#mason scaffolding

[tianjinwellmadescaffold]

Ladder Frame Scaffolding Manufacturing - H Frames - Wellmade China

[daydreaming-in-letters]

Hi! Is it possible you could do one shot about Andrew x reader having an intimate moment and him sharing his favorite poetry with her while they’re relaxing? Something sweet and fluffy (could possibly turn into something steamy totally up to you)

Please, please, please, send me more pictures, writing these ficlets is giving me life.

I kept this one fluffy. Enjoy!

The unhurried caress of gentle fingers slowly pulled you from your light slumber. You had not moved an inch in the time you had been gone, your head still resting against his chest, the steady drum of his heartbeat right next to your ear. The rest of your body lay safely secured between his legs, a blanket draped across the both of you to keep your joined heat close.

It seemed he also had not moved an inch, probably not to wake you, and the thought warmed your heart. You did not dare to stir in his arms either, afraid he might stop the absent-minded movement of his fingers in your hair. But your own body chose to betray you, the lure of his warm form underneath your own too tempting. And so you let your hand glide along his stomach and chest before it slid down to his side where it squeezed the pliable flesh affectionately.

“Welcome back, love,” he whispered, his lips finding the crown of your head in a tender kiss mere seconds later.

“Still deep in the Heaney, hm?” you deduced as, from the corner of your eye, you spotted the book that was sitting in his other hand. As it had been ever since the two of you had cuddled up on the sofa together.

He hummed in affirmation, the guttural sound rolling through his chest and spreading onto your drowsy form, as if you had needed to be soothed further. As if that was even possible.

“Will you read to me?”

There was no chance you could have seen the blissful smile on his face without moving, but you could hear it, loud and clear, in the fervent, “Yeah!” that followed your request promptly. He was always so happy to share his beloved poetry with you and you basked in his enthusiasm, his melodic voice and passionate recital. It was heaven.

But as his hand left its destined spot on your head to turn the pages, you almost regretted asking. An agonised whine broke from your lips upon the loss of contact and he could not help but chuckle at your antics, making his attempt to shush you not nearly half earnest.

“Sh, love, focus now. This is a beaut.”

“I can’t!” you protested. “Not as long as your hand is not back where it belongs.”

You knew he was shaking his head in amusement, still his fingers catered to your needs immediately and it was only then that you felt yourself relax against him again, ready to hang on every little word he would grace your ears with.

“Scaffolding, by Seamus Heaney,” he began, the heat of his breath wafting through your hair, and you were home.

“Masons, when they start upon a building, Are careful to test out the scaffolding;

Make sure that planks won't slip at busy points, Secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.

And yet all this comes down when the job’s done Showing off walls of sure and solid stone.

So if, my dear, there sometimes seems to be Old bridges breaking between you and me

Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall Confident that we have built our wall.”

He paused for a moment to let the words sink in, but it did not take long for his enthusiasm to break loose.

“Isn’t that a lovely one?”

“It’s beautiful,” you confessed, feeling compelled to lift your head and glance up at him. The most genuine, heartwarming smile awaited you and his happiness about your approval was everything. How on earth you deserved this man was absolutely beyond you, but who were you to question his choice? All you really could do was enjoy every single moment the two of you were granted together. He must have thought the same, even if he did not tell you so. It was evident, written all over his face. In the softness of his eyes, the placid smile upon his lips, in the touch of his hand as it ever so gently cupped your cheek, the book lying abandoned somewhere on top of the blanket now.

“Come here,” he whispered, but he did not wait until you moved, his head already leaning down, eager to meet you halfway. Still, when his lips finally touched yours, there was no hurry in their movement. You had all the time in the world. And hidden within his sweet taste on your tongue, there was a truth so plain and yet so absolute, that whatever storms there were to come, the two of you had built your wall.

[joldfish]

Where did you learn to draw like that? It's such a unique style!

I have a hard time placing what "my style" is, so I'm curious to hear what other people recognize in my art as distinctive.

Most of my practice probably comes from trying to imitate specific bits that I like from the art I consume, though I usually give up part of the way through on trying to guess what the artist was thinking about and just blend it with whatever shortcuts I've developed over the years. This often involves just whatever physical motions are most comfortable. My hands and wrists suck so I tend to give up on precision and cleanliness and lean into messier linework.

Some specific artists I pull from are Worthikids, Mason Lindroth, Jack Stauber, Paru Itagaki, Ryoko Kui, thecatamites, Rankin Bass, Vewn, Mike Mignola, qugre, Katsuya Terada, Dev Madan, Fumito Ueda, Yoji Shinkawa, and Mortis Ghost.

Anatomy is worth learning, but I think less about the details and more on the big picture rigid forms and the pulleys that squash and stretch to move limbs and fingers. Gesture drawing is probably the best way to get better at this (and I don't do enough of it lol oops).

I sort of think of characters like squishy puppets. I block in the joints in relation to the head/chest and try to imagine how the muscle/fat/clothes hang from their scaffolding.

I wish my art was composed of more bold forms and symbols, but elegantly simplifying complex forms is difficult and I have trouble imagining things in my head so I'll fall back on imitating realism as a crutch.

For palettes I usually lean towards complementary, triadic, and analogous hues and then mess around with the saturation and value until I like the resulting mood.

[torchlitinthedesert]

Happy Birthday to McGough & McGear, released 17 May 1968! And happy birthday to Derek Taylor’s marvellous press release, too:

The album was launched with a small lunch party, and the copies given to those attending had a typed (multiple carbons) press release enclosed written by Derek Taylor in very stoned mode, which has become very collectible. It read:

HELLOW.

Thank you for coming to lunch.

It is very nice of you and we are your friends.

Now then, what do you want to know about it all?

“Oh well of course” you may say “How do we know what we want to know; surely you would be the best judge of that. After all is said and done, what is there to know?” It is so much a case of guessing, for there’s no knowing what anyone would want to know.

No.

Let us guess. Eyes down.

“Our father, all the eights, 88… …”

We are already confusing the issue.

This approach is what the psychologists call “maze making” or “problem posing” or “crisis creating” brought about in order to find a solution, or an exit line.

Now … …. Some names … …

Jane and Mrs Asher … William I Bennet (WIB) … Spencer Davies (is) … Barry Fantoni … Mike Hart … Jimi Hendrix … Vera Kantrovitch … Gary Leeds … Dave Mason and Carol … MIKE McGEAR … ROGER McGOUGH … John Mayall … Paul McCartney … John Mitchell … Zoot … Graham Nash … Viv Prince (yes) … Andy Roberts … Prince “Stash” de Rola … Paul Samwell-Smith … Martin Wilkinson …

What have they in common? What have they not? They are all beautiful. The two in capital letters are here today. They made the album. You have in your hand or adjacent. They are in the Scaffold. (The capital letters were mine not theirs. McGear and McGough have no egos.)

The other people are friends. Friends. Friends who all contributed to the album in one may or many or all or a little.

At any rate they all went into the recording session and sang or played or beat some tangible thing or simply waved their arms to create in the air some benign (we mean, of course, benign) turbulence

McGear and McGough are from Liverpool poetic and funny, concerned and open….

Well listen, we are all here together now aren’t we? In circumstances such as these, who needs a press release?

Have we not tongues to speak.

You are kind.

Thank you.

Derek.

From Barry Miles, The Beatles Diary Volume 1

(This track listing has some suggestions as to who played on what.)

[thingsthatbleedfic]

Mind sharing another snippet from the next chapter? 👀

Sure anon! Here's another snippet <3 also you'll be happy to know that we officially finished a beta draft of chapter 10 and have now moved to finishing chapter 11!

The building is in a nondescript part of town, much of it under construction. The imposition of scaffolding and cement masons has left it bereft of citizens, especially at this hour, when not even the crews linger.

The building that the Doctor has chosen for this meeting is one of the more finished structures on the block. It stands primarily in concrete, dressed in poly sheeting.

It towers above them now, an obelisk. Only the ground floor entrance emits light. It’s a sour white light—a clear signal, intended for Yassen alone. This is where he’s expected. The automatic doors sigh open.

The lobby is bare. A skeleton of a room, without even flooring laid over the foundational pour. It’s composed in shades of gray. Stairwells sit either side, symmetrical, on the far side of the lobby. A bank of elevators sits center, and the only furniture is a sprawling, multi-sided desk, moored in the midst of the space.

Dr. Three would not come alone—it was an easy assumption to make, but only confirmed by no effort made to conceal the fact. Four armed guards cover each exit.

Several paces ahead, Dr. Three mars the scene. Dark suit and placid face like a thumbprint on an otherwise spotless pane of glass. His hands are folded behind his back, and a smile plays over his face. The picture of pleasantry, framed by the guards flanking his sides.

Two of the door guards silently step into Yassen’s shadow. Yassen feels anything but pleasant.

“Doctor.”

Dr. Three inclines his head. “Cossack. Lovely to see you—you look well.”

[missmissypaperdolls]

andersonstone Gargoyles x hellsing au

At first, the discussions were just for a memorial statue, as if that’s something really to burn in everyone’s memories. Yet, the talks and talks circled around, some erection of the battle, some momento of what had happened- as if anyone could dare to forget. And that’s when the idea was planted, not at all for some grand gesture of monument. But, for carving the stone, the living stone, into what will be a soldier- what will become alive- what would look in form, in shape, and in face, in size (perhaps actually a little larger than the original source), a copy in attempts, with a few necessary modifications, such as what was required for the magic, the spell to take- the creature would need wings, not quite angelic in shape or form, and a tail- of course, for balance but all other markers would be modeled from the once living human known as Father Alexander Anderson (Lord God bless and keep the soul, Amen).

The carver was skilled, he had to be- the amount of magic stone the church had acquired for the project was limited, precious and valuable resource, rare, even more so then the natural born gargoyle creatures that they mimicked in the carvings. None of the grey white stone could be wasted. For the assignment, the old Father Peterson had been assigned, from section VI Bartholomew, the section was in charge of building, carpenters and craftsman, resurrecting and rebuilding many of the razed churches, and also within it, masons and laborers, those who were skilled trained since youth to hone their craft and skill to precision. As the rest of the church their numbers had suffered and dwindled, he was the oldest among them and not many years left unless Lord allowed. Yet even in his great age, his skill and hands served him well, his tools remained steady and his eyes remained bright and clear, all through the blessings of God. Father Nathenial Peterson had made many fine statues of Saints and of Christ, of Mother Mary and of angels in his years at the church, each fine and lifelike stone, that one might pass and think it would move. If any was to the task of forming what will be, it was him. And so he was given as many images the church had as references including a poor drawing a child had done (how is that helpful?), which was not many pieces for photography of the former Agent of Iscariot was unwise, Anderson was as secret as the rest, shrouded in mystery, as was necessary for all those who served, yet with enough angles from bits of newspaper, Natheniel began his work. Lucky for him, Anderson shapes lended well to being a block form. The face was sharp, the jaw wide, the nose and brow- the eyes were always the hardest for any stonesmith, and for that Father Petterson took his time, his worn hands with small tools chipped away for days, breathing and praying, that the beast will fill with life, blessed by Lord God, with a soul- he built scaffolding for the shoulders, sitting above the block and chiseling. Even the bits of stone he broke off to form, would be used for other works, tools and weapons, a few which the creature would wield. And so, for almost four years, he worked- the block slowly looking more like a man, but not quite a human for its scale size was large and the wings broad. The runes were marked under the soles of the feet, along the back of the calves, into the spine, along the tail and curves of the shoulders, along the wings, each one delicate and neat and precise- as needed- for any mistake and the work would be wasted, the magic must be true, must be correct, each mark in place, in order, and set with prayer and purpose with silver tools. This was the most notable difference between a man made gargoyle creature carved and those who were naturally born from living stone eggs- the ones born in the wild had no rune marks, they were given life by God, not by magic beckoning for God’s blessing. And so the last rune mark is set, upon the creature's breast where under the stone a heart should be- Father Peterson draws away feeling like a proud papa, hoping the sin of pride won’t corrupt the being. The last step, a blessing christening, the baptismal holy water set, the words spoken over the forehead, the cross along its brow- and named, so it may live. “Rise now, wake from sleep, and serve God Lord in a new life upon this Earth, be blessed with a soul upon the authority of Christ I shall call you Anderstone.” Yes the name perhaps could have used some workshopping but he wanted the creature to have its own name separate from the man who it was modeled after yet harkening to its origins. He waits, for now God must work.

He prayed that it may take the first breath of many. His son, his creation, his pride. It stood, in the moonlight, of the church atrium, and the stone eyes closed, the room settled with a feeling no man could name, the pulsing of magic, and it’s lungs filled, the chest rose and fell and the eyes opened, a glowing vivid deep green like jade stone the rest of it remained grey white, the large clawed tip hands moved as if testing. The tail flashed flickering. It was most certainly alive, and most certainly curious- of how it became to be- to exist- yet somehow knowingly of things, and it spoke one word upon the air in a deep accent “Amen” and so it was done, Anderstone was born. Father Peterson echoed the sentiment “Hallelujah Amen” The work had just ended and just begun all the same, for Anderstone was not born to just stand about basking in its own existence. It had a purpose, a reason and a mission, to serve, to protect, to guard, to guide, to watch, to learn, to battle, to fight, to be a soldier, God’s weapon, God’s tool. It did not know some things, and so he was taught to read, a necessary lesson, for the Word of God in the Holy Bible was a weapon itself, and the creature took to books like fire upon a dry plain. Anderstone would be Father Peterson’s last creation, his last statue, he already knew before he finished the stone figure. It was his last masterpiece. His old age would catch up with the carver. Now was to turn the being over to be trained. Some things such as walking, climbing and even gliding came naturally to the beast man. But more skilled combat and weapon welding needed to be learned.

--

Idk I had a half thought idea it would be cool if Alexander Anderson was a gargoyle. Yes Anderstone is a stupid pun name.

[scotianostra]

1st October 1788 - On this day Deacon William Brodie was hanged along with his accomplice George Smith for burglary and housebreaking.

Prior to his arrest, Brodie had been living a double life. By day he was known around the upper-class parts of town as a successful businessman, council member and deacon of the Edinburgh Incorporation of Wrights and Masons. He was a professional carpenter, and did work for some of the richest people in the city.

However, by night he could be found in the taverns of the Cowgate, where he was known as a prolific gambler and womaniser. His nocturnal activities included founding two illigitimate families, and ran him deeply into debt.

His legitimate occupation provided him with the means to make considerably more from his clients than they had intended. When working on a house or other property, Brodie would usually be provided with a key to allow him access (since the occupants would not wish to be present during the work). He would make a copy, and then wait a while after completing the work and returning the original. He would then use his copied key to enter the unsuspecting client's property and rob them of all their valuables, entering and exiting without leaving a trace of his presence. His first crime was the robbery of a bank, whose safe he installed and then emptied of £800.

This technique proved incredibly successful, and Brodie quickly found it to be far more exciting than his previous gambling career had been. He became a one-man crime wave, committing so many flawless burglaries that the council was forced to form a special commission to investigate. Brodie, as a highly-respected council member, was of course asked to join it, and derived even greater pleasure from investigating his own crimes.

Brodie's thrill-seeking addiction to crime only increased, and he decided to form a gang to commit even larger thefts. He found three willing accomplices, and together they decided to rob the Excise Office in the Canongate.

The plan might have gone off without a hitch, except that Brodie, who was acting as lookout, had decided to make the robbery even more exciting by getting drunk first. Alarmed by the sound of an approaching guard, Brodie fled the scene and left his gang to be captured.

Knowing it was only a matter of time before his accomplices informed on him, Brodie fled the country. he was eventually arrested after having been identified in Amsterdam, trying to book passage for the Americas. He was found hiding in a wardrobe and brought back to Edinburgh to face trial.

It did not take long to find the erstwhile deacon guilty, and he was sentenced to hang on the recently installed set of gallows on the Royal Mile, which Brodie (as chief carpenter in Edinburgh) had helped to design and fund only the year before, though he did not as popular legend holds build it himself, nor was he its first victim).

It has been suggested that Brodie planned to cheat the hangman through the use of a silver tube concealed in his throat to prevent strangulation, or a set of cunningly-rigged chains and hooks to support his weight. If this was the case, then his devices let him down, as he was declared dead on the scaffold and buried later that day in an umarked grave in Buccleuch.

The deacon's double life eventually helped inspire Robert Louis Stevenson to write The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde: Stevenson's family had owned a cabinet made by Brodie, and the story had fascinated the author as a boy: a man who could divide his nature between upstanding moral paragon and criminal monster with no-one ever learning that the two were linked, until the monster destroyed the man. Brodie's history was a perfect exploration of the duality of human nature, and the dangers of indulging our darker sides.

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[fellow-weary-traveler]

Elect of the Nine | Elu of the Nine Morals and Dogma - Chapter IX Part VII The dread of punishment will never make a Mason an accomplice in so corrupting his countrymen, and a teacher of depravity and barbarity. If anywhere, as has heretofore happened, a tyrant should send a satirist on his tyranny to be convicted and punished as a libeler, in a court of justice, a Mason, if a juror in such a case, though in sight of the scaffold streaming with the blood of the innocent, and within hearing of the clash of the bayonets meant to overawe the court, would rescue the intrepid satirist from the tyrant’s fangs, and send his officers out from the court with defeat and disgrace.

[longeyelashedtragedy]

gimme a whole speech on the writing of visited upon the sons, pls

ok! i hope you mean this for real and aren't going to laugh at me for giving a whole long serious answer (omg sometimes the 'i was a weird kid' instinct kicks in) but i assume your kindness 💙🤍

random trivia: i almost never write with music on, cause my head is so wild about music that it's too distracting, but i wrote this with "money" by pink floyd on repeat and i'm honestly not sure why? (i also wrote "digestif" listening to motorhead...not sure why either but u gotta roll with it)

where to start...

i wrote a really big chunk of the beginning while standing under some scaffolding waiting for a freak summer downpour to end so i could go get iced coffee. that's my favorite way to write--in a weird place on my notes app full of autocorrect mistakes and other things like that because i'm so in the zone that my brain is going way too fast for my fingers to keep up.

i was sooooo Absorbed in fact that i didn't realize until a couple days later that i had written it really oddly without realizing? You know how in 3rd person pov even if you're writing one person's perspective and you're in their head so you know their emotions, thoughts etc, you still narrate with the character's name? Like...Mason chokes on the the sip of water he was trying to take.  “Uhhh…that’s kind of fucked up?” he manages to squeak out in between coughs.  This is making him think things he doesn’t want to think doesn’t want to think doesn’t want to—He coughs again and runs his fingers nervously through his fluffy hair. that kind of thing? what i realized is that i had written this POV really strangely and tho frank is the POV he never refers to himself by name? is that a thing? i was like "well that's weird" and tried to fix it but the fic refused...it made the POV feel too distant when the point of the fic is that he's increasingly lost in his own mind. the closer you as the reader are to that, the better. i trust my writing instincts like--if i instinctively wrote that way then it must have been for a reason! (note that the middle section is written in the "traditional" 3rd person way which again just--felt way better because that section is soooooort of a coherent narrative--which is also kinda done for a reason)

however this meant i had to repeat mason's name WAY more than sounds natural so it wasn't confusing, and if i just Did that with no explanation, that's the kind of thing i'd pick up on as a reader and would consider to be unforgivably bad writing. so, i called it out directly in the fic, and gave it an in-world reason, which then actually became the fic summary 😂 (Mason, his Mason—It’s the repetition that dulls the emotions (some people would call that repression, wouldn’t they, but that word implies something wrong with one’s mental state and there’s nothing wrong at all) My fic my rules!

this fic was written really in like, 2 or 3 days of writing. it was nearly impossible to just write little bits here and there. this pov was very demanding of my full attention because i also had to disappear into franko's mind to write it and it's hard to just like, do that when you have 10 spare minutes. because of this i almost gave up on it because it felt like i'd never be able to regain the momentum of the first writing day and also--also--i struggled with the structure SO HARD. my initial plan was to have the fic start out normally, and then intersperse frank's memories with the present, and each time he re-joins the present from a memory he gets more and more fucked up. (and of course, mason is clueless to it at first, and then he's all ?????) you can see lil remnants of this throughout--i think mostly in the beginning when he pours the rosé. (His fist clenches around the bottle as he pours and Mason catches that too. For fuck’s sake, he’s not supposed to.) Initially, the first section of the memories section--Dad getting too worked up about young!frank wanting to drink something pink--was going to come right before that, so there was a direct context--oh, he's remembering that while he pours. BUT--

that happened to work there, but i realized if i kept doing it like this i was going to be imposing something way too restrictive on the rest of the fic. i'd have to create each bad memory and then make the corresponding "present day" section relate to that memory and there'd be no way to make that happen naturally without seriously forcing some part of the story, and who wants that? this got me so stressed out especially as the (self-appointed) King of the Flashback that i wondered if i should just leave them out altogether. somehow i decided to write all of the flashbacks i would want to have in an entirely separate document, and then just write the "present" parts all at once, and then decide how i'd want to combine them.

2nd trivia point: because of this, this was one of the only fics in recent memory i've ever written relatively in order from start to finish. usually i write a beginning and an end and then fuck around in no order in the middle till it's done.

i can't quite remember what happened next, but i think i then did skip a bit to writing the end, and suddenly my mind wanted to develop something that came up earlier in the fic, at the beginning, where he refers to the feeling of something pursuing him. i think i meant that more in a vague sense at the time, and wasn't going to explore it, but (maybe something from @new-berry inspired me? possibly?) considering how fucked-up i wanted him to be at the end vs the beginning, and how coming out of a dissociative episode your relationship to yourself and to the world around you can be really wonky and fucked up--at least in my personal experience--i realized what if i could make that concept a lot more Real, and put in the imagery of a ghost in the room. but what kind of ghost? well, obviously not an uwu scary ghost, but you can come to your own conclusions as to what he thinks is "haunting" him.

this meant that i could write that last paragraph, which sincerely is one of my fav endings i've written in a long time, and as often happens when i write endings, the whole fic then made sense to me. and i realized instead of writing scattered memories and having frank's behavior in the present Escalated, i was going to drop the entire memories narrative into the fic in one big chunk, creating a story within a story, and have it be so all consuming that he completely loses track of what is happening. (which i feel like is an especially wild thing to do while you're having a Sexual Encounter and thus leaves mason rightfully disturbed--love me some Wretched Sex!!! sorry!)

i had a couple people tell me they completely forgot what was supposed to be happening while they were reading it, which made me so happy because that was what i wanted!

when i see this mf i see a dude who is so tormented and repressed and shaped by how he was treated as a kid. his dad made football his life so oppressively (in some ways) that he has, as he's said, no hobbies other than football and reading and now that football is no longer a good place for him there's just nothing left. add that to the fact that he clearly has never ever really healed from his mom's death in 2008 (and you can say a lot about his disingenuousness and lack of accountability as a coach, but the extended part about how he dealt with grief and loss on the diary of a ceo podcast was so fuckin real and it was a bit wild to see a famous person be so open) i feel like someone like this has a mind like a haunted house and can't quite go about things "normally." i wanted to create this feeling in the fic.

the best writing experiences turn into therapy sessions and when i was done writing i realized that i was expressing something about myself through it, which is how uncomfortable i feel in situations with a lot of very cishet expectations, as someone who is VERY not het and stealthily very not cis. i had already known this of course from conversations with coworkers, but this fic made me realize how much i fucking resent it--how much anger i feel toward it really--which was...interesting to learn about myself i guess.

anyway that's visited upon the sons for ya. i'm sure i left something out, but i feel sad that i'm no longer writing it, cause it was one of those experiences that make me think writing is fun. i always think writing is fun, but you know what i mean?

(footnote: my fic that i've been referring to as 'bitter mutual cheating' takes place around 2 months after this one, and it's from mason's POV and he reduces the whole upsetting experience to one line (Frank sounds panicked, and there’s only one other time that Mason can remember hearing him sound like this–that night with the West Ham jersey where Frank seemed to go kind of crazy and he had to tell the guys in the dressing room that it was his sister’s cat who had scratched the shit out of his back) which is just kind of a fun mindfuck for me. 7000+ words of agony but all mason even was aware of was...that, lol.)

(OH, i forgot! in the last line: Holding his Mason tight like it loves him, that word "like" is important. is he realizing--just for a moment--that his "love" for Mason is just kind of a placeholder for something else? someone else? we'll see...)

[tianjinwellmadescaffold]

Ladder Frame Scaffolding Manufacturing - Welllmade China - Masonry Scaff...

[dig-with-it]

Scaffolding

Masons, when they start upon a building, Are careful to test out the scaffolding; Make sure that planks won’t slip at busy points, Secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints. And yet all this comes down when the job’s done Showing off walls of sure and solid stone. So if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be Old bridges breaking between you and me Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall Confident that we have built our wall

— Seamus Heaney

[cedarxwing]

Random worldbuilding stuff

De figuris Veneris, Chapters 6-8

The Shermans were the family Dolarhyde would have killed next if he hadn't been caught in Red Dragon (they lived in Oklahoma instead of Pittsburg, though).

Paregoric was not a controlled substance until 1970 and was still available over the counter without a prescription in some states until the 90s.

Lily of Florence. Hannibal would have seen this flag hanging from the Palazzo Vecchio during his time in Italy.

The Salon of Lilies is where the directors of the Uffizi Museum and the Belle Arti Commission met at a joint session to argue if Hannibal (aka Dr. Fell) or one of their nephews should be the new curator for the Palazzo Capponi (Hannibal, Chapter 19): "The two committees were a contentious and prickly assembly--for years they could not even agree on a venue, neither side willing to meet in the other's offices. They met instead in the magnificent Salon of Lilies in the Palazzo Vecchio, each member believing the beautiful room suitable to his own eminence and distinction. Once established there, they refused to meet anywhere else, even though the Palazzo Vecchio was undergoing one of its thousand restorations, with scaffolding and drop cloths and machinery underfoot."

I couldn't help lifting from the Red Dragon dinner scene.

Mason Verger was a member of the board of the Baltimore Philharmonic. He says in Hannibal that he never attended any BSO events, but that would be a plausible way for them to meet in a world where Hannibal never became a therapist. I thought about adding him to the dinner scene, but he doesn't really have a place in this story.

Benjamin Raspail (the original Franklin Froidevaux) was gay and hooked up with James Gumb in the books. John's line about his playing doesn't hit as hard in the movie because Raspail was still "listed as a missing person." The line is darker here, but follows period-typical attitudes about queer death.

Hannibal's special interest in Florence is because he's half Italian. From Hannibal, Chapter 21: "Dr. Lecter believed, from fragmentary family records, that he was descended from a certain Giuliano Bevisangue, a fearsome twelfth-century figure in Tuscany, and from the Machiavelli as well as the Visconti. This [the Palazzo Vecchio] was the ideal place for research. While he had a certain abstract curiosity about the matter, it was not ego-related. Dr. Lecter does not require conventional reinforcement. His ego, like his intelligence quota, and the degree of his rationality, is not measurable by conventional means." Guiliano Bevisangue is fictional. The name Bevisangue roughly means "blood-drinker" in Italian. Later: "He delighted in the writing style of Neri Capponi, banker and emissary to Venice in the fifteenth century, and read his letters, aloud from time to time, for his own pleasure late into the night."

Autoimmune encephalitis was not discovered until 2007, so Hannibal's knowledge is anachronistic.

The Woolly Bugger fishing fly was invented by Russell Blessing in 1967 and was popularized in 1984 when an article was published about it in a fly fishing magazine. Now it's one of the most popular fishing flies of all time.

For Hannibal's letter, I quoted The Complete Poems of Michelangelo, Sonnet 89, translated by Joseph Tusiani, but Hannibal would have translated it himself. He flips the pronouns in the English version. The homoeroticism of the poem might not have been obvious if Hannibal was reading an older Italian edition without context. For more info see "Michelangelo and Tommaso Cavalieri: The Dual Nature of Love and Desire" by Isaak Loewen (2020).

Identifying typewriter make and model based on a letter was almost impossible after many companies began sourcing their typeface from the same manufacturers in the 60s-70s. The terminology Will uses ("alignment" and "off-foot") comes from the SWGDOC Standard for the Examination of Typewritten Items. Off-foot means the character prints unevenly.

Next: Chapters 12-19

[like-ghosts]

Dead Drops 5 (Part 2a): The Siren City of Nuka-World

Like the last post, this section about Raiders will contain mentions of slavery. This is Nuka-World, after all.

Colter was a bitch. That much was true. However, it was Colter who originally brought together a tenuous union between the Disciples of Pain, the Operators Group, LLC, and P.A.C.K. - the Partnership for Active Collaborative Killing. Uniting, he was decent at. Running a raider empire, he was not. His tenuous rule was supplemented by his right hand man, Porter Gage, and his enforcer, Lex. Gage and Lex, as all raider underbosses did, quickly conspired to overthrow Colter and his lazy supporters. Colter handled inter-factional relations and attempted to play the faction heads against each other. Lex conspired then to sow disdain for Colter by sending small teams of loyal Disciples to sabotage the Gauntlet, artificially enabling more and more newcomer to get through, forcing Colter to spend more time doing his newfound hobby, killing those who emerged on the other side of it.

Finally, upon discovering the plot, Lex was forced into exile, though it would not be long before she returned through the Gauntlet, wielding a car bumper that she hammered into the shape of a sword. Tossing the heads of his guards that stood against her towards Colter, she demanded a duel, then proceeded to outsmart his electified power armor with a Thirst Zapper. She toyed with him for the next hour, systematically destroying limb after limb of his armor until he collapsed. She took great pleasure in ending his life, humbling and sadistically prolonging his death for all of Nuka-World to see. Colter's death was not challenged by his sycophants, either by fear or by Gage's political soothsaying. Lex claimed the title, and then proceeded to promise an expansive and lucrative future for the union of raider guilds, immediately sending task forces to conquer the rest of the park.

Mason was not satisfied when his Pack drew the short straw. Everyone knew there were only 5 park districts to control, and Mason's claim over the Safari Zone was not enough for him, even though it was the largest park in the complex. He planned his own coup, only for it to fail, miserably. He only was able to muster a slim majority of his faction, and he split his forces to take the power plant and dam simultaneously. The latter group failed to detonate charges at the dam, and the power plant's tenuous hold was only temporary. Mason's faithful would be purged, and those who sided with Lex were rewarded. Weylan, who had proven his worth to Lex by bringing her the head of a Deathclaw, would be named interim alpha of the faction, while Mason was used as a public knife sheath for the next few days. Finally Lex spared his pain by gutting him on a scaffold in front of the Fizztop Grille.

After the question of political unity was answered, then came the opportunity to turn Nuka-World into a paradise. Well, a paradise for one group of people. Quickly, the Connecticut Valley became a haven as a shady bordello with a casino attached to it, with slave auctions being a sideshow. That sideshow was where the real money was made, however, and the unique skills the raiders possessed, that of savagery, avarice, and domination, melded quite well to rival Paradise Falls in terms of acquiring and training human chattel. To avoid going into too much detail, assume "human chattel" to mean all senses of the word.

The sudden influx of raider survivors came as a bit of a shock, as the Commonwealth's population of Raiders - while full of weak suckers - were well on their way into domination of an even weaker settler population. It was "That Bitch Ashley" behind it all. Having the puritan Minutemen of the Commonwealth at the helm of their republic proved to be both detrimental and helpful to their business, as the loss in coercive income from the east was supplanted by new employment. Nuka-World rocketed from a raider camp to the New Vegas of the East, but with sickening upon sickening twist.

[sergioguymanproust]

An architect can dream up buildings that are out of this world ,an engineer can figure out the stresses and the ratios ,the stones that will support immense weights and the span limits for iron and oak timber , but the carpenters and masons are the ones doing all the physical labor and building the scaffolding for them to move the materials up to the very top ,and are subject to all the dangers that imply working safely,but sooner or later some will injure or die .They are the unsung heroes of architecture.Today we marvel at these structures but the credits are given to the architects only. Let’s not forget about that gave their sweat and their blood for these buildings that still stand as testimony to our civilization .Think and say a prayers for those long gone souls. Words by Sergio GuymanProust.

JOHN TOWNER, Paris, France

[divinejhonson]

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