: hope, regaining inspiration, renewal, healing, moving on, new purpose, calm after the storm (Reversed Star: despair, lack of faith, pessimism, boredom, anxiety, being overwhelmed by past problems)

.

I feel like while Kaito is naturally more Sun coded and Kokichi more Moon coded, they have some qualities of both cards. And Star vs Reversed Star is so temping to bring in for DR.

I was thinking of it as a past, present, future kind of reading, but also maybe situation, action, outcome. Starting out with high self confidence and some childish black and white thinking. (Maybe a little over confident and childish to the point of egotism and inflexibility, shades of reversed sun...). Covering for insecurities by projecting a fake persona to everyone around, doubling down on the lies and self-deception a la chapter 5. Finally, either coming through everything stronger, with renewed hope, or else crashing and burning, overwhelmed by unacknowledged issues that have built up.

.

As for the specific imagery...

Sun: I stuck pretty close to the traditional imagery here. The flag/banner has their respective prints on it, and I put Kaito on Mars while Kokichi remains on Earth. It's also sundown or sunset for Kokichi; is he moving towards the Moon or away? The horse is obv. very chess piece inspired. Kokichi gets his King Horse a la the mask on his bed, and I gave Kaito a pegasus because flying.

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Moon: Moving a little bit away from traditional imagery as more of the canon situation seeps in, but still pretty close. The moon floats "outside" the cage, wearing their respective false faces. (We know from the ending that the skyline on those glass panels isn't real...) They both have an Exisal in the background in place of one of the towers, but Kaito has a bamboo grove a la Princess Kaguya; Kaguya came from the moon and she will go back, no matter how much people on Earth love her. Kokichi has one of the racks that sits beside shrines where you're supposed to tie bad/unlucky omikuji (paper fortunes) so that the bad luck doesn't follow you; living in purposeful denial of bad things, but they lurk there on the horizon.

They both still have at least one dog/wolf, but I gave Kokichi a fox because of their association with being tricksters. Also, wolves and foxes, as predators, are framed as villains in stories, but at the same time it's also not uncommon to see them as heroes (stereotype of predator/hunter vs stereotype of bravery/nobility and cleverness). Also, contrast of fox and hound, like the clash of Kokichi presenting himself as childish + annoying vs a genuine threat. Kaito has the dog, monkey, and pheasant that accompanied Momotaro, continuing his fairytale theme.

Everyone seems to argue over what the crawfish means in the original, but I went with the interpretation of moving from water to land, evolution, things coming to the surface. So, Kaito has a koi. I think most people know about the "koi climbs a waterfall and becomes a dragon" thing because of Magikarp, but here it is again just in case! Kaito's got an aquatic creature struggling against its nature in hopes of someday actually transforming into something grander. Kokichi has a poison dart frog. Already amphibious, so it can go between water and land freely, but visibly harmful to anyone who tries to get close.

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Star: The least traditional imagery and the most V3 canon imagery. There's still a tree, but it's a pine tree. ...I dunno, no explanation for that, it just looked nice 🤷‍♀️The two jugs are replaced with the poison and antidote bottles. Originally, they're supposed to represent the conscious and subconscious and pour in two different places, but here they're mixing together directly. V3 resolves the "truth vs lies" theme by arguing you have to accept ambiguity. Also, Kaito and Kokichi's whole plan rests on them managing to work together to obscure exactly who is in the Exisal in the end.

There's a figure in the foreground in Kaito's jacket, but they're just a silhouette (a la the culprit); it's not either of them, it's both, and they're reaching beyond the bounds of the game. The star in the sky is ringed by the trial podiums, since all of their hope for the future rests in derailing the next trial. Can they win? Well, Shuichi and Kiibo are at the top, the two people they (or at least Kokichi...) know can be problems, but Tsumugi is specifically blocked from view, always overlooked...

[charthurlover]

What perfume/cologne would the Van Der Linde gang wear

hi!! this is my first tumblr post, and i don’t exactly know how to do this or work the app, so forgive me if this is horribly worded or confusing.

anyways, this is my opinion on what colognes or perfumes the gang would wear. horses and cain included, since they are technically a member of the gang!!

Abigail -

something woodsy, maybe like the forest or a campfire, cedar wood, trees, plants.

examples:

- G-Water

- Tam Dao

- Snoqualine

Arthur -

tobacco, scent of alcohol, mud, outdoors.

examples:

- Jasmin et Cigarette

- Rien

- Earthworm

Baylock -

ashes, grease.

examples:

- Tobacco Blaze

- Garage

- La Yuquam Homme

Bill -

any popular male fragrances, or like gunpowder and fire.

examples:

- 9mm Ballistic Therapy

- High Noon

- Campfire Nights

Boaz -

dynamite, money.

examples:

- Wall Street

- Don Xerjoff

- 1805 Tonnerre BeauFort London

Branwen -

oatcakes, apples, water.

examples:

- Lostmarch Lann-Ael

- Be Delicious

- Cavalli Acqua

Bob -

blood, gunpowder, sweat.

examples:

- Vena Cava

- Richard Dark Side

- Secretions Magnefique

Brown Jack

pomade, alcohol, blood.

examples:

- Classic Fragrance

- Heeley Agarwood

- Molotov Cocktail

Cain -

dog, mud, grass.

examples:

- La Panthere Edition Soir

- Grass

- Zoologist Bat

Charles -

light florals, nature, clean fur.

examples:

- Coach Floral

- Super Cedar

- Coyote

Dutch -

blood, metal, tears.

examples:

- Vassago

- Spacewalk

- Rainy Season of Dresden

Davey -

snow, wood, fire.

examples:

- Waltz of the Snowflakes

- Tobacco Vanille

- Inquisitor

Enis -

whiskey, beer, grass.

examples:

- Tom Oud

- Stout ‘n Smoke

- Dune Road

Grimshaw -

sulfur, metal, cinnamon.

examples:

- Bloody Smoke

- Vanille Absolu

- Jupiter

Gwydion -

birds, leather, salt.

examples:

- Seemannn

- Black Saffron

- Millésime Impérial

Hosea -

moonshine, stew, metal.

examples:

- Moscow Mule

- Starfish & Coffee

- Santal 33

Jack -

water, horse, corn oil.

examples:

- Petrichor

- Cuir de Russie

- Seems Legit

Javier -

mahogany, cotton, musk.

examples:

- Redwood Leaves

- Lazy Sunday Morning

- Urban Musk

Jenny -

snow, wool, wood.

examples:

- Redwood Mist

- Battaniye

- Grey Vetiver

John -

sweat, musk, grease

examples:

- Flores Negras

- Silver Musk

- Cristina La Veneno Ni Puta Ni Santa

Kieran -

blood, grass, oats.

examples:

- Hora de la Verdad Sombra

- Figuier Eden

- Harran

Karen -

beer, guns, whiskey.

examples:

- Beguile

- Wicked John

- Kutay

Lenny -

blood, books, bullets.

examples:

- Seems Legit

- Diamonitirion - elixir atonit

- Moon Child

Mac -

metal, bullets, kerosene.

examples:

- Craft

- Iron Duke

- Nuvolari Rubini

Maggie -

dirt, stone, bog.

examples:

- Le Sillage Blanc

- During the Rain

- Swamp elixir

Mary-Beth -

books, ink, gold.

examples:

- Bibliophilia: Love of Books

- Supreme Vanilla

- Royal Blood

Micah -

rot, corn, mold.

examples:

- Saint Louis Cemetery #1

- Funerie

- French Kiss

Molly -

roses, grass, trees.

examples:

- Roses Musk

- Leila Lou

- Colors de Benetton

Nell II -

sweat, cows, pig.

examples:

- Amyi 3.17

- Cuir de Russie

- Hyrax

Old Belle -

carrots, beer, hay.

examples:

- Carotte

- Sónar

- Basilico & Fellini

Old Boy -

musk, tears, cow.

examples:

- Another 13

- Ozone

- Osmanthus

Pearson -

meat, vegetables, crawfish.

examples:

- Gino: Steak Scented Eau de Parfum

- Eau de Cuisine

- Wild Carrot Oud

Reverend -

whiskey, incense, coffee.

examples:

- 7 Loewe

- Bourbon e Fava Tonka

- Black Opium

Sadie -

blood, tears, gunpowder.

examples:

- Bull’s Blood 2nd Edition

- Cool Glacier

- Rendez-Vous!

Sean -

whiskey, sweat, bullets.

examples:

- Malt Akro

- Monochrome

- Amour Nocturne

Silver Dollar -

fire, wool, metal.

examples:

- Encens Pyro

- The Sheepfold, Moonlight

- Rosenrot

Taima -

deer, blood, meat.

examples:

- Ma Bete

- Trinity Blood

- Good Girl Gone Bad

The Count -

sugarcubes, peaches, pears.

examples:

- Pixie Dust

- Allure Eau de Parfum

- First Base

Trelawny -

doves, rabbits, silk.

examples:

- Ruğa Sablo

- Wet Garden

- Baklava Musk

Tilly -

bullets, baby powder, swamps.

examples:

- 266ts Pontiff’s Harley

- Cashmere Mist Eau de Toilette

- Haxan

Uncle -

manure, horse, cow.

examples:

- D’zing

- L’heure Fougueuse

- Zoologist Cow

again, this is my first post so i’m very sorry about it being bad or isn’t looking right for tumblr. so sorry.

[romantiqueofthemind]

You know just HOLYFUCKINGSHIT THANK YOU BAZ?!!!!!!!!!!!! FUDNFKDNDKSND WE FINALLY GET CRAWFISH, HEATBREAK HOTEL!!!! VIVA LAS VEGASS!!! I CSNT EVEN TYPE RN FUCKINGNRJFIEKDJDNF

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[gothhabiba]

btw, if Jonathan Olivier wanted to point to early, primary evidence of a distinction between gumbo févi (with okra) and gumbo filé (with powdered sassafras leaves), he would have been better served by this 1784 journal article (M. P. de la Coudrenière, "Observations sur la sassafras, arbre de l'Amérique"; in M. L'Abbé Rozier & M. J. A. Mongez Jr., eds., Observations sur la physique, sur l'histoire naturelle et sur les arts, Book 24 (January 1784), pp. 63-4).

the part that has to do with gumbo reads:

Ces feuilles [de sassafras] employées dans les sauces, les font filer comme de l'eau gommée, & leur donnent un gout agréable. [...] Le principe gommeux qu'elle contiennent est tel, qu'une pincée de cette poudre suffit pour rendre un bouillon visqueux. C'est ce mets que l'on nomme en Amérique gombo. Cependent il faut distinguer ce ragoût américain, de celui qu'on nomme gombo fevi. Celui-ci est fait avec les gousses d'une espèce de grande mauve, connue des Botanistes sous le nom de Sabdariffa. Toutes les parties de cette plante contiennent un suc visqueux; & les gousses, lorsqu'elles sont vertes, rendent l'eau plus gluante encore que ne le font les feuilles de sassafras. La première fois que l'on mange de ces gombos, on sent une sorte de répugnance, à cause de cette viscosité; mais quand on en a goûté deux ou trois fois, la répugnance passe, & l'on voudroit ensuite en manger tous les jours, principalement du sassafras, qui est beaucoup plus savoureux que le févi. Les Créoles de la Lousiana l'aiment si passionnément, qu'ils ne peuvent manger d'autre potage que celui qu'ils font avec du boillon, du piment, du sassafras, & du maïs ou du riz cuit à l'eau. Il faut avouer que ce potage est bien plus sain & bien meilleur au goût que toutes nos soupes de pain. On fait du gombo aves toutes sortes de viandes, de volailles & de poisson. On en fait aussi avec des chevrettes & des écrevisses. Celui de choux est le moins estimé; il se mange, ainsi que celui de chevrette, le soir, & tient souvent lieu de souper. (p. 63)

translated to English, let's say that's:

These [sassafras] leaves, when used in sauces, make them form strings like gummy water, and give them a pleasant taste. [...] The thickening power that they contain is such that one pinch of this powder is enough to make a broth viscous. This is the dish that we call gombo in America. However, it is necessary to distinguish this American stew from that called gombo fevi. That one is made with the pods of a species of large mallow, known to botanists as Sabdariffa. All parts of this plant contain a viscous juice; and the pods, while they are green, render water even more glutinous than sassafras leaves do. The first time that one eats one of these gumbos, one feels a sort of repugnance because of this viscosity; but when one has tasted gumbo two or three times, the repugnance disappears, and from then on one would like to eat it every day; principally sassafras gumbo, which is much tastier than the févi. The Créoles of Louisiana love it so passionately that they cannot eat any soup other than this one, which they made with broth, pepper, sassafras, and corn or rice cooked in water. It must be admitted that this soup is much more healthful and much better-tasting than all of our bread soups. Gumbo is made with all sorts of meat, poultry, and fish. It is also made with shrimp and crawfish. That of cabbage is less esteemed; it is eaten, as is that of goat, in the evening, and often takes the place of supper.

[adarkrainbow]

Aulnoy's famous fairytales: The White Doe (1)

Do you remember the reblog I made about the giant crab attacking fairies? Well if you recall it, be happy for this is the fairytale I am about to talk today - and if you don't, you're in for a wild ride.

"La Biche au Bois" (The Wood Doe/The Doe of the Wood) is one of madame d'Aulnoy's most famous and renowned fairytales, still present in fairytale collections of the 19th and 20th century. It was notably included in Andrew Lang's Orange Fairy Book as "The White Doe", and it received several alternate English translations - The Hind of the Forest, The White Fawn, The Enchanted Hind, The Hind in the Woods and many more... Today I am here to talk about the original fairytale, the true story and the true meanings behind it. For the sake of convenience I will use the common English title "The White Doe" - but know that this isn't the actual French title, and rather an English invention. Know also that this fairytale is not part of madame d'Aulnoy's first fairytale book - but rather her second one, "Contes Nouveaux ou Les Fées à la moe", "New Fairytales or Fairies in fashion".

In this post, what I will do is simply summarize the fairytale in an (I hope) easy way - all the subtle meanings, cultural allusions, literary twists and turns will be talked about in a different post. So get ready for one of d'Aulnoy's most famous story.

THE DOE OF THE WOOD

Once upon a time, there were a king and a queen who had a perfect couple, loved each other dearly, and were beloved by their subject. There was only one thing missing for their absolute happiness: a child. The queen desperately wanted one - not only did the couple had no heir, the queen was certain the king would love her more if she had a child. For five years the queen tried to have a child, with no success, and she regularly visited miraculous or curative waters at various "fountains" (in the French language at the time, "fountain" also meant natural springs, but frequented and used enough to become more "civilized" than wild streams only frequented by beasts - so in the text, the queen visits a wood with several "famous fountains" in it, these aren't our modern fountains, just water streams and springs). As the queen sat near one of the fountains, and asked her servants to leave her alone, she complained out loud about her not having any child - and suddenly a big crayfish appeared out of the water, and talked to her (which surprised her). I insist: in English translations you will find the words "crab" or "lobster" but in the French text, it is an écrevisse, aka a crayfish or crawfish.

The crayfish tells the queen she will obtain what she seeks, and informs her of the existence nearby of a palace where fairies live - it is hidden from "mortal eye" by magical clouds the fairies created. But if the queen agrees to follow the crayfish, it will guide her towards the palace. The queen agrees but worries slightly over the fact that the crayfish can only walk backwards - and suddenly the Crayfish transforms herself into a "pretty little old lady". She leaves the fountain without being wet, beautifully dressed - the good-looking old woman is actually the Fairy of the Fountain. The Fairy of the Fountain takes the queen through a path that is usually blocked by thorns and briars - but on their path roses, orange-trees, violets and all sorts of other plants bloom, and birds sing. They arrive at a shining palace made entirely of diamonds, and in it live six beautiful fairies. The fairies announce to the queen that she will give birth to a daughter, that she will named "Désirée" (Desired), because she was a desired child - they also give her a bouquet made of six different flowers sculpted in precious stones. Each flower corresponds to the name of one of the fairies, and they explain that when the baby is born, the queen will merely have to invoke them while holding their flower, so that they may come and give the baby their gifts. They then let the queen visit their palace, and its wonderful gardens with abnormally large abricots and cherries, before the Fairy of the Fountain escorts her back. Her servants were in panic because, not finding the queen anywhere, they thought she had been kidnapped - but she returns fine, and in fact she returns eight more day to visit the Fairy of the Fountain and the six fairies' palace, before finally settling back home.

The queen became pregnant and gave birth to the little Desired, as the fairies had predicted. Immediately, she used the precious-stone bouquet to invoque the six flower-named fairies, who arrived on chariots of precious materials (ebony for one, ivory for another, cedar for a third) dragged by birds (the ebony chariot has white pigeons, the ivory one has black crows). This is explicitely described as a sign of the fairies coming "for friendship and alliance", because when a fairy is angry or vengeful, she rather travels on a chariot dragged by dragons, fire-breathing snakes, lions, leopards or panthers. The fairies offer the baby all sorts of impressive fairy-crafted presents - cloth that can't be worn out even after a thousand years of use, lace in which was embroidered the whole history of the world, bed covers in which are depicted a thousand types of games, a craddle with four little Cupid statues that animate themselves and rock the babe whenever they need to be put to sleep or quieted down... The fairies even touch the ground with their want to summon a nurse out of thin air when the baby starts crying for milk. Finally, the fairies give their six gifts: 1) virtue 2) spirit (intelligence) 3) miraculous beauty 4) happy fortune (good luck or good fate) 5) a strong and good health 6) that she may succeed in everything she tries.

But of course, as one expects in fairytales, this is where things go wrong. A gigantic crayfish, so big she barely goes through the door, appears in the bedroom - it is the Fairy of the Fountain, angered that she was disdained and not called upon, despite being the one that allowed the queen to discover the fairy-world in the first place. The angry fairy even says that she had a feeling the queen would be ungrateful, and this is why she took a crayfish form in the first place - to hint at her that "her friendship would go backward". The queen begs for her forgiveness, to no avail, but the other six fairies (referred constantly as her "sisters") manage to quiet her down. And that's because the Fairy of the Fountain is actually pretty vain - and by flattering her (for example begging her to leave her monstrous and dreadful shape so they can admire her natural beauty), they manage to calm her down a bit. The Crayfish Fairy decides that she won't harm the baby as much as she originally intended to... But she will still harm it. So, she declares that an unspecified misfortune would happen to the princess if she ever saw the light of day before her fifteenth birthday, and that this misfortune might lead to her death.

Once the Crayfish Fairy leaves, the queen begs the six good fairies for help. Their solution is to create by magic a beautiful palace with an underground entryway but no door nor window, and lit by so many candle-lights that there is as much light in there as if it was bright day. Desired is forced to live in this palace, shielded from the light of the sun, until her fifteenth birthday. Hopefully for her, her life in there isn't too boring or dreadful - the fairies made sure she has a thousand different beauties around her, and that she gets to learn in a fun and entertaining way the completely history of the world ; and all sorts of teachers on all the subjects possible are sent to her. She notably grows so beautiful that "if her mother didn't have to be by the side of her husband, she would have stayed with her daughter all day long". The fairies also regularly visit the princess, offering her all sorts of gifts. But one fairy in particular loved Desired more than the others - it was the fairy named Tulip, and she kept insisting that the queen must be vigilant and protective, because the Crayfish Fairy is a vindicative one and might do great harm to the princess. The queen promises her many times that Desired will not be exposed to sunlight before she is fifteen... But the queen does something that ends up dooming it all: she prepares the portraits of her daughter and has them sent to all the courts of the world, as one usually does to prepare a princess to enter the world of royalty.

And so, the portrait reaches the hands of a prince named Prince Guerrier (Prince Warrior, a name given to him because he won "three great battles"). Prince Warrior falls in love with the portrait of Desired. He falls in love so much that he refuses to be parted from it, he locks himself in a room with it to speak to it as if it was alive - and of course, people immediately start thinking the prince has gone mad. The king his father summons him for a stern chat, because he won't have his son just turning mad for no reason and speaking to furniture. We learn here that prince Warrior is engaged to princesse Noire (princess Black), an arranged marriage - but he says he has fallen in love with princess Desired and wants to marry her, he is even ready to die if he can't be with her. To appease his father who doesn't understand his son's passion, Warrior brings to him Desired's portrait, and when he sees it, the king is just as charmed as his son, and he immediately agrees to break off the engagement with Black and have his son wed to Desired. He says he is even ready to fight off a war with princess Black's kingdom, that it would be worth having Desired as his daughter-in-law!

To be sent as an ambassador to Desired's court, is selected a man named Becafigue (it is a type of fig-eating bird), an eloquent courtier, a young lord that was known to "dearly love the prince" and always be ready to pleae him. Becafigue goes to Desired's court with an enormous amount of golden carriages and magnificent horses, and a thousand gifts of diamonds and precious stones and rubies, all engraved with love messages or shaped like hearts - as well as a portrait of the prince, "painted by a man so talented, the portrait could speak and make compliments". Before this whole ambassy can arrive to the court, the fairy Tulip appears to the queen and warns her of the arrival of Becafigue - she insists that the queen must NOT let Desired out of the palace, because she isn't fifteen yet, and she warns her, no matter what Becafigue says or does, do NOT allow Desired under the sunlight. The queen promises again to follow Tulip's warnings...

But unfortunately all the incredible riches of Warrior's courts, and Becafigue's mockery of the "useless and ridiculous warnings of fairies", and the impressive talking portrait of Prince Warrior, all make a great effect on everybody. The queen shows her daughter the portrait and the gifts, which makes Desired fall in love with the prince, and the marriage is quickly accepted - but given Desired is only fourteen, her parents send back Becafigue without her, insisting that the prince must wait three whole months, until her fifteeneth's birthday, to actually see her. And this news... doesn't please Warrior. He falls for the typical thing of 17th century romances: this sort of "love-sickness". He is so sick and sad to not see and be with his love he stops eating, he stops sleeping, he stays sleeping or lying down on a sofa all day long, only writing to Desired and speaking to her portrait, losing his strength... The king is very alarmed at seeing his son's health deteriorate, and the doctors are clear that it is a love problem with no actual remedy beyond the prncess herself. So the king decides to go see Desired's court himself, in person, to beg her parents to rush the wedding - the problem is that the king is actually old, and as it turns out he can't do such a long travel himself. So he sends again Becafigue, with very touching letters, to try to bend the king and queen to their will.

Meanwhile, princess Desired is also in love, constantly looking at Warrior's portrait and constantly worrying about him and her wedding (though she doesn't fall sick like him). We are here introduce to the two personal servants/company ladies of Desired. One is Giroflée (Gillyflower) who loves her mistress dearly and was her faithful servant ; the other, called Longue Epine (Long Thorn) is actually secretly jealous of the princess. It is noted that Longue Epine's mother was the governess of the princess and that, after raising her, she should have loved her too... But the governess loved even more her own daughter, and so seeing Long-Thorn's hatred of Desired made her hate too the princess.

WARNING! OBLIGATORY RACIST MOMENT OF OLD-TIMEY TEXT!

So, we catch up to the famous "princess Black", who we learn is actually an Ethiopian princess - and "the most vindicative being in the world". She is furious at being tossed away like that by having her engagement broken, and she argues to the ambassador that she has the two things a prince would want from her 1) she is VERY rich and 2) she is beautiful. This is the most racist moment, as the princess describes her "beautiful" feature - "the flat nose, these big lips, this dark skin". Which are indeed in this story beautiful features for Ethopians themselves - but which are meant to be taken as a mockery here, since these traits, thought at the time to be typical of Africans, were at the very opposite of the beauty canons of 17th century France. At the time, to be beautiful, a woman needed to have 1- a thin mouth, with thin lips, almost nothing at all 2- a small nose, the smallest the better and 3- a pale skin, not just "white" because even a white skin can be ugly if it is tanned, but a truly paper white, chalk white skin. Of course, as a result the description of "Ethiopian beauty" becomes an "ugly portrait" by French standards. The Ethiopian princess is also shown to be very cruel - as she almost "begins her revenge" by killing the ambassador that brings her the bad news, and it is only because he flatters her and praises her that she accepts to spare his life.

The thing is that, to make sure her revenge is complete, princess Black goes to visit (on an "ivory chariot dragged by ostriches") her best friend and godmother... the Crawfish Fairy! The Fairy of course shares the pity of her goddaughter, and quickly searches why the prince Warrior might have rejected her... Only to find that it is all because of Desired. And the Fairy, who until this point had actually forgotten almost everything tied to Desired, saw her desire for revenge re-ignited. The narration even points out that, without princess Black's fury, the Crayfish Fairy might not even have done anything against Desired is she saw the light of the sun - meaning her own curse would have not been activated. But princess Black convinced her to rather unleash all of her fury against the princess... [Note that this is the last time we see princess Black, she had her revenge, she is satisfied, she returns home after gifting Crayfish with flowers and fruits].

Back to the main story! Becafigue arrives at Desired's court, and again does a very powerful plea, once again accusing a "too great credulity in little fairies", and explaining how the prince might die of heartbreak due to thinking the princess hates him and doesn't want to see him. When Desired learns her beloved's prince bad states, she herself faints - and ultimately she decides of a solution, a way for her to see Warrior and have a happy wedding (without the bethroted dying first), while tricking the "wicked fairy of the Fountain" and avoiding her curse. She convinces her mother the queen to prepare for her a shielded, windowless, pitch-black carriage for her to travel into - to undergo a journey where they will only stop and rest when night falls, so that she can reach Warrior's castle without ever seeing the rays of the sun. This is all promptly done - and that despite Tulip's earlier warnings that the princess should not leave her palace and not follow Becafigue to the prince's castle.

The travel goes its way, with Desired inside the pitch-black carriage with her two ladies-in-waiting, the faithful Gillyflower and the jealous Long-Thorn. Long-Thorn has also fallen in love with the prince upon seeing his portrait, and so she, alongside with her mother, hatched a devious plot to take the place of the princess... As they arrived in sight of Warrior's city, and when it was high noon, Long-Thorn brutally opened the carriage, letting the sunlight flow in. The second Desired saw the sunlight, she turned into a white doe and ran into the woods. Her servants split in two - one group running after her, another running to the city to warn Warrior. But the Fairy of the Fountain was nearby, and caused such a huge thudnerstorm and all sorts of disorienting charms, that neither group could reach their goal and they all ended up completely lost. The only ones spared were Long-Thorn and her mother. Long-Thorn promptly stole the clothes, jewels and belongings of Desired, her mother acting as lady-in-waiting, and decided to march to the city, pretending to be Desired. (There is even an humorous section where Long-Thorn realies that the jewels of the princess are a bit too heavy for her, since they include a crown with diamonds "big as fists", and a sphere "bigger than her head" to be held in her hand - but her mother insists on her carrying it all so she doesn't get mistaken for a fake princess)

Long-Thorn and her mother end up meeting the carriage of Warrior and his parents, who were rushing to welcome Desired. The royals are very surprised to learn that Desired is walking to their city, all on her own, outside for one servant - and when they see "Desired" they are horrified because Long-Thorn doesn't look at all like the portrait Warrior fell in love with. Long-Thorn is so tall, that the clothes of the princess barely reach her knees. She is extremely skinny, to the point the prince calls her "a skeleton" and a "mummy". Her teeth are black and they don't line up in any kind of order - and finally she has a hooked nose shining of a "bright red", making her look like some exotic parrot. The prince and his parents, outraged and disgusted at having been deceivedby a fake portrait, and thinking the whole "We hid her from the sunlight" was just a scam, decide to imprison Long-Thorn and her mother in a castle as hostages (and later we learn that Warrior's father decides to go to war against Desired's father, despite his old age).

Warrior meanwhile is broken - completely broken. His dreams and hopes were crushed, and yet he is still in love, madly in love - but only with what he thinks is a portrait of a person that doesn't exist. Despaired and unable to stand living at the court anymore, he decides to secretely escape his city (with the help of his faithful servant Becafigue), and to exile himself into some lonely place far away from humanity so he might spend there his "sorry life". They traveled for three days inside a deep, vast and dark forest, but filled with fresh herbs and fresh streams.

Back to Desired, now turned into the White Doe, she worries about a lot of things - she worries about finding what to eat (and is quite surprised when she naturally starts eating grass and feels satisfied by it) ; she worries about the various "wolves and lions and bears" that haunt the forest ; she wonders how long her metamorphosis will last, and if there is a remedy to the curse... For several days she flees and hides throughout the woods. Now, the fairy Tulip is still around, and despite being angry at everybody ignoring her warnings, she still cares about Desired (earlier in the text, it was explicitely said that, when she spoke to the queen about Desired, she called her "our daughter" as if she was her mother too). So, since she is too angry to help her directly, she rather guides Gillyflower towards the Doe, so that the two can help each other. Unfortunately Gillyflower isn't much help, since all she does is also cry a lot, recite all the dangers they face, and be blatantly unable to find food or shelter. Gillyflower cries for her poor mistress, the White Doe cries because Gillyflower cries - and because the White Doe cries, fairy Tulip is also saddened and decides she will forget her anger, and help her goddaughter.

Tulip promptly appears in front of the two lost girls, and she explains that she cannot undo the Crayfish Fairy spell because she is more powerful than her - but she softens the spell, by allowing Desired to return to her human shape every night. She also points out a path and says the girls will find there shelter and help. Indeed, at the end of the path, there is a nice and cute little house, with in it a nice and helpful old lady, who agrees to shield them ina two-person bedroom, "simple but cute and clean", and giving them excellent food to eat.

And would you look at that! Prince Warrior and Becafigue also arrive near the old woman's house, and she also gives them shelter - but she gives them a different bedroom, and she doesn't talk to them about her other guests, and since the two groups keep going in and out of the house at different times, they never actually meet or realize they share the same house. (This is part of the humor of the fairytale). The following day, to distract/entertain himself, Warrior goes hunting in the woods (which is one of his main pleasures), and he finds the White Doe that he immediately starts to hunt. Given Warrior is a talented hunter, he would have called the Doe if it wasn't for Tulip's protective spells that made sure the transformed princess wouldn't be harmed. They both lost each other and exhausted themselves in the hunt. When she returns to her bedroom in sweat, Desired explains to Gillyflower what happened, that a "young hunter" almost got her killed. Gillyflower tries to convince her to not leave her room anymore when she is under her doe shape, but Desired explains that the curse forces her to "do what the deer do" - aka, leave for the woods every day. Meanwhile Warrior explains to Becafigue that he doesn't understand how he couldn't capture "the most beautiful hind I ever saw", and he decides to return hunting for her the following day.

However said following day, after looking everywhere for the white doe and finding her nowhere, he eats some apples and falls asleep on the grass. The doe passes by and takes the opportunity offered by the hunter's sleep to study him - and she immediately recognizes him as prince Warrior. Forgetting any survival instinct, she decides to sleep near the prince. This however wakes up the prince, which in turn makes the doe flee. The prince, who thinks the doe has something "lovely" and "familiar" to her, runs after the animal - and after running several times around the forest, the exhausted doe gives up, lets the prince catch her... Only for Warrior to pet her, hug her and feed her some grass, making clear that he doesn't want to kill her anymore but rather make her some sort of company animal. Desired is very pleased with this... But upon seeing the sun going down, she forces herself to escape the prince, fearing too much what would be his reaction if he saw her transform.

Desired tells her story to Gillyflower, while prince Warrior tells his to Becafigue (he is especially angry that the doe tricked him to flee, despite him doing all he good to make her happy and content. Becafigue mockingly advises the prince to "punish" the doe for her "infidelity", and the prince decides to do so before leaving this house and the woods. The following day the doe and the prince meet again, and after some joyful petting the doe tries again to escape discreetly from the prince - but the prince, knowing what would happen, shoots an arrow through the doe's leg to prevent her from leaving. (The narration points out that the reason the prince acted in such a way was because of the evil influence of the Fairy of the Fountain, whose spell was supposed to put "in danger" the transformed princess)

After making sure the doe can't run anymore, the prince starts putting bandages and all good things that heal on her leg, but at the same time makes clear he won't let her escape anymore, and will take her with him in his next travels. He takes back the doe in front of the house and ties her to a tree, before preparing with Becafigue. While the prince is away, Gillyflower sees her mistress wounded and tied up - she promptly unties the knots and frees her, only for the prince to return. "That's my doe!" he says. "No that's mine!" Gillyflower replies, and to prove this, Gillyflower keeps giving specific orders to the doe (like "kiss me on the right cheek, put your hoof on my heart") that the doe of course obeys. The prince is saddened to see his new pet already has a mistress, but he lets Gillyflower leave with the doe... Only to discover to his surprise that the two return to the old woman's house!

Confused, he asks the old woman who basically answers "Oh yes, that's a lovely girl and her doe who have been living in the room right next to you all this time. Isn't it funny?". And Becafigue recognizes Gillyflower as one of the personal servants of Desired - since he saw her at Desired's palace when he acted as the ambassador of the prince! Deciding there is a mystery to unveil, Becafigue doesn't hesitate to create a hole in the wall between their room and the room next door - and what a surprise he has upon seeing Gillyflower tend to the wounded arm of the real princess Desired, who complains about the evil spell that forces her to become a doe each night! The prince also looks through the hole, and in a burst of mad love just kicks down the door of the girls' room and puts a knee on the ground before Desired, giving her a passionate love declaration. Their love exchange continues all up until the night, and by the miracle of love, Desired doesn't turn into a doe anymore - the curse is broken!

Wrapping it all, Desired and Warrior understand the full story and the treachery of Long-Thorn. The old woman of the house turns out to have been the fairy Tulip in disguise all along: she heals the princess' wounds, and gives her and Gllyflower all sorts of beautiful dresses and jewels (as well as strong horses) so they can all return together to the castle of Warrior's father, in time to prevent the upcoming war. Once there, Desired actually asks for Long-Thorn and her mother to be pardoned instead of severely punished, her charity going even as far as to allow them to leave to go wherever they want to be. Of course, such kindness makes the old father praise her even more.

There are great festivites for the wedding of Desired and Warrior, and the six benevolent fairies are all invited - as a gift, they decide to offer the newly wed couple their own palace, the one Desired's mother visited regularly. The fairies even move by magic the palace on a beautiful meadow near a river, so it could be more reachable by humans. Becafigue ends up marrying Gillyflower, with who he fell n love ; the Tulip fairy gives four gold mines to Desired "so that her husband might not claim he was wealthier than her", and it is said that the "adventures of the White Doe were sang throughout the world".

THE END

[perexcri]

will going on his casino run in las vegas: tired, overwrought, expected, hinted at by canon

will going on his casino run in biloxi: refreshing, exciting, unexpected, spits in canon's face, brings up more interesting questions (such as: wtf are you even supposed to do in a place like biloxi), implies that he couldn't afford to enact his fraud in las vegas and had to settle for somewhere else which adds both humor and interesting socioeconomic questions to the matter. oh also if he did it at the right time of year he'd get to go to a crawfish boil lol

[m0ney]

LACR 23ss*°:⋆ₓₒ

[rastronomicals]

5:15 PM EST February 21, 2024:

Pussy Galore - "Crawfish" From the album Historia De La Musica Rock (May 1990)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm

¡Bravo!

[youngchronicpain]

I have always dreamed of travel, ever since I was a little girl watching my dad leave for trips overseas, coming home with gifts for me from places I could only imagine at the time.

But when I became disabled, things got a little more complicated. Before I started using mobility aids, travel didn't even seem possible anymore. I could barely get out of my bed each morning, how was I going to stand and walk through an airport and then stand and walk and sit and stand and walk and sit through the different cities I was obsessing over?

(You see, when you are stuck in bed, particularly because of chronic pain and fatigue, you must obsess over something. Otherwise, the days get a little too long and too painful and the bad thoughts start swirling around you again.)

And so, I still dreamed. I watched videos of people traveling in the countries I wanted most to visit. I practiced different languages. I learned to make different foods. But I still yearned for more.

Once I started using mobility aids, things really opened up for me, especially after starting to properly manage my chronic pain with medicine, PT, and my spinal cord stimulator implant too. I was a very young cyborg who had to charge herself daily and take meds every few hours. But hey, that actually made me feel kind of cool! I was battery-powered, baby!

And eventually, I even had a powerchair to help me go all of the places that my body could not (or sometimes, should not) bring me.

That was years ago. Since then I have seen the temple deer of Nara, Japan. I have visited Gyeongbok Palace and eaten delicious street food in Seoul, South Korea. I have taken a train from New Orleans to LA, then LA to Portland, seeing the California coast in glorious detail. I have eaten Viet-Cajun crawfish in Houston. I have eaten a two dollar corn dog in a Las Vegas casino. I have eaten Voodoo Donuts in Portland. (Okay, I admit, food is what most excites me about travel. And plants! But that's a conversation for another time.)

Now, I look back on this past year and I can't help but smile. I've found a partner who loves travel as much as I do (who happily gets my fifty medical bags, cushions, and wedge onto the plane, and helps me advocate for myself with the airlines). Someone who is strong, and warm, and would go anywhere in the world that I wanted to go.

I wish that I could tell my younger self that it would get better. That this was possible. That I would be able to do all of the above things in a powerchair. And that it didn't matter if I could walk (just with a ton of pain), I still deserved mobility aids and accommodations to help my pain, fatigue, and mobility. I wish I could tell her all of those things.

And that it gets better. Even if it gets worse too.

[ausetkmt]

It’s Mardi Gras. Welcome to The King Cake Drive-Thru.

A tire shop parking lot has become a popular destination for those craving the beloved treat. The only problem: Which variety to choose?

By Rick Rojas

Reporting from Metairie, La., and the kitchen of Joyce’s Sweets in Ponchatoula, where he sampled a praline-filled cake fresh from the oven.

Of course Mardi Gras is about boundless revelry: the weeks of balls and the parades that shower the streets of New Orleans with beads. But beneath all that, it is also a period of metamorphosis.

A midwinter Tuesday transforms from the most mundane of days into a festival of frivolity and vice. People shed the cocoons of their regular lives and emerge plumed in feathers and sequins.

And this year, just outside New Orleans, a tire shop that for as long as anyone can remember sold only car parts has become a bustling marketplace offering king cakes, the delicacy of the Carnival season, in just about any conceivable flavor.

All you have to do is drive up.

“Any idea of what you want?” Tiffany Langlinais asked a customer who pulled up on a Friday afternoon.

It is a daunting question at the King Cake Drive-Thru. Flaky or fluffy? Filled with cream cheese? What about strawberries, ice cream, even crawfish — or nothing more than the traditional plastic baby? Cakes from more than a dozen bakeries are on offer.

Others have had the idea to sell king cakes culled from various local bakeries, at one location, like King Cake Hub in the Mid-City neighborhood of New Orleans. But the innovation of the King Cake Drive-Thru, which Ms. Langlinais opened in January with her fiancé, Mike Graves, is the added convenience of accessing that bounty of options without even needing to get out of the car.

The drive-through has drawn nurses headed to morning hospital shifts, parents with cars full of children, tourists on road trips and people with limited mobility or weakened immune systems keeping them from easily browsing bakeries. Even the food writer for the city’s main newspaper, The Times-Picayune, passed through.

“I’m surprised nobody thought of it before you, Mike,” David Scripter told Mr. Graves as he dropped off an order of dozens of cakes from Bittersweet Confections, a bakery started by his wife.

“Sometimes,” Mr. Graves said, “the best ideas are right in front of you.”

The drive-through, which takes over the parking lot of Duckworth Tires in the suburb of Metairie three days a week, often has a line of cars waiting when it opens at 7 a.m., and has sold out its inventory well before 7 p.m., its listed closing time.

King cakes have always been a staple of the Carnival season along the Gulf Coast, a crown of pastry served during a burst of gluttony and good times before the austerity and fish fries of Lent. (King cake season begins on Jan. 6 — known as Twelfth Night, Epiphany or Three Kings Day — and ends with Fat Tuesday, or Feb. 13 this year.)

A king cake, in what many consider its purest form, is a ring of brioche-like dough with a dash of vanilla, a crunchy coating of purple, green and gold sugar and a small trinket known as a fève — usually a plastic baby — baked inside.

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“It’s almost blasphemous to get cream cheese in it,” Pam Carr said the other day as she placed an order a staunch traditionalist never would: a pair of cream cheese and chocolate cakes to share with her co-workers at a warehouse store. “Those are the ones I like!”

King cakes are another front in a familiar New Orleans divide. There are those who believe that adhering to tradition means refusing to budge from how things have always been done, and those who maintain that experimentation and interpretation are not an insult to the past, but a tribute.

“Anyone can put anything in a king cake now,” Bridgett Saylor Meinke said as she surveyed the drive-through’s selection.

She grew up on old-school king cake but has been cautiously open to trying some newfangled varieties, like the bananas foster from Brennan’s (“Absolutely delicious,” was her take) and the strawberry cream cheese from Joe’s Cafe.

“That’s the one I’m on the hunt for today,” she said.

The drive-through’s menu varies some week to week, written on a white board by Ms. Langlinais. The couple buys the cakes from bakeries at a wholesale rate and sells them at a markup, with prices ranging from $17 to about $50 per cake. (They come in a range of sizes, too.)

On a recent weekend, there were plenty of traditional options, as well as the Bavarian cream from Caluda’s, an almond cake from District Donuts, boudin or crawfish varieties from Clesi’s Seafood, and lemon curd and vanilla bean cakes from Paw Paw’s Donuts.

The one with Vietnamese coffee filling from Dough Nguyener’s Bakery sold out quickly, as did the cinnamon cream cheese option from Tartine.

Ms. Langlinais wanted to lure customers with their favorite offerings from well-known spots but also nudge them toward cakes they may not know. Those from Joyce’s Sweets, a bakery in Ponchatoula, almost an hour away, are a prime example.

Joyce Galmon is known for her pralines, but she has made king cakes for 25 years, stuffing them with a filling made from broken pralines she could not sell.

“Miss Joyce has no social media,” Ms. Langlinais said. “You can only call her. She has no website.”

In past years, Ms. Galmon would sell as many as 90 cakes in a season. With the King Cake Drive-Thru, she has sold more than that in a single weekend.

Hers is a labor-intensive process, teasing out the dough, lathering on the praline filling, and then letting the cakes rest and rise for several hours. The result: a gooey, crunchy eruption of cinnamon and sugar.

“It’s got me on my toes,” Ms. Galmon said after delivering a fresh batch to the tire lot. “It was a hobby for me, but they’ve made it bigger.”

For all the excitement the drive-through has caused, it is a simple operation. From the street, it almost looks like a Covid testing site.

“No frills, as you can see,” Ms. Langlinais said, “with our tent and tables and Mike’s van.” She was referring to a raggedy but reliable 2007 Kia Sedona missing its middle seat.

Jimmy Duckworth, the owner of Duckworth Tires, gave them a pretty good deal on rent: a king cake a week. Last week, he got his favorite, the cinnamon cream cheese kind from Tartine.

“I’ve been very lucky in life,” he said. “Give them a break — why not?”

He nodded at Mr. Graves, who was busy helping customers.

“Look at him,” Mr. Duckworth said. “He’s all happy.”

A few years ago, Mr. Graves, 35, had been a lawyer in Manhattan, working in finance. Then he moved to New Orleans and started a novelty ice cream business called Bof Bars. He had no ties to New Orleans — he grew up in Chicago — but now he cannot imagine leaving. He and Ms. Langlinais are planning to get married in March.

Ms. Langlinais, who also owns a marketing business, grew up in a shrimping family in Biloxi, Miss., immersed in the elaborate world of Mardi Gras.

She became something of a king cake connoisseur. She has tried more than 100 varieties. She keeps a spreadsheet with detailed notes. (“Enjoyed the light filling but would want x3 for me to be truly happy,” she wrote of one encounter.)

“I know that it’s not a super refined operation,” Ms. Langlinais, 33, said, “but we want it to feel like us.”

There have been setbacks. One day last month, Mr. Graves woke up at 3 a.m. to find someone had busted a window on the minivan and stolen 100 cakes.

The whole endeavor has been exhausting: The excruciatingly early mornings hustling to collect the cakes at bakeries or rendezvous points in random parking lots. The 12-hour days on their feet at the drive-through. And there have been the urgent after-hours calls and texts.

“My kid didn’t tell me she got the baby!” said one friend desperate for a last-minute cake. (According to tradition, the one who finds the baby is responsible for supplying the next cake.)

The drive-through is usually open on Fridays through Sundays, but customers have asked if the couple would be selling cakes on Fat Tuesday.

Not a chance.

Duckworth Tires will be a tire shop again.

“I’ll be partying,” Mr. Graves said.

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

Okay, here's a question for you: Grima + seafood. I have a character who grew up predominantly near the water and therefore grew up eating lots of seafood, and while I feel like Grima would probably have eaten a lot of normal fish, he might balk at crustaceans (much to my character's amusement), and so I got curious to know your thoughts on the matter! I admit that I don't know if Middle-Earth's waterways would even have crustaceans, but I wanted to hear your thoughts nonetheless!

Oooh yessss more Grima + Food questions, my favourite

I don't see why Middle Earth's freshwater sources would be so different from that of Europe's where they wouldn't host more than just fish - so I think you are safe to assume if Grima lived near a fresh water source he would have been familiar with all that such a vibrant ecosystem had to offer in terms of food.

For shellfish and molluscs and the like--he absolutely would be familiar with them! Or, at least, fresh water iterations, depending on where you have him growing up. Obviously marshland vs lakes vs streams vs swift running rivers are all going to provide different options (though definitely with overlap between some of them).

Some of the shellfish he might have known include freshwater oysters, mussels, clams, snails etc.

In streams, rivers, lakes and other such there's crawfish - which was historically a huge food source in Europe (though generally not the UK, but middle earth isn't bound to UK environment thank god, especially not Rohan). This means Grima seeing a lobster would be like "huh, a very large and weird looking crawfish".

An potentially fun nuance to add is that crawfish were, at various times, considered a bit of a luxury item and so it might be something he had greater access to as he climbed up the metaphorical food chain.

However, if he grew up where they naturally occur, and depending how you want to write land ownership and poaching/foraging laws in Rohan, he might have just had them around as day-to-day food. Or, it might have been something he (and his family) secretly foraged/poached from whoever the big-wig land over was.

There are also freshwater crabs of different sorts--found predominantly streams and rivers--so that's another food source he may have been familiar with.

Lake shrimp! that's another freshwater crustacean he might be familiar with. They're generally harvested for their tail meat.

In terms of characters getting seafood into Rohan, I really don't see that happening simply because of the distance that would be required to travel and the slow nature of transportation in middle earth. If Grima is eating seafood, like lobster or salt-water based crabs, oysters etc. he would have to be in a coastal town, or very near one that transportation on ice can be done in a timely manner.

--

Another thing to consider when thinking through food access and cultivation and what a character might have had or not had, or the quantity of it, is land management.

In Europe, the medieval period saw the rise of legislation intended for protecting freshwater fish--particularly young stock and migrating spawning fish from over exploitation.

Therefore, Rohan might have laws on when you can harvest crawfish and how many you're allowed to harvest at a time from a specific area.

--

Also a fun thing to think through is the cultural relationship with fishing and how it may have changed. Rohan historically was a nomadic society, and would have likely made great use of northern rivers and lakes in Rhovanion, where they originate from.

Depending on how much they incorporated fishing into their regular food-obtaining practices (it would have been seasonal), they likely would have developed a strong cultural relationship with the activity and the food it produced. How much of this relationship survived their colonsing/settling in what is now known as Rohan is up to the writer.

Also, did Dunlanders have a strong fishing practice? If so, when the Rohirrim colonized that land, how much did they absorb? How much did they erase? We know they expelled the Dunlanders, but even in an expulsion based scenarios, cultural exchange/shift is never a one-way street. Therefore they would have likely adopted things of the Dunlander traditions as much as Dunlanders that remained may have been forced to adopt Rohirrim traditions.

From an article on historical freshwater fishing in Europe:

Archaeologists have identified fishing cultures in prehistoric societies in Western Europe, for example, among Magdalenian hunter-gatherers in France and Northern Iberia both through bones and art, while the Mesolithic period in Scandinavia was also rich in fishing communities. These fisheries continued to be exploited through the millennia, not least in northern Europe. Artisanal fishing was of great importance in the historic period for the Sami, whose specialised fisher-hunter-forager cultures existed until recently along northern rivers and larger lakes in Sweden and in Finland. The Fisher-Sami fished the lakes of Tjäurajaure and Tjieggelvas in Swedish Lapland and the Inari Sami were predominately fishermen in Lake Inari in northern Finland until recently. The Skolt Sami in the borderland between Russia and Finland were mainly fishers before the Second World War. Like other fishing Sami, they migrated along rivers to their camp sites following the fishing season and although this practice has declined, many Skolt Sami are still fishermen.

If you want to have Rohan keeping some of its migratory/nomadic culture, you can people living in seasonal establishments. (This is what I have happening in What Makes a King where Grima grew up in one such community that moved with the seasons to specific areas, which they had done so for generations.)

From the same article:

[...] a medieval example is that of the farmer fishers of the south Devon coast in England, who had secondary seasonal settlements for fishing along the coastline and in estuaries. These ‘cellar settlements’ were used for storing fishing equipment, smoking fish and replaced by permanent fishing villages from the end of the fifteenth century. The fisher farmer lifestyle was found along many parts of the British coastline, practiced most recently in remote islands such as Orkney and Shetland off the Scottish northern coast and the now depopulated St Kilda west of the Outer Hebrides. 

They're speaking, of course, to coastlines but the practice is also done inland along freshwater rivers, lakes, marshes and the like.

-----

Ok I have gone on far too long about freshwater fish and fishing.

All this to say, Grima would not be flumuxed by crustaceans and would likely look at a lobster and go "large, different coloured crawfish relation of some kind!" Crabs he would have no issue with, again they're fairly similar in appearance, with some key differences (size, colour, shape of claws). Shrimp he may know. Same for a lot of molluscs, he would likely know them as related to the freshwater version he eats.

It's taste where things would differ! Saltwater mussels and freshwater mussels taste different! That is the sort of thing where he might have a "huh, interesting" moment.

[waveofstars]

☕ COZY THINGS TAG GAME !!

Tagged by: @myriadxofxmuses <;3 Tagging: anyone!

► 𝐌𝐔𝐍

★  ⸻   comfort food(s): Any kind of mexican food, crab rangoons, shrimp, jalapeno crawfish chowder

★  ⸻   comfort drink(s): Iced coffee

★  ⸻   comfort movie(s): La La Land, The Way Way Back, My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service

★  ⸻   comfort show(s): Vanderpump Rules, Gilmore Girls, Buffy the Vampire Slayer,  RHOBH

★  ⸻   comfort clothing: Any kind of cozy cardigan / sweater

★  ⸻   comfort song(s): Graceland Too by Phoebe Bridgers, this is me trying by Taylor Swift

★  ⸻   comfort book(s): The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches 

★  ⸻   comfort game(s): Baldur’s Gate 3, Stardew Valley, Animal Crossing