#but the externals are...ehhhhh

[getvalentined]

The result of that flash poll I did the other day, Riv wound up winning so here he is!

Random OC lore below for anyone interested.

Riv is the oldest of the aur, a species unintentionally formed from the energetic aftershocks of the creation of his planet. Because there was only so much of that energy to go around, there are a limited number of "souls" available for their species, and thus the aur have a static population. Although functionally immortal, they do lose neuroelasticity over time, which eventually makes living pretty unpleasant, so they inevitably opt to pass away and allow a new member of the species to be born.

Several thousand years ago, Riv contracted a particularly dangerous magical condition that left him discolored—he used to be a very pale apricot color and his hair was opalescent white—and with chronic pain, but also keeps him from losing neuroelasticity, allowing him to live basically forever without experiencing the ennui that is the literal death of the rest of his species.

Travelers of other species who came across the aur in ancient times wound up essentially engaging in a millennia-long game of telephone that led to a gross misunderstanding of what they actually looked like, which is where the concept of unicorns comes from. When the aur finally went public as a species to get people to stop killing each other, everyone was very surprised to find that they look nothing like horses or deer. (Although they do have hooves, which is what led to the mistranslation that brought about that misconception in the first place.)

[non-sims]

been posting sims for about 10ish years & had antoinette for about 7/8 of those years and just now did a edit with her about her namesake

🙂‍↔️ better late than never...or something

I think I said this already but, middle school me watched that Kristen Dunst maire antoinette movie ONCE and it changed me.

idk if it was her name, the "aesthetics" of that era, or her history. cause I went through a deep dive reading about maire antoinette.

[shadowhatesfun]

Writing existing character descriptions! I'll add more as I go!

Super Frisk (Young)

Also known as Frisk Dreemurr

Age: 20

Description: A young SuperFrisk, newly trained from her time with Toriel, is now in town. Learning to manage the daily life of Monster Ambassador and Superheroine!

Powers: Super Speed, Super Strength, Flight, Invulnerability, Heat Vision, Ice Breath, X-ray Vision.

Solar Overload: When overloaded with yellow sunlight or releases all the energy stored inside, it releases its most powerful state and attack!

Supernova Frisk: Releasing all her power, turning her into a solar superpower, with her body looking like the surface of the sun. His powers are almost close to those of a god in this state with all his abilities at their maximum, without restrictions. However, this form will only last as long as your energy, once you run out of energy or release the form, you will be helpless for a few hours depending on how much you pressed it while using it. If you have overcharged on the form and only use excess energy to use this form, you will still have your powers, but it will have slight effects on the powers.

Solar Flare: His most powerful attack was intended solely for desperate final measures: gathering all of his body's energy and releasing it in a massive burst of external energy or concentrating it with his heat vision. Once used, it will lose its powers for 24 hours and will be out of service for a while, so caution is necessary when moving.

Weaknesses:

Green Kryptonite: Bright green rock that originates from underground, has the ability to drain SF of its powers, can also be potentially fatal, there are other types of kryptonite.

Red Sun: A Yellow Sun gives Frisk her Powers, but a red sun drains her powers, leaving her powerless, it is not deadly or painful like kryptonite but it will leave her weak, however it is easier to recover.

Magic: She is invulnerable to most attacks, but magic can affect her, not like the average person, but it does affect her.

Costume: Handmade, bikini bottom with cropped top half, with red boots and cape. Modified by Sans to be more authentic, based on the original design.

(This is drawn by @aniitaruiz, she is usually the artist of this! She is great! (i mean ehhhhh I don't know xD)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

SuperFrisk (Modern)

Age: 25

Biography: After the SFA Commander kills her, she wakes up under this incredible pressure, trapped. She is too weak and can't escape, she's not strong enough… but then she discovers that after not giving up, she finds this fire inside her that she turns to to finally escape, as if it were coming out of a shell… and from it came a new SuperFrisk…A better SuperFrisk. She was faster, stronger, more experienced, she was something more…It seems that this Blue Sun had made her something special after all…

Powers:

All Powers Enhanced: The Blue Sun has unlocked a higher level of power within her and made her the strongest she has ever been. She has all her previous abilities, but they have multiplied and improved to crazy levels, far beyond what she was before, she still doesn't know how far she can go, but it is the closest she has come to divine power levels but she is controlled so as not to let his new power go too far.

Supernova Frisk (Blue Flame): SuperFrisk's yellow solar form was now blue flames that were released. It is now a god level form. Your time in it has improved and you have more control over it and you can detransform and avoid the penalty of its use, but the downside is that the price of going too far is that you will be powerless, but now even longer than before.

Solar Flare (Blue): Now a blue sun, the force of the final movement is even MORE powerful, it could destroy planets. even universes if the right conditions are met. but now its use can reach 48 hours, even a week. It is much more powerful and you will have a better chance of using it depending on how strong the explosion or heat vision is.

Weaknesses:

They are all more effective against her: while all of her powers are even stronger, that also means that her weaknesses are even more effective and dangerous for her, while before she could still work a little with kryptonite, now it can completely incapacitate her. The distance that previously only bothered her can now leave her on her knees. She should be more cautious with all this. Kryptonite, Red Sun, Magic.

Costume: New with belt and shorts, can access items hidden in the belt, has a more modern blouse and cape.

(This version is drawn by @dioger-art, she is just as amazing! Show him some love! She loves new people! The more the better! (she's even more EHHHH…but lazier! XD Be careful with Dio Time! Never fails!)

[blowingoffsteam2]

still weirdly thinking about how the hashtags in kingstagram are heartpounds, what a simple but genius move... and people still think we are reaching. on another note, I don't know if you already talked about it, but a scene that is odd to me is when jiminy, chip and dale talk to sora while he's saving everyone. I kind of understand jiminy, since he's always with Sora and could represent his conscience but the other 2? also do you think jiminy will be with Sora in kh4?

Yeah I always thought it was weird that Chip and Dale were able to call Sora in that place, since he was basically inside the hearts of the worlds (rather than in the real, external world?) but ehhhhh I guess I can buy it. One other thing that's weird about that scene though is that in the novel, it actually describes how Sora got back into the tunnel where he then finds Kairi. It says that he opened a dream keyhole/portal on the ground and dove down into it. Which uh...seems pretty ominous given when Xehanort just warned him about how the Lich would lead him down into the abyss. (I won't lie, the thought that Jiminy and Chip and Dale there were illusions created by the Lich has crossed my mind a few times but...)

Anyway, no I'm pretty sure Jiminy isn't with Sora in kh4 since we saw him at Disney castle in the kh3 ending. I feel like they would have mentioned that Jiminy also disappeared with him, which wouldn't make much sense anyway since it was Sora that abused the power of waking.

[zkfanworkweek]

ZFAW Fan Content Creator Interviews: HayleyNFoster

Hey everyone! We hope you’re all excited for ZFAW, and to honor (ha!) ZFAW’s commitment to supporting and celebrating fan content creators in the Zutara fandom, we’re going to be rolling out a series of interviews with well-known and widely-beloved content creators over the next few weeks. We’ve got artists and fanfiction authors, some names you recognize as well as a few phenomenal up-and-coming talents, and we can’t wait for you to meet them all!

For the second interview in this cycle, we have our best propaganda creator and this fandom’s hottest new artist/undisputed queen of the animatic, @hayleynfoster!

1. Tell us about how you came to ship Zutara. What does this ship mean to you?

When I was around 14 or 15 and caught Avatar: The Last Airbender on television, I was drawn in by the art style, the humor, and the wonderful characters. I caught the episodes out of order, and the first one I saw and wasn’t prepared to be sucked in by was The Waterbending Scroll. It intrigued me at that age, and the line “I’ll save you from the pirates” combined with the tension between Katara and Zuko in that whole scene was electrifying. I remember my teenage self thinking these two have so much chemistry! And when I saw a commercial on Nickelodeon that featured fanart submitted by fellow Avatar fans, I realized that I could do that to! So I set about making Zutara fanart for myself. I stumbled onto Youtube, practically in its infancy, and discovered that people set clips of Zuko and Katara set to music (And this was still in season 1 days… so people who made these amvs were the real mvps because they were able to make compelling narratives in their amvs with like practically nothing to work with!). The AMVs really spurred my interest in this couple, I remember distinctly one Zutara AMV using the Dido song White Flag utterly capturing my imagination. I found fandom shortly after, getting into deviantart and forums. But the ship really began to mean something to me when, as I was working on my drawings in the computer lab at school, a buoyant presence hovered over my shoulder noticing my Zutara art on the computer screen. The girl was someone I had never really talked to and had only seen from afar but she immediately started excitedly saying she shipped Zuko and Katara too! In this simple shared obsession, I made one of the best friends I’ve ever had and we’re still friends to this day. We would theorize and fangirl over Avatar like it was nobody’s business; we poured over bootleg San Diego Comic Con footage that showed spoilers for season 2 before it aired; we lost our freaking minds when we finally saw The Crossroads of Destiny. We had watch parties every week as Season 3 of A:TLA aired, and comforted each other when the show ended as it did (much ranting was shared). Those are some of my happiest memories from high school… all because this one pairing from this wonderful show. Even though Zutara didn’t happen, we still chat every now and then about it. Zutara will probably be a lifelong obsession, always bubbling under the surface. And without it, I would have never realized that animation was a viable career path. It really did inspire everything including the work I’m doing to this day in the animation industry. I owe a lot to this ship and to Avatar: the Last Airbender.

2. What inspires you to create zutara fanworks?

The resurgence of Avatar: The Last Airbender this year really helped sort of spark that dormant love I had for Zutara. The show’s ending still disappointed me on the rewatch, but Zuko and Katara’s relationship arc was as captivating as ever, so I turned to some fanfiction and looking at people’s pretty Zutara art and AMVs to just revel in fanon instead of getting to hung up on the actual ending of the show. But then I realized, with quarantine and my work load being pretty light, I had time to actually make all new Zutara art for myself, art I was never fully capable of making as a kid, but now could do with my 7 years of industry experience and just… life experience. And I was inspired to do some corrective animatics to satisfy my own desire for a different ending. I just really like exploring these two characters, doing different and interesting things with them, and frankly I’m inspired to make cute, fluffy, romantic art simply by virtue of living in a really sad and depressing world. Things are so crazy right now, creating art about two characters I love being in love, is comforting. And it helps to have inspiring music and amazing Zutara amvs to just sort of stir up my emotions and imagery in my head to make into animatics and art.

3. Be selfish - if you could request one fanwork based on your own art/fanfic, what would it be? What would you absolutely love to see someone create?

Ohhhh… Well, It’s always nice to have people write fanfiction that puts words to my animatics. I am not that great at coming up with dialog myself, so I’ve just chosen to indulge in visuals and emotions for my boards. But when I read things like RideBoldlyRide’s take on my Reunion Animatic, it makes me pretty giddy. (They finally have voices!) :) And this is the MOST selfish thing I could request, but I’m not shy about saying how much I love well done amvs, so I will literally kill for someone to make Zutara AMVs to songs I like… Like, most of AURORA’s songs but especially Exist for Love, Sunseeker by The Naked and Famous, Promises or Take Me by Aly & AJ, Adore You by Harry Styles, Human Enough by ONR, Never Let Me Go by Florence + The Machine, and/or Almost (Sweet Music) by Hozier just… I can see the AMVs so clearly to any of these songs in my head, but I don’t have the tools or skill set at my disposal to make a compelling fan video. When I was in high school, I originally thought I wanted to go into video editing simply because I loved making very crappy AMVs (they were so bad you guys), but I figured out being a storyboard artist was more in my wheelhouse. haha

4. Any words for people who are new to the fandom and/or nervous about sharing their work for the first time?

If you’re new to the Zutara fandom, just have a good time! Don’t waste too much time arguing with people over your shipping preferences. I wasted so much of my teen years having pointless shipping wars with people on DeviantArt, and I’m just so much happier nowadays because I’m just making Zutara art in my little corner of the internet, and honestly, in the politest of ways, I don’t give a shit if people don’t like my art or Zutara. haha I think that’s sort of a key thing for people thinking of posting creative works here in the fandom, just make art for yourself, satisfy your own desires for the pairing, get your creative sparks flying, and create just for the joy of creating. It’s always nice to get comments and such, but simply making the art should be what spurs you on, not the external validation. And have a good time, don’t worry too much - I say as someone who worries about EVERYTHING. But honestly, making art for A:TLA is some of the most relaxed I’ve been because I make it just for me. I’m lucky others seem to like it too!

5. What’s an idea for a fanwork that you have but haven't gotten around to making?

I have an idea for a second generation storyline with my Zutara kids that involves Kya (the eldest firebending daughter) falling in love with an airbender boy (tentatively named Gora in my headcanon who’s a bit of a rabble rouser and one of Aang’s kids he had with a Kyoshi Warrior), and then they start a socialist revolution in the Fire Nation in order to dismantle all of the hierarchical societies across the Avatar world… Together Kya and Gora Fan the Flames of revolution… ehhhhh... Get it?? Oh! Oh, and then Katara, who had put in legit liberal reforms in her time as Fire Lady listens to her daughter after resisting in the first part of the story, but then realizes she can actually play a part in the dissolution of the royalty and is also active in the revolution realizing that moderate liberal reforms are no substitute for a society free of serving royalty (which she had always been uncomfortable with but had rationalized with herself that she was doing good in her capacity as Fire Lady.) I just feel like there’s a lot of cool potential for discussing these ideas and also having some aspirational change in the Avatar world. lol For aesthetics and just happy fluffy times, I can indulge in Fire Lady and Fire Lord Zuko stuff, but really at the end of the day, I take issue with the structures in a society that have to exist for monarchies to exist. Soooo, I kind of want to do my own corrective story for that… if I ever have the time or guts. On a less ambitious note, I would love to do a Zutara sparring animatic to practice doing action, but I need a good story; I am not good at doing fights just for fighting’s sake. Those are just some things I have rattling around in my head.  

6. Are you participating in ZFAW? If so want to give us a hint as to your plans?

Yes! The most I can say is I have one animatic almost finished and one that’s still being thumbnailed. The rest are probably going to be comics or emotive single pieces based on the fanfics I really like right now. :)

[bisluthq]

hypothetically, if at some point in the future during re-recording promo, someone asks about joe and she says that they had that producers/engineer zoom event prior to the grammys where they discussed the making of folklore and it was suggested to the folklorians that his contributions went beyond just being a sounding board for his gf while she wfm and they had home videos, timestamps, etc. reviewed and determined that credits were merited, would you be willing to believe that?

Or would you remain on team taylor is a cunt who's full of shit and mouth fuck her forever.

EHHHHH it’s not about willing to believe or unwilling to believe. If someone external suggested this I’d ask how much of that had to do with Joe’s identities as a white man - like how much of people finding value and importance in what he was saying was linked to how he presents and who he is and how obviously men’s contributions to women’s work are always seen as pivotal. 

And like I said to that other anon, the thing is production in music is the determination of technical stuff. If Joe was constantly talking over Grammy award winning musicians, he apparently sees this as an easy side gig which... I think is very unfair. Joe has CONSTANTLY called working in film as being a sponge and talked about how much he learns from everyone on set. So it’d be super ooc for him to walk into something he’s LESS SKILLED AT and start determining the direction. I just... ya.

There’s no way that this isn’t shitty tbh.

Finally, if he really was that involved, he absolutely should have been credited from July. It is bullshit to say they didn’t want the attention because they credited his songwriting.

[ghost-leviathan]

My red nmarker slid onto the axe and I tried to fix it but.....ehhhhh (I’m externally screaming)

[bellasredchevy]

ehhhhh you make a good point but just because things happen in real life doesn’t mean those things are right or ok—and conflict stemming from external sources can still make the story interesting. more emphasis on the sinister motives of the volturi and the looming threat of the newborn army could’ve made eclipse plenty interesting without the hamhanded love triangle and left-field butchering of jake’s characterization. and my criticism of jake’s sexual assault is the same way i’d treat any perpetrator of sexual assault, be it real or fictional. if anything, i go easier on jake because i can recognize that it’s a result of racist writing. in summation... it is possible to create interesting and realistic stories without having to resort to toxic behaviors from your characters

have your “i’m just gonna say it” moment and drop your unpopular opinions about twilight anonymously in my inbox

[raiswanson]

Tagged in by @siarven, who knows and shares my love of spending too much time on tag games lmao

Rules: Answer the questions and then tag as many writers as there are questions answered (or as many as you can) to spread the positivity! Even if these questions are not explicitly brought up in the novel, they are still good to keep in mind when writing.

Aaaaaaa so many WIPs to consider for this but I think I’ll do Dancing Sands for now because it’s my baby (And fully drafted!! Did I mention that?? This sucker could be getting betas once I get back around to it!)

FIRST LOOK

1. Describe your novel in 1-2 sentences (elevator pitch)

A captured dancer must escape a nobleman’s magical menagerie or lose himself forever.

2. How long do you plan for your novel to be? (Is it a novella, single book, book series, etc.)

Sands is book one of (at least) two books serving as an origin story for Havoc, the narrator/MC. He appears in multiple other works I have, so you could say Sands is a spin-off series but they def stand on their own. ;) 

3. What is your novel’s aesthetic?

GODS, SAND, GOLD, AND CLINKY ACCESSORIES~

4. What other stories inspire your novel?

For the story itself at creation, nothing that I’m aware of. It sort of just...happened.

That said reading the Captive Prince trilogy definitely inspired me to pick this project back up after a loonnnggg hiatus/heavily influenced one of the major subplots.

5. Share 3+ images that give a feel for your novel

I’ll do you one better and push a few Sands moodboards on you ;D

MAIN CHARACTER

6. Who is your protagonist?

That’d be Havoc! He’s the narrator, at least.

7. Who is their closest ally?

Havoc finds himself alone and isolated fairly early into the book, and part of the fun of the story is working out who’s really on his side and has his back, so this is a tricky question to answer without spoilers.

I will say a number of deities have his best interests in mind and their influence is felt early on, though...

8. Who is their enemy?

This one is easy: Marik, the noble who may or may not be behind a number of atrocities throughout the novel and would like nothing more than to break Havoc’s spirit into splinters.

9. What do they want more than anything?

Getting away from Marik and going home in one piece is the ideal

10. Why can’t they have it?

Lots of pointy swords and magic aren’t easy to slip past

11. What do they wrongly believe about themselves?

Well he’s certainly wrong in regard to his ability to handle himself alone :^)

12. Draw your protagonist! (Or share a description)

My art is “meh” at best. Have sketch a friend drew for me instead ;)

PLOT POINTS

13. What is the internal conflict?

There’s a bit about maintaining your self worth in the face of adversity, and learning to accept that sometimes you just need to open up to others, even if that’s scary.

14. What is the external conflict?

Did I mention the sharp pointy swords blocking the exits?

15. What is the worst thing that could happen to your protagonist?  

Can I say “everything in this book? Because that about sums it up.

Absolute worst thing would be sustaining permanent leg injury that would prevent Havoc being able to dance anymore. Dancing is his life.

16. What secret will be revealed that changes the course of the story?

Ehhhhh not sure there’s really any one secret to pin down that changes the course of the story. There is one big secret that heavily impacts certain characters, but that’s spoilers~

17. Do you know how it ends?  

Sure do! ;) It’s already written! And boy is it a doozy of a thing

18. What is the theme?  

I’ll be real this is my least favorite question in the history of ever because I think centering your story a theme is garbage, so skipppppp

19. What is a recurring symbol?  

Bit on the nose, but dogs/wolves (and the fierce loyalty they represent) are a pretty large presence.

20. Where is the story set? (Share a description!)

Pseudo-alternate-parallel-fantasy Egypt. It’s Egypt-but-not, set in a world where the gods have up and left and the deserts have consumed almost everything. There are oases and cities still around, and some stubborn rivers, but for the most part there’s nothing to find but sand and death.

It’s a rough, mostly lawless land peppered with wandering tribes of the few people that didn’t die in the shift that grew the desert, plagued by wealthy nobles that have claimed the desert and its inhabitants as their personal playthings.

21. Do you have any images or scenes in your mind already?

It’s completed, but I still have plenty in mind for the sequel ;)

22. What excited you about this story?  

Everything. Havoc has always been one of my favorite characters because his personality is just...so good. And god do I love the rest of the cast. They're my A Team.

The plot and subplots are pretty rad too ;)

23. Tell us about your usual writing method!  

It’s mostly just loads of whining and complaining and plunking along at a crawl until I can get someone to read the thing and tell me what they think. Then I crank it to 11 and write like 80k in a month before crashing, and come back a month or so later to try and wrap things up haha

It’s a mess. 0/10, would not recommend

Not gonna tag anyone because this is huge, but I’d love to see other people’s answers!! Fill it out and tag me so I can see your WIPs!! This goes for all of you! ;p

[xtinyslip]

"IF THAT'S WHAT I WAS? I WOULD NEVER HAVE SURVIVED YOU." it might have been who he used to but matt couldn't remember the last time he'd actually been that person. he'd crossed the line with what he had done to gabi, there wasn't much he could do to step back from that. he couldn't undo what he'd done there and sure, perhaps there were parts of him that were still good but even those were TAINTED now. "so what's it going to be? because you're not bleeding to death. not when i'm here to make sure that doesn't happen." sure, it looked like the bleeding had stopped externally but what about internally? matt wasn't an idiot. "ehhhhh, defensive much? you not talking about him says more than if you were." and of course, he was going to react with violence and threats. "let me guess? you'll tell yourself you'll kill him last? so no one else has to watch you not live up to your threats for once." oh, matt knew what being in love was like. maybe, a little too much. "that's a big ask." especially, considering he and edgar were hardly on good terms right now. "tell me what i need to know and i'll do my best. i promise." was he bluffing? no, he would try. he meant it. "is it finally time for you to learn the same lesson everyone else has? you can't always get what you want." @lcvenderhcze

FINN ONLY SNORTED, shaking his head a little bit. was he supposed to be afraid of him? oh, he wasn't and never would be. he knew much better than that. "you could try, but.. that was never your strong suit, was it? pretending to be stronger than you actually are. pretty sure you're no more than a little scared boy." shrugging, as he looked over at the other. was that what he saw? he saw .. the same scared boy that he had seen through med school. only that he was much more pathetic right now. wasn't he? "i'm not talking about him here," he didn't want to. it hurt. "he's a coward and a traitor and he will die alongside everyone else. that's for sure." and that was all that they would get out of him when it came to this matter. he wasn't talking about it or will - IT WAS.. FAR TOO MUCH FOR HIM. IT REALLY WAS. "i want you to end visitations. i don't want to see anyone that i don't have to. evernever will find his way here, that much i know, but.. the others? NO." was he talking about someone in particular? yes, maybe he was. it was easier to be alone and perhaps, that was not all that he wanted to ask, but.. they'd start with that for now. "YOU KNOW.. BOY? THERE'S ONLY ONE THING THAT I WANT FROM HER NOW. IT'S TO WATCH HER SUFFOCATE AND DIE LIKE THE LITTLE BITCH SHE IS. NOTHING ELSE." @xtinyslip

[theillustrativewitch]

Mom: what do you want for Xmas?

Me: *internally* tarot decks. So many tarot decks.

Me: *externally* ehhhhh Idk. I don't really want anything. I have too much crap to get rid of

[not-poignant]

Okay, an update on the Thelma and Louise ('Pia has two tumours named Thelma and Louise') situation!

If you're new to this situation, I have a thing called Hereditary PGL/PCC or PGL1 or the SDHD variant or gene fault. It is incurable. And it makes me grow tumours. It's also known as the paraganglioma/pheochromocytoma thingie, which are very rare endocrine tumours that are rather horrid and never benign, even if they're not metastatic. It's also known as  'you have para what?' and 'how do you pronounce that again?' and 'geez, I'm a doctor and I still have never heard of it' and 'is that cancer?' I currently have two paragangliomas. Both on the right hand side of my neck. One is a carotid body paraganglioma that sits nicely between the internal and external carotid arteries (this is bad for the arteries, they couldn’t save them the last time I had a carotid body paraganglioma on the left hand side). The other is a glomus vagale tumour that is growing in the vagus body of the vagus nerve, and this one is large enough to be pushing my arteries apart, and is a little too close to the jugular and the tympanic membrane and skull case. A hungry glomus vagale will happily eat the skull and penetrate into the brain, but...so far that’s not happened to me. *crosses fingers*

Right now, we are at the part of the Thelma and Louise movie where you're sort of in the gross part of the popcorn and the movie is dragging a bit and you're like 'we get it, it's a roadtrip, go off the cliff already.' I'm wishing I'd bought Maltesers along for the ride, and Glen's wondering why we came to see this dumbass movie in the first place.

Since the last time I updated, I've since had plasma metanephrines drawn again, and discovered I cannot actually do the 24 hour urine metanephrines test at all (because IBS). That's okay, plasma metanephrines will do.

Today I saw a high end Endocrinologist at Charles Gairdner hospital, in the Endocrinology (Endo) clinic. It was...a frustrating appointment.

Firstly, Endo don't handle the surgery, so he couldn't tell me anything regarding it, when it would be, what the side effects would be, or anything like that. (This prompted me to call my Vascular Surgeon’s office immediately afterwards and do the polite version of 'where the FUCK is my ENT surgeon already' at which the receptionist emailed Vascular Surgeon about it immediately - except he's on leave. But I *do* need an ENT for that glomus vagale tumour, even high end Endocrinologist said that an Endocrine surgeon would not be good enough / skilled enough for that glomus vagale tumour. You know what kind of tumour I don't recommend? The one that surgeons go: 'no I don't want to deal with that one I'll handle the other ones thanks.')

Secondly, *there are no specialists that deal with my condition in Western Australia.* None. Not a single one. Even Prof John Walsh (who I didn't see today) - while recommended - is not a specialist.

This meant that while I was seeing one of the best Endocrinologists in the state, I still knew more about my disease, condition, treatment options, recommendations, new research and so on than he did. Let's take a moment to think about how reassuring that felt. Glen's gonna run and get some Maltesers because this part of the film sucks.

In moderately good but entirely expected news, I'm getting an appointment for a full body MRI and it was confirmed that I'll be getting full body MRIs every two years for the rest of my life, with plasma metanephrines every year for the rest of my life. *thumbs up*  

In other news, if I want to see John Walsh - the only Endo that's been recommended even though he's not actually a specialist in this condition, I mostly have to see how my luck pans out in the next appt (Charles Gairdner do not let you pick your doctor). If I don't see him there, he has private appointments once a week in the morning, at the Keogh Institute (research).

I'm a bit frustrated at this point and mostly trying not to be. I know this is such a rare disease and these tumours are so rare that you do end up knowing more than a lot of medical staff. But I did hope for *one* specialist in Western Australia. Just one. Additionally, I was really hoping to learn more about the risks re: the surgery, all I am learning at this point is that there are definitely a lot of risks associated with that glomus vagale tumour, enough that specialists are like '....ehhhhh talk to the ENT about that one :/'

My follow up with Vascular Surgeon is on May 11th. Between now and then we're going to Melbourne for 10 days, to mostly take my mind off things. The tumours are staying pretty quiet and they're growing pretty slowly, but my PTSD / mental state has started wearing a bit, and I had my first lengthy anxiety attack the other night. Nothing I haven't dealt with before, I'd just hoped to put off that part of the process a bit longer.

So here we are, intermission is coming, and then we're back to watch the rest of the movie and the inevitably slide of Thelma and Louise into the abyss of surgical waste! Thanks for joining me, I'll see you next time! *noms on Maltesers.*

[nikkoliferous]

Ehhhhh, I’m iffy on the Hela-Ragnarok one because calling for the Bifrost at that moment, to begin with, was about as out of character as you could possibly get. 😒 So I kind of prefer to just forget that ever even happened. Lol But yeah, aside from Avengers (where he clearly wasn’t even fully in control of his own mind), his actions across the franchise as a whole don’t really support the whole “Loki is a narcissist” narrative that exists? We don’t count the play and the statue of himself in Ragnarok because 1) that was bad writing, not bad characterization and 2) he likes to pretend like he’s unaffected and self-centred (which is a defense mechanism) but if you solely analyze his behaviour--or hell, even just his body language--the idea that he only cares about himself is nearly laughable.

I suppose you could maybe make an argument for post-identity crisis Thor (2011) Loki. Maybe. But even then, he may not be being controlled by an external force, but he is essentially having a psychotic break, so... honestly it’s not a significantly different circumstance.

And hell. Even Avengers!Loki has rare moments of clarity where you can plainly see that he doesn’t want any of what’s happening. Right before he stabs Thor, for instance, he looks around and his face has legit panic and horror written on it. Which is sort of foreshadowed by Coulson’s “you lack conviction” line.

So hey, you know, I just want to put it out there that Ragnarok!Thor is actually not even equally bad but is a worse person than any not-minded-controlled Loki is. Because under any normal circumstance, I can’t fathom Loki electrocuting Thor and then stand over him gloating while Thor writhes in agony (literal description straight from the script).

Loki protecting Jane Foster deleted scene

this shows that loki really cares about jane 

he is with a hand in her back, telling her that he is there and no one will hurt her 

but again Marvel cut that why marvel! i really hate you

the movie was so rushed and short and they still cut scenes xd

ohh i can handle my lokane feels *-*

gifs from: http://whereareyouravengers.tumblr.com/post/76064738337/friendly-reminder-that-this-fucker-wanted-to-kill

[theresatherethere]

Notes: Place and Placelessness (Relph)

General notes on place

1

“To be human it to live in a world that is filled with significant places: to be human is to have and to know your place”

6

Places are “sources of security and identity for individuals and for groups of people”

41

“Here is where we know and are known, or where the most significant experiences of our lives have occurred”

42

“A place is centre of action and intention, it is ‘a focus where we experience the meaningful events of our existence’”

It’s common use in language, not abstract theoretical, but trying to understand its multiple meanings and uses (first few pages, on why studying geography matters…)

44

“the recognition that while places and landscape may be unique in terms of their content they are nevertheless products of common cultural and symbolic elements and processes”

46

Three basic elements of the identity of places:

“Static physical setting, the activities, and the meanings”

63

Quoting Ian Nairn (1965)

“So sense of place is not a fine art extra, it is something we cannot afford to do without”

Sense of place more than “ability to recognize different places and different identities of a place”… rather “‘the sense of continuity of place necessary to people’s sense of reality”.

Sense of place can be authentic or contrived

Place as an active process

1

“the ‘creation of place’, or as the development of a system of meaningful places that give form and structure to our experiences of the world”

3

“Places of meaning: they are characterized by the beliefs of man. ‘Geographers wish to understand not only why place is a factual event in human consciousness, but what beliefs people hold about place… It is this alone that underlies man’s acts which are in turn what give character to a place’”.

“A place is not just the ‘where od something; it is the location plus everything that occupies that location seen as an integrated and meaningful phenomenon” - according to Lukermann - Relph somewhat disagrees…. but it includes perception!

4

“The foundations of geographical knowledge lie in the direct experiences and conciousness we have of the world we live in”

5

“geography is initially a profound and immediate experience of the world that is filled with meaning” - Dardel

30

Ian Nairn: “‘People put down roots… I’n a terribly short time; I myself take about forty-eight hours… I would even argue paradoxically, that that mobility increases the sense of place’”.

Susanne Langer: “a ‘place’ articulated by the imprint of human life must seem organic, like a living form… “

34

Places “are created and known through common experiences and involvement in common symbols and meanings” - made with other people THOSE that are highly imageable change less, are the scenes of important haps, express power. Those that are not… that is what I’m concerned with

38

Quoting Simon Weil, The Need for Roots

“To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul… A human being has roots by virtue of his real, active and natural participating in the life of the community”

*********

Field of care:

“The places to which we are most attached are literally fields of care, settings in which we have had a multiplicity of experiences and which call forth an entire complex of affections and responses”

“But to care for a place involves more than having a concern for it that is based on certain past experiences and future expectation — there is also a real responsibility and respect for that place both for itself and for what it is to yourself and to others. There is, in fact, a complete commitment to that place, a commitment that is as profound as any that a procaine make, for catering is indeed ‘ the basis of the man’s relation to the world’”

Can we find this kind of care at Burlöv? Of course we can!

Intentionality:

42

“Places are thus incorporated into the intentional structures of all human consciousness and experience. Intentionality recognizes that all consciousness is consciousness of something”

“Human intention should bot be under simply in terms of deliberately chosen direction or purpose, but as a relationship of being between man and the world that gives meaning”

43

“…places are essentially focuses of intention”

“in short, those aspects of the lived-world that we distinguish as places are differentiated because they involve a concentration of our intentions, our attitudes, purposes and experience”

“The essence of place lie in the largely unselfconscious intentionality that defines places as prfound centres of human existence”

44

“Inteidity of place is as much a function of intersubjective intentions and experiences as of the appearances of buildings and scenery”.

PROFOUNDNESS - who gets to decide

43 - not superficial or mundane experiences…. Relph seems concerned with only the spectacular, but these are not the settings of our lives, the frequency/habit/ritual of space making them important settings of our lives.

47

“The meanings of places..are a property of human intentions and experiences”

Home

Is Burlöv anyone’s home? Do they use that language to describe it?

39

“Home is the foundation of our identity as individuals and as members of a community, the dwelling-place of being”

40

“‘the fixed point by which he knew his position in the world and his relationship with all humanity’” - quoting Handlin (1951)

Heideigger thinks that modern people are unattached, have no homes, but Relph rebuts:

“there are surely more stages of association with me places than complete attachment and complete unattachement”

44

Places are a unity of “place, person and act” — action

71

“Even though the founding of a place may be its most dramatic and significant event, place-making is a continuous process and the very fact of having been lived-in and used and experiences will lend many places a degree of authenticity” !!!!

“What appears to the outside to be homogenous and placeless, is from within n closely differentiated into places by the personalization of property, by association with local events and the development of local myths and by being lived-in, all of which five a genuineness and authenticity to somewhere quite inauthentically created, be it a subdivision of mass-produced Tudorbethan houses or a high rise apartment building”

BUT - he thinks that these places are still somehow placeless? ? ? The drama of their creation can be understood as a geologic event, and we must take up the immense forms of planners and designers past decisions as much as we would a cliff face left over from an ice age. :::

“Yet such ‘authentification’ can never be complete for it can never reach the deepest levels of sense of place” I TOTALLY DISAGREE!

Why the judgement on place attachment to second hand homes?

78

Quoting Brett (1970)

“A place in this sense cannot be bought; it must be shaped, usually over long periods of time, by the common affairs of men and women. It must be given scale and meaning by their love. And then it must be preserved”.

142

Quoting Alan Gussow (1971)

“The catalyst that converts any physical location — any environment if you will — into a place, is the process of experiencing deeply. A place is piece of the whole environment that has been claimed by feelings”.

143

“At less deep levels placeless is the adoption of the attitude described by Harvey Cox as an ‘abstract geometric view of place, denuded of its human meaning’”.

Ways places distinguish themselves

3

“Place involves an integration of elements of nature and culture; ‘each place has its own order, it special ensemble, which distinguishes it from the next place’. This clearly implies that every place is a unique entity”. Lukermann

30

As visual landscapes. “and it is usually such clearly defined and publicly observable places that feature in trade accounts or in simple geographical descriptions”.

Rene Dubos: “there is a ‘persistence of place’ — or a continuity in the appearance and spirit of places; just as the individuality and distinctiveness of the appearance of any one person endures from childhood to old age, so the identity of a particular place can persist though many external changes because there is some inner, hidden force — ‘a god within’.”

145

“Placelessness must be transcended”

Quoting Georges Maroré (1966)

“That human activity become more dispersed is inevitable, but to compensate let the occupied, lived-in space acquire more cohesion, become as rich as possible, and grow large with the experience of living”.

“This will not come about automatically but through deliberate effort and the development of ‘secularization’, an attitude which corresponds closely to selfconscious authenticity” — ehhhhh

“Like everything else in the secular city variety must be planned or it does not happen” isn’t that technique ? ?  ?

146

“What we need… is an approach that is responsive to local structures of meaning and experience, to particular situations and to the variety of levels of meaning of place”

He rejects Alexander and Gorden Cullen (visual landscape), saying they are too “formal and too rigidly prescriptive”

Just let it happen! I have the benefit of hindsight. They were writing in a crisis of identity.

“An approach that takes its inspiration from the existential significance of place” - which just happens, without planners!

“Thus allowing scope for individuals and groups to make their own places, and to give those places authenticity and significance by modifying them and by dwelling in them”.

“it is possible to provide conditions that will allow roots and care for places to develop” the human urge for making meaning is so strong, they can root in 24 hours or 548 hours or whatever, they can find meaning in non-places, if you just let them.

147

“psycholgocial consequences and moral issues in uprooting and increasing geographical movbility and placelessness”

“The only alternatives are to celebrate and participate in the glorious non-place urban society, or to accept in silence the trivialization and careless eradication of the significant places of our lives” OR let it be and let the complexity of the world reassert itself.

Peacemaking is unconscious and authentic - especially at Burov century

Place and people

33

“Place is essentially its people”

34

“The relationship between community and place is indeed, a very powerful one in which each reinforced the identity of the other”

Places as individual

36

“Although common experience is unquestionably an important element in understanding place, it does not suffice to define its essence”.

37

What is important is that this place is uniquely ad privately your own because your experience of it is distinctively personal”

43

“Such places may be defined in terms of the functions they serve in terms of communal and personal experience”

45

“It is not just the identity of a place that is important, but also the intuit that a person or group has with that place”

78

“But authentic place-making seems to have become decreasingly probable on a community scale since Hellenic times, and now seems to be vested largely within individuals”  — “the probability may have declined but the possibility and the need for such genuine self expression in places still exists”.

Caring for place

37

“In both our communal and our personal experience of places there is often a close attachment, a familiarity that this part of known and being known here, in this particular place…and the familiarity that this involves not just a detailed knowledge, but a sense of deep care and concern for that place”.

42

“Drudgery is always a part of profound commitment to a place, and any commitment must also involve an acceptance of the restriction that places imposes and the miseries it may offer”.

44

“Improved knowledge of the nature of place can contribute to the maintenance and manipulation of existing places and the creation of new places”

121

“These inauthentic attitudes to place are themselves specific form of an inauthentic mode of existence in which both individuals and societies fail to recognize the realities and responsibilities of existence, and do not experience the world and its places for what they are” THIS BOOK PERPETUATES THIS!

142

“For those swayed by the easy charms of mass culture or the cool attractions of technique this does seem to be the primary, perhaps the only, way of experiencing environments; and consequently they feel no care or commitment for places: they are geographically alienated”

What he calls existential insideness

“The various levels of insiders are manifest in the creation of distinctive types of places. The deep levels of existential insiders are apparent in the unselfconscious making of places which are human in their scale and orgnaization, which fit both their physical and cultural contacts and hence are as varied as those contexts, and which are filled with significance for those who live in them”

“Authentic and self-conscious insiders offers a similar, though less completely involved, possibility for expressing man’s humanity in places”

“Uncommitted insiders is the basis for placelessness”

143

“Placelessness describes both an environment without significant places, and the underlying attitude which does not acknowledge significance in places”

Place as not necessarily beautiful

Burlöv centrum isn’t beautiful, but beauty (or pleasurability) isn’t a precondition for place

41

“The places to which we are most committed may be the very centres of our lives, but they may also be oppressive and imprisoning”

“There is a sheer drudgery of place, a sense of being tied inexorably to this place, of being bound by the established scene and symbols and routines”.

“As the ground of our everyday lives places must partake of what Henri Lefebvre (1971) has called ‘the misery of everyday life’, with its tedious tasks, humiliations, precipitation with basic necessities, it hardships, meanness and avarice.

Authenticity - OLD MONTREAL IS IN BAD FAITH

64

“An authentic person is thus one who is sincere in all he does while being involved unselfconsciously in an immediate and communal relationship with the meanings of the world, or while selconciously facing up to the realities of his existence and making genuine decision about how he can or cannot change his situation” - could be said more of Burlov than of Malmo Central.

65

“in unselfconscious experience an authentic sense of place is rather like the type of relationship characterized by Martin Buber (1958) as ‘I-Thou’, in which the subject and object, person and place, divisions are wholly replaced by the relationship itself”.

“An authentic sense of place is above all that of being inside and belonging to your place both as an individual and as a member of a community, and to know this without reflecting upon it” BURLOV ? ? ?

68

Contemporary society, as primitive society has “the need for a sense of place” however it “certainly does not follow that places created in technologically advanced cultures are made as authentically as those of primitive or even vernacular cultures”.

Place authenticity of vernacular cultures: “direct and unselfconscious translation intro physical form of a culture, its needs and values, as well as the desires, dreams and passions of the people”.

But even supposed “self-conscious”  design is operating within a context of need, materials available etc.

Writing in 1976: “In north America the only instances of authentically yet unselfconsciously created places are peripheral to the main thrust of the society” — now though, the main thrust is the reproduction of (inauthentic) urban spaces, meanwhile these placeless places have decayed and developed their own culture.

Using the aesthetic re-evaluations of the 1970s, where people began to appreciate the dishevelled and lived in character of inner cities, thus rendering those qualities as themselves inauthentic, in the campaign to preserve them or build new ones… I am suggesting another reevaluation of aesthetics.

“But to the insider, these shoddily uniform houses are small world, each as homogenous and well defined as a village” (Hoggart, 1959)

76

Somehow the taking up of legacy architecture is considered inauthentic…

77

He argues that making authentic place is the domain of artists and inspired individuals, “most od us are condemned to live in other peoples’ houses and machine made places” - so what, making place doesn’t just stop there. Tim Ingold — there is a constant making.

78

“With the exception of the work of such talented individuals modern self-concious design has tended to result in places which are single-purpose, functionally efficient, often in a style independent of the physical setting, reflecting mass values and contrived fashion”

but what of the handyman that punches a new door into a wall, that adds a plant shelf by a sunlight, all the little modifications that make home home? These places are built, then lived in. They are containers for inevitable homogeneity.

78

“As a form of existence authenticity consists of a complete awareness and acceptance of responsibility for your own existence” — okay, I admit not everyone does this… maybe… but no…

Distinguishes between fundamental connection with place ‘I-though’, and what is possible in contemporary society, an “I-You relationship with place, in which there is a genuine response to the meanings, symbols and qualities of a place and an attempt to identify it”. — think about this in terms of interviews — of course we’re not producing the space, but is it dangerous to devalue it in this way?

81

Describes inauthenticity of technical approaches to planning. Compares to Sartre. But now THAT can be applied to preserving “authentic places” like Old Montreal…

The orthodoxy of modern planning is not forever, it was movement that has since eroded, and now we must take up its legacy and find meaning in the cracks of the concrete.

82

“An inauthentic attitude to place is essentially no sense of place, for it involves no awareness of the deep and symbolic significances of places and no appreciation of their identities”.

His description of kitsch is focused on those intentionally constructed and mass produced objects and places like motels, ponderosa steak houses with fake cactuses, overzealous baroque decoration” … but now I must include real places themselves into the mix (Old montreal).

83

“Kitsch is an attitude of inauthenticity in which places are treated as thing from man is largely alienated, and in which the trivial is made significant and the significant is made trivial.

Placelessness

45

“Kevin Lynch defines the identity of a place simply as that which provides its individuality or distinction from other places and serves as the basis for its recognition as a parable entity”

“‘there are as many identities of place as there are people’”  

But also common identity:

“certainly it is the manner in which these qualities and objects are manifest in our experience of places that governs our impressions of the uniqueness, strength and geuineness of the identity of those places”

“the weakening of distinct and diverse experiences and identities of places”

64

opposed sense of place with placelessness, but I want to suggest, placefulness as an alternative  

65

“for contemporary man even when space is unselfconsciously experienced it is primarily functional and secular and places are merely interchangeable locations”  (“but for man people there nay still exist deep psychological links with places” secular and religious…

“But however great the need for such a sense of place may be, the possibility of its development for manu people in technologically advanced cultures has been undermined by the possibility of increased spatial mobility and by a weakening of the symbolic qualities of places”.

BUT BECAUSE these placeless places have become associated with low rents, these people have less choice “for a better home in a better neighbourhood”, their place ties are real.

78

“The present trend appears to be away from a variety of authentically created places which reflect an interaction of diverse intentions and values with a respect for physical settings and landscapes, towards non-place urban relax, international landscapes and placelessness” —— AH! I can use his terms against him, but fundamentally disagree with his point about second hand homes and authenticity reserved for genius.

79

At the time, 1976, anxiety about loss of identity, much like Arts and Crafts movement was a reaction to the first wave of industrialziation - legacy is cottagey 1920s homes for the latter, and the resurgence of inner cities and peacemaking for the former.

We are creating a ‘flatscape’, lacking intentional depth - BUT INTENTIONALITY IS SO RARE AS A FORM OF AUTHENTICITY, you said it yourself!

Quoting Cullen (1971) - “‘we appear to be forsaking nodal points for thinly spread coast-to-coast continuity of people, food, power and entertainment” - these are the needs and wants of modern humans…  he says it himself later on the page “while placelessness does comprise look0alike landscapes that result from improved communications and increased mobility and imitation, behind these lies a deep-seated attitude that attends to the common and average characteristics od man and of place.” That’s one side, the other size is how they’ve adapted it to their specific needs.

Always an anxiety about modernity, I understand, I would have fought with them too. But times have changed and we must embrace the nuances 40 years later.

80

“To a very considerable degree, we neither experience nor create places with more than a superficial and casual involvement” NO NO NO

90

Placelessness is “cutting across or imposed on the landscape rather than developing with it”

109

“It becomes virtually impossible to tell one locality from another, for they all look alike and feel alike” - how bout 40 years later ,with decay?

Burlöv as Subtopia

105

Subtopia, according to Nairn, is “the mindless mixing up of all man-made objects without any pattern of purpose or relationship”.

114

Scale and giantess of industry obliterates places. “The increasingly similarity and grand scale of operation apply not to just the mining and manufacturing centres but also to the associated management and retailing centres”

I think he places too much agency on the developers of these retail centres. They’re decaying, they’re empty, they’re not profitable… not “deliberately contrived”

121

“These inauthentic attitudes to place are themselves specific form of an inauthentic mode of existence in which both individuals and societies fail to recognize the realities and responsibilities of existence, and do not experience the world and its places for what they are” THIS BOOK PERPETUATES THIS!

“Such an inauthentic existence is the very root of and essence of placelessness, and the superficial expressions that constitute placeless geographies can only be properly understood in terms of such profound inauthenticity.

139

critique of modern places as simplified signs

but burlov simple aint

:The major feature of these myths that infuse present-day landscapes is their simplicity”.

Placefullness

80

“being lived-in confers some authenticity on even the most trivial and unrelentingly uniform landscapes”.

So, it’s not about the fear of placelessness, which will always exist… it is “important to recognize that placelessness is an attitude and an expression of that attitude which is becoming increasingly dominant, and that it is less and less possible to have a deeply felt sense of place or to create places authentically” — THAT SECOND PART IS WHERE MY ESSAY DWELLS.

117

An authentic geography is “primarily the product of the efforts of insiders, those living in and committed to places, and a geography which declares itself only to those insiders to to those willing and able to experience places empathetically”

131

The everyday

“Everyday life comprises all that is humble, ordinary, and taken for granted it is made up of repetitions, of small gestures, and insignificant actions in which all the elements relate to each other in such a regular sequence or accepted pattern that their meaning need never be questioned”

132

“In everyday life a sense of social responsibility has been outmoded by a desire for individual freedom and comfort” - because of narratives of placelessness?

“The everyday landscape is perhaps more easily understoodd as all the commonplace objects, spaces, buildings, snd activities that we accept as comprising the setting for daily routines. Ut has lurid signs, car parks, wires, side splits and semidetached houses, corner stores and filling stations. It is often ugly and chaotic, looks awful in many different ays, but in some respects a vital mess because it is unpretentious and uncontrived and a more or less unselfconscious expression of peoples activities and wants” — BURLOV

139

“We have not yet found our places in this redefined world” the world with “an expanded scale of events, big and alien”, quoting Gyorgy Kepes (1965).

WE HAVE NOW

{Places with settings which are not only distinctively local and reflect a continuity of style and tradition, but also constitute profound centres of care and existence”

“they have no active part to play in the new landscape” ??? I a disagree!

“The new landscape is characterizes not by its profound meanings and its symbols, but by rationality and absurdity and its separation from us, It is characterizes too by its everydayness as the ordinary and unexceptional background to our daily lives, by its confusion tear results from a lack of focuses, discrete regions, or any familiar pattern and by its simplicity and obviousness.

140

“The roots of significance in the present day landscape are shallow”

He tries to say he’s not being negative but he is! Critique of lack of care within landscape…

Notes for the book

Burlöv centrum is not spectacular, and that’s why I chose it

The places in this book are likely ones you’ve never read about it, and that’s precisely why I chose to write about them

83

Le Corbusier “a house ia machine to live in” and you can change your machine to live in as often as you change your bicycle, your fridge, your car - same as cities

And now, the modern tourist critical of those who check off capital cities and attractions, attempt to travel authentically. But nevertheless they are tourists, they are trapped by the fact that they will be moving on. They can only engage visually - airbnb and eating authentic food and stuff.

Relph takes up the standard narrative of globalization (90). But, there is local specificity, you can find it if you look for it. Unreasoanable and unfoudned fears that also heralded academics to call “the end of geography” with the invention of the internet.

93

Disenyification! ! ! I LOVE THIS BOOOOOOK

I agree with the cyncism, but philosophically disagree with the sentiment — these tourist industries are authentic in the mere fact of their existence

Directly addresses old motnreal phenomenon - I go both ways! I hate the museums these places have become and acknowledge that the high-rises are now part of Majorca’s culture !

Why I love the placeless cheap airline airports, they aren’t concerned with concealing those that work and live there? pg 93…

97

HE DIRECTLY CITES HONEST EDS IN TORONTO AS A PORNSCAPE AHHHH

Mercantile history, not directed to outsiders, but to everyone. We are consumers, not the whole of us, but that’s what humans are. It’s fine! Honest Ed’s has been celenbrated for its immense distinctness unlike anywhere in the world ! ! !

OMG

Portmeirion, North Wales, a village collected by architect Clough Williams Ellis in the early 20th century incorporating buildings from all over the world.

101

Museumification: old montreal, stockholm, amsterdam…

Williamsburg

Upper Canada Village - built after st lawrence vally flooded. Especially ghostly…

Skansen

Milton

Black Creek Pioneer Village

ETC

105 - the subtopia

The strip mall when it first emerged , described by Ian Young, 1969 cold comfort, notes from a native land

“A flat, stark, one-storey building constructed of several huge rectangles of glass and chlakbrick, splayed across the centre of a vast, empty carparl. A few neon signs shine meaninglessly from the walls, and on the smooth black lot the white parking lines look like cryptic glyphs of gigantic proportions; at intervals between them are high white metal poles, each with two lozenge shaped bottle green lamps suffusing the whole area in a ghastly green light…the lifelessness, the chilling stillness, conveys nothing human at all. It seems like nothing so much has Maertian landscape — the first scientific laboratory on the barn surface of a cold, alien planet”

My things have changed…

“In other countries, subtopic may take slightly different form” - THAT’S PLACE EXPRESSING ITSELF THANKS

109

“It becomes virtually impossible to tell one locality from another, for they all look alike and feel alike” - how bout 40 years later ,with decay?

“Subtopias has been developed not on the basis of direct experience but in an ad hoc way from the remote and abstract perspective of maps and plans — organic cities were ad hoc too, just different technology available.

BIG BUSINESS

“To a very great extent, the landscapes of tourism and subtopic are consequences of the activities of big business, for they are inevitably made up of the products and reflect the needs dictated by such business even when they have not been constructed directly by them”

Before the nineteenth century, most industries and businesses were local and small concerns, they fitted into their settings, made from local building materials, in scale

Written at a time when sense of place wasn’t included in economic planning which affected spatial planning, but now with Richard Florida, that has received a dollar value, and has the been homogenized

There’s that game that drops you anywhere in the world on google street view. But it’s broken by its very design, it only drops you onto roads. What if you were dropped into back alleys, back yards? Kitchens? Food courts?

137

he write about ontario place - but history didn’t end and it decayed and is not home to a host of meanings

Further sources

Lawrence Durrell, The Spirit of Place

Peter Black, God’s Own Junkyard - photobook of suburbia

Stephen Kurtz, 1973. Howard Johnsons all looking the same… !

Venturi, learning from las vegas - critique of strip mall architecture

[coldgoldlazarus]

Marinette/Ladybug and Mato/Black Rock Shooter are pretty natural counterparts; both being protagonists and having the 'disaster normal/badass alter-ego' personality dynamic going on. Mato is more of a dumb jock tomboy where Marinette's a fashion designer and BRS is considerably more edgy than Ladybug, so it's a bit iffy in some ways, but still.

Chloe/Queen Bee and Kagari/Chariot also seem pretty sensible to pair up. Chloe is just selfish where Kagari is outright sadistic, so it's not a perfect fit, but both are rather childish and antagonistic blondes with a really poorly-handled but potentially interesting redemption arc. I think it works, overall.

The others though, I'm less sure about. Yomi/Dead Master doesn't have any easy counterparts at all, aesthetically or personality-wise, except maybe Juleka, and even that feels like a stretch. (They're both goth, and that's about it.) Given that Yomi is Mato's girlfriend, would that mean... Marinette/Juleka? A bit of an unconventional ship, but... I could see it. Or, if I'm just going by shipping, Lila and Yomi could arguably work as counterparts. They don't really overlap in personality and they're polar opposites in aesthetic taste... But they are both nemesis to their respective protagonists as their alter-egos, and I ship them together. (Difference is Yomi/Mato is canon, while Lilanette is considerably less so, but whatever) Ehhhhh, close enough I guess?

Yuu/Strength is another weird one; initially I was going to go with Kagami, since they both have the 'externally stoic and responsible, internally hot-blooded and angry' thing going on, but at the same time I feel like Adrien/Chat could work for similar reasons, and not be leaving the poor guy in the dust. Mato and Yuu being tomboy bffs doesn't quite mesh with Marinette and Adrien's crushing/oblivious dynamic, but since I'm not shipping them anyway it works out fine.

Then there's Saya/Black Gold Saw. Setting aside alter-egos, Ms. Bustier is the most natural fit for Saya, as both are kind teachers, older than the rest of the cast, but really that's the only thing they have in common. I think Gabriel/Hawkmoth or Nathalie/Mayura correlate much better; like Saya, they're older characters in a position of authority, with alter-egos who are mostly antagonistic yet have sympathetic goals. It's still not perfect, with Mayura committing evil acts for a good overall goal, while Black Gold Saw comes out by the end as more of a misunderstood anti-hero rather than a sympathetic villain, but there's still enough overlap for it to work. Plus, since I already decided on Adrien as Strength, him collaborating with Saya's stand-in makes a lot more sense if it's Nathalie.

...I have put entirely too much thought into this.

Now I wanna do a cracky Black Rock Shooter/Miraculous Ladybug crossover

But the real question is, should it be the BRS cast as superheroes in Paris, or the ML cast as edgy warring beings in a lovecraftian hellscape?