#problematic oak

[raymurata]

perhaps the most impossible ask: reasons why oak is problematic

See, I was just talking to @skullhaver and @ghosty-ana about that.

And here's the thing, Oak falls in love in 3 days, man. Next question.

Lol. XD but like, I'm not joking, they're ready to peel tangerines for Gal, and they've known each other for a month and flirted for literally 3 days. This fucking idiot has no chill, they're gonna u-haul Gal within six months of this relationship, if Gal lets them. 😂 They have so much love to give they might suffocate Gal with it. They'll try not to. XD A complete fool, a clingy buffoon, um tolo romântico.

And they don't let anyone sleep because they're such a blabbermouth. Problematic for the Moonlighters and Galsariad in particular. Also, they cry at the drop of a hat. They cry over everything and then some.

Class consciousness overkill? Too woke for their time, anachronistic; bad indigenous rep bc they have taken on the colonizer religion and also technology and magic. Also I didn't research the patterns on their clothes enough or choose any one culture to base myself on, I just made my own fantasy culture adding onto CR lore ( adding more nuance to CR lore).

And as Liv pointed out, they have an extremely badly calibrated love and friendship care bear beam xD The little guy (gender neutral) just spills out people's shit in the gentlest yet most brutal ways possible, and then just look cute and like, no one ever gets mad at them. They do think that being adorable and whimsy will get them far -- they know very well how to be serious and gloom, but you catch more flies with honey. Please protect me I am small. Also, can you give me a hug? -puppy eyes- Little shit knows exactly how irresistibly sweet they are.

Also, they fit the "child-like, innocent, uwu asexual character" trope. And not only that, an ace character whose backstory touches heavily on the matter of sex. I'm pretty sure a lot of people would come for my neck (others would relate, I hope. I try my best to handle this with utmost care and proper narrative weight, like everything else in Tarlyn's story), so like, yeah, oof.

Problematic little guy would get canceled or infantilized by the fandom.

Finally, they smoke tobacco. Like, everyone has to have an irredeemable flaw, amirite?

[calamity-unlocked]

I need lark to get more problematic as the season goes on. I hope he'll do something absolutely awful in the persuit of his goal (and I hope someone gets hurt), and people scurry to villainize or defend him much like whats happening with scary rn. i think i actually need this to live

[bonefarm]

It’s dipped below 105 so we’re doing some tree trimming and lawn work this week.

Maybe if the weather behaves I’ll finish my chicken yard that’s been half done for like.. 11 months.

[oakstar519]

also MIKE i wanna see more mike. why don't i get to see mike for more than thirty seconds. why is mike working in a random parking lot. actually i don't care i just want to hang out with mike some more.

[chaosandmarigolds]

imma request more bc that adoption one actually sent me to the heavens and back..

so i have a similar idea that i wanna throw out there but have it be Dad!simon riley and foster/adopted!reader. Have like, their interactions when reader has to first meet simon, and simon is able to bond with reader bc hes traumatized too

it can be like a headcannon style or a one shot, whatever idea striked you.

like actually can i be you? like you write SO GOOD so QUICKLY my writers block could NEVER

(I'm actually a Tomato right now I'm blushing so much in my school library what- thank you so much!! your words will live rent-free in my head for the next seven to eight weeks ngl

Ahem ahem I have a new thingy- Adoptive dad Simon! lil blurb (700-1000 words i think) & foster!care reader (i don't think I used gendered pronouns but if I did please remind me)

For the record, you never thought yourself to be a problematic child, sure you were a little unruly and you lived by your own rules but to be honest any person in your situation would be the same. A child whose childhood was ripped from you the second your father grabbed a beer bottle and the rest you preferred to keep locked away under a lock with a key you kept away. So you sat in your social workers office for what you thought was the billionth time in the month, hands mindlessly fiddling with your hoodie string and eyes staring out the window.

Birds. You always wondered what it would be like to be a bird, it must be nice, to be free like one at least- no matter how cliche the thought you enjoyed it.

Only for it to be ripped from you as you hear your named hissed from the workers, Margi's, mouth. With a grumble you turn to look at her from across the oak table, trinkets from her perfect life adorning it, and her perfect little family in a golden frame, staring at you- made you sick.

"Seventh school, seventh! Are you trying to have to move counties again?" She snipped at you, her voice dull as she typed something into her computer.

"Maybe I am."

Margi gives you a look, a frown written across her face, "What does that mean?"

"The Wilsons, Adams, Johnsons, Kievs, they all suck and they were mean."

"They were mean?" She mocked your voice and then scooted her chair to face you fully, "I'm trying here, kid, I'm trying. But you-" she shuttered a laugh as if she just found your mere presence unbearable, "You make it so hard, you're goin to Douglas county."

A look is etched across your face as you take in the news, Douglas was forty miles away, so the news was a bit shocking. "Wha-"

"There is a single man-"

"No."

"Yes. You'll sleep here and he's picking you up in the morning."

--

It was stupid, Price had told him he needed to find purpose in his life and that fostering might fulfill that- well...he didn't realize his captain meant dogs and cats and somehow he had passed to be a foster parent. For reasons that are beyond him. So there he was, four foster kids deep- all adopted within two or so months and then going to their new homes. He wouldn't lie, he didn't like any of them but he was sure to be as kind as possible, as...open as he could (which is close to none) but according to the children he did a great job.

Somehow.

There was a new one, problematic from the file, a story reading a bit too close to his own that he almost didn't want to take it up for the sake of his own mental clarity. However, it was urgent, and there was a need and the solider in him urged him to go on and fulfill it. So that is why he was now standing in the police station at six in the morning an hour away from his home.

A brief conversation with the social worker and a few police officers that had encounters with you, all warning him with the banter of your antics and that if he had any common sense he'd 'slap some sense into you' All of that he just responded with a glare and changing the topic.

Then they brought you out your lively hood packed into a small and tattered black and blue duffle bag and clothes a bit worse for wear, looking exhausted upon all of that. Simon made eye contact with you for a moment, it almost seemed like a stare-down- until the social worker cut in-between you both.

She motions to you as she introduces you to him and she then motions to him, trying to take your bag to hand to him but you had an iron grip, "Mister Riley-"

"Simon." He interjected, giving the worker a look, "Call me Simon."

You bite back a smile at how flustered Margi became by his correction and after a few more warnings of how you like to run away and skip school and everything you had a tendency to do you sit on the bench in the building. A good forty or so minutes passed and you wouldn't lie you were hungry so as soon as 'Simon' came over you chirpped up, following as he had motioned for you to do.

"Could we get some food?"

Simon stayed quiet until you reached the truck, letting you put your duffle bag into the back and then stopping you from getting in the front, checking your height against his chest and then with a breif motion of the hand told you to sit in the back.

Alright. You thought, not a big talker.

"Diner okay?"

"There's a good one down the street-"

Simon hums and grabs his phone from his pocket as he buckles up, holding it back for you to take, "Put it in the gps, yeah?"

A faltering silence as you stared at the phone, which was new, normally your foster parents wouldn't let you touch anything of theirs- much less a piece of technology. An unlocked piece of technology.

--

"Can I get juice?" You ask quietly as you look over the menu, subconsciously looking for the cheapest option.

"Mmhm, what else?"

To that you look up, "An...and pancakes?"

"An' eggs."

"What?"

"An' eggs," he said again, looking up from his menu, "Growin, need protein."

"I don't...like eggs." You see his blonde eyebrows furrow to your words and you mumble on, "Not alone, I like potatoes and eggs but eggs alone make me gag."

"Then get potatoes an' eggs."

Darn, there goes pancakes. So when the waitress comes back over she gets Simon's order and then yours, and you ask for the potatoes and eggs, only for when she left Simon to be staring you down.

"Have you ever been told you're scary?"

"All th' time. Though' you wan' pancakes."

A moment and you blink, "You said to get eggs and potatoes."

"Get al' three."

"But that's expensive."

"Ah, yea- 20 dollar's for a meal tha' gonna make you full an' happy is expensive," He dully replied, and then your expression he did his best to soften his expression, "Kid, is okay, yeah? Don' feel bad."

You sniffle as you see the waitress come over with your juice and his very boring black coffee, "Can I actually pancakes?"

"I'd be offended if you didn't."

(anywaaay that's it! hope you liked it! <33 ps. i love feedback and comments it truly makes my day!

[autistichalsin]

I'm loving your blog as a huge halsin stan and autism supporter so much!!!

one thing I wanted to ask because I'd love to hear your response is that my wife heard rumors that halsin is straight, which to me seems absolutely preposterous (aside from it being a weird thing to program in, considering gender is so flexible in character creation). what do you think? (if you don't have time or resources to answer obvs no worries at all, I was just curious!)

Thank you!!!!

To that rumor (not your wife, just that statement in general): LMAO..... no. It's usually said by people who hate Halsin and want to paint him as a pervy problematic straight man.

NONE of the romanceable characters are straight; all of them are pansexual. Not playersexual, pan. Here is an interview with one of the writers (who wrote both Halsin and Shadowheart) confirming it- explicitly saying the word pansexual. I think Neil Newbon, who both voiced Astarion and was a director, said the same.

Halsin is also one of the "explicitly" pansexual ones, as he mentions having had male and female partners before; one story he can tell you under certain circumstances involves a Nelanther pirate who "clawed my back and cried my name until he was hoarse" and also mentions tenderly lying with elf maidens "under the boughs of oaks."

Halsin's the textbook definition of pan. <3

[eowyntheavenger]

By Emily Strasser | August 9, 2023

At the theater where I saw Oppenheimer on opening night, there was a handmade photo booth featuring a pink backdrop, “Barbenheimer” in black letters, and a “bomb” made of an exercise ball wrapped in hoses. I want to tell you that I flinched, but I laughed and snapped a photo. It took a beat before I became horrified—by myself and the prop. Today is the 78th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, which killed up to 70,000 people and came only three days after the bombing of Hiroshima that killed as many as 140,000 people. Yet still we make jokes of these weapons of genocide.

Oppenheimer does not make a joke of nuclear weapons, but by erasing the specific victims of the bombings, it repeats a sanitized treatment of the bomb that enables a lighthearted attitude and limits the power of the film’s message. I know this sanitized version intimately, because my grandfather spent his career building nuclear weapons in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the site of uranium enrichment for the Hiroshima bomb. My grandfather died before I was born, and though there were photographs of mushroom clouds from nuclear tests hanging on my grandmother’s walls, we never discussed Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or the fact that Oak Ridge, still an active nuclear weapons production site, is also a 35,000-acre Superfund site. At the Catholic church in town, a pious Mary stands atop an orb bearing the overlapping ovals symbolizing the atom, and until it closed a few years ago, a local restaurant displayed a sign with a mushroom cloud bursting out of a mug of beer.

Oppenheimer does not show a single image of Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Instead, it recreates the horror through Oppenheimer’s imagination, when, during a congratulatory speech to the scientists of Los Alamos after the bombing of Hiroshima, the sound of the hysterically cheering crowd goes silent, the room flashes bright, and tatters of skin peel from the face of a white woman in the audience. The scene is powerful and unsettling, and, arguably, avoids sensationalizing the atrocity by not depicting the victims outright. But it also plays into a problematic pattern of whitewashing both the history and threat of nuclear war by appropriating the trauma of the Japanese victims to incite fear about possible future violence upon white bodies. An example of this pattern is a 1948 cover of John Hersey’s Hiroshima, which featured a white couple fleeing a city beneath a glowing orange sky, even though the book itself brought the visceral human suffering to American readers through the eyes of six actual survivors of the bombing.

The Oppenheimer film also neglects the impacts of fallout from nuclear testing, including from the Trinity test depicted in the film; the harm to the health of blue-collar production workers exposed to toxic and radiological materials; and the contamination of Oak Ridge and other production sites. Instead, the impressive pyrotechnics of the Trinity test, images of missile trails descending through clouds toward a doomed planet, and Earth-consuming fireballs interspersed with digital renderings of a quantum universe of swirling stars and atoms, elevate the bomb to the realm of the sublime—terrible, yes, but also awesome.

A compartmentalized project. The origins of this treatment can be traced to the Manhattan Project, when scientists called the bomb by the euphemistic code word “gadget” and the security policy known as compartmentalization limited workers’ knowledge of the project to the minimum necessary to complete their tasks. This policy helped to dilute responsibility and quash moral debates and dissent. Throughout the film, we see Oppenheimer move from resisting compartmentalization to accepting it. When asked by another scientist about his stance on a petition against dropping the bomb on Japan, he responds that the builders of the bomb do not have “any more right or responsibility” than anyone else to determine how it will be used, despite the fact that the scientists were among the few who even knew of its existence.

Due to compartmentalization, the vast majority of the approximately half-million Manhattan Project workers, like my grandfather, could not have signed the petition because they did not know what they were building until Truman announced the bombing of Hiroshima. Afterward, press restrictions limited coverage of the humanitarian impacts, giving the false impression that the bombings had targeted major military and industrial sites—and eliding the vast civilian toll and the novel horrors of radiation. Photographs and films of the aftermath, shot by Japanese journalists and American military, were classified and suppressed in the United States and occupied Japan.

The limit of theory. Not only is it dishonest and harmful to erase the suffering of the real victims of the bomb, but doing so moves the bomb into the realm of the theoretical and abstract. One recurring theme of the film is the limit of theory. Oppenheimer was a brilliant theorist but a haphazard experimentalist. A close friend and fellow scientist questions whether he’ll be able to pull off this massive, high-stakes project of applied theory. Just before the detonation of the Trinity test bomb, General Leslie Groves, the military head of the project, asks Oppenheimer about a joking bet overheard among the scientists regarding the possibility that the explosion would ignite the atmosphere and destroy the world. Oppenheimer assures Groves that they have done the math and the possibility is “near zero.” “Near zero?” Groves asks, alarmed. “What do you want from theory alone?” responds Oppenheimer.

Can the theoretical motivate humanity to action?

One telling scene shows Oppenheimer at a lecture on the impacts of the bomb. We hear the speaker describe how dark stripes on victims’ clothing were burned onto their skin, but the camera remains on Oppenheimer’s face. He looks at the screen, gaunt and glassy-eyed, for a few moments, before turning away. Americans are still looking away. As a country, we’ve succumbed to “psychic numbing,” as Robert Jay Lifton and Greg Mitchell call it in their book Hiroshima in America, which leads to general apathy about nuclear weapons—and pink mushroom clouds and bomb props for selfies.

On this anniversary of Nagasaki, the world stands on a precipice, closer than ever to nuclear midnight. The nine nuclear-armed states collectively possess more than 12,500 warheads; the more than 9,500 nuclear weapons available for use in military stockpiles have the combined power of more than 135,000 Hiroshima-sized bombs.

If Oppenheimer motivates conversation, activism, and policy shifts in support of nuclear abolition, that’s a good thing. But by relegating the bomb to abstracted images removed from actual humanitarian consequences, the film leaves the weapon in the realm of the theoretical. And as Oppenheimer says in the film, “theory will only take you so far.” Today, it’s vital that we understand the devastating impacts that nuclear weapons have had and continue to have on real victims of their production, testing, and wartime use. Our survival may depend on it.

[mindblowingscience]

It's a simple question that sounds a little like a modest proposal: "Should we cut down all the oak trees?" asks Tom Sharkey, a University Distinguished Professor in the Plant Resilience Institute at Michigan State University. Sharkey also works at the MSU-Department of Energy Plant Research Laboratory and in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. To be clear, Sharkey isn't sincerely suggesting that we should cut down all the oaks. Still, his question was an earnest one, prompted by his team's latest research, which was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The team discovered that on a warming planet, plants like oaks and poplars will emit more of a compound that exacerbates poor air quality, contributing to problematic particulate matter and low-atmosphere ozone. The rub is that the same compound, called isoprene, can also improve the quality of clean air while making plants more resistant to stressors including insects and high temperatures. "Do we want plants to make more isoprene so they're more resilient, or do we want them making less so it's not making air pollution worse? What's the right balance?" Sharkey asks. "Those are really the fundamental questions driving this work. The more we understand, the more effectively we can answer them."

Continue Reading.

[gnpwdrnwhiskey]

Southern Inhospitality

Pairing - Dieter Bravo x ofc!Ava

Word Count - 1.7K

Warnings - God, I don't even know. Mentions of food, mentions of tense family gatherings and insecurities, just general Thanksgiving family gathering vibes....oh and also, hopefully Rhett & Scarlett don't mind I borrowed a few lines

Author's Note - this takes place like a year or two in the future of where Dieter and Ava currently are in the main story but it's pretty spoiler free. Big big thanks to @tinytinymenace for sending me this prompt for a first sentence fic thing. And to @wildemaven and @trulybetty as usual for cheerleading me through this lol! 💕

As he stepped on the escalator and descended into the arrivals terminal, he thought to himself, "this is the dumbest idea I've ever had."

Okay, maybe not the dumbest. He's Dieter Bravo, he's done a lot of dumb shit in his life. But this probably ranks right up there.

And Ava hadn't exactly invited him but when they'd talked the previous evening, she had said she missed him and that was pretty much the same thing right?

Besides, she'd sounded so miserable back in her family's clutches, it was like his duty or whatever to sweep in and rescue her. The last time she sounded that withdrawn- well, he doesn't like to think about it, but he'll be damned if they ever repeat it. Time for him to step up and white knight this shit.

He's starting to second guess the whole idea though as the Uber makes its way up the long oak lined drive, the massive magnolia tree taking up the majority of the front yard coming into view before the actual house does.

"Goddamn," he whispers to himself as the car comes to a halt in front of a true southern plantation house- fucking columns, gleaming black shutters, coach lights, rocking chairs and all.

What the hell has he gotten himself into he wonders as grabs his bag from the Uber and makes his way up the steps to the imposing front door and ringing the bell.

He's halfway expecting the door to be answered by a housekeeper or a butler or some shit and is surprised when it swings open to reveal a pre-teen boy in perfectly pressed khakis and a polo.

"Yeah?" The kid says nonchalantly, more interested in the phone in his hand than the actual guest at the door and Dieter catches a glimpse of chipped glitter nail polish as the boy's fingers fly over the keys.

"I'm looking for Ava. Ava Greene? Is this the right place?" He asks, sliding his Ray-Bans down his nose and trying to peer behind the kid into the house. "Or like the right fucking century? They know the south lost right?"

The kid looks up at Dieter and flashes him a mischievous grin and suddenly Dieter sees the family resemblance. At least he knows he's at the right house. Must be one of Drew's spawn.

"The news of the fall of the Confederacy has not yet reached the man of the house. We fear, due to his advanced age and frail condition, such a staggering blow may cause him to expire."

Dieter snorts out a laugh and the kid smiles even wider. "Welcome to Oak Hill," he says with a dramatic bow. "Please, do step inside and join us on this day when we celebrate the most problematic of American holidays."

"Harry! Who's at the door? You didn't let the Jehovah's Witnesses in again, did you??" Ava's voice comes from somewhere further in the house and Dieter finds himself automatically stepping inside as if drawn to her.

"They're actually here for you," Harry calls over his shoulder. "Something about how you've been living in sin with a cad and a scoundrel."

"Haha," Ava laughs. "Very funny, smart ass. Seriously, who's here?"

"Seriously, it's for you. Come see."

The tapping of heels on hardwood flooring comes closer and Dieter thinks maybe he's stepped not only into the wrong century but also into a completely alternate reality- Ava- his messy, wonderful, Converse wearing Ava, in heels?

His gaze starts at her feet as she comes into view and hot damn, she really is wearing a killer pair of pumps, then some long swirly plaid skirt he doesn't have a name for, crisp white button up, pearls at her ears and throat, hair pulled back in a complicated looking up-do.

"Harry, everyone I know is already here...." And then she catches sight of him standing behind Harry and he grins at the surprised expression on her face. "Dieter-- what are you doing here? What about your meeting?"

"I rescheduled. I should've never agreed anyway," he shrugs, reaching out to pull her into his arms and she goes willingly. "I shouldn't have let you come here by yourself."

"I told you it was fine, that'd I'd be fine," she says as she wraps her arms around him and leans into him. "I'm mostly fine."

"You're not fine, look at you," Dieter laughs, pulling away enough to hook a finger in the vee of her shirt, accidentally on purpose undoing one more tiny button and sneaking a peak. "You have a bra on. I didn't even know you owned one."

Ava snorts out a laugh and melts back into him, tucking her face into his neck and nipping at the skin there. "Behave, Bravo. We're amongst civilized company here."

"I'll try, but you do look like every sexy librarian fantasy I've ever had," Dieter whispers into her ear, hands sliding down her back to rest on the curve of her ass.

"You're an idiot," Ava whispers back, holding on to him a little bit tighter. "But I'm so glad you're here."

"Take your sunglasses off," Ava says as they walk hand in hand towards the family room.

"What?"

"We're inside. Pretend you're a normal person and take your sunglasses off."

"But why?"

"Are you high?"

"What? No!"

"Then take them off. Please do not make this any worse than it already will be. When we go in for dinner, sit up straight, keep your elbows off the table, mind your manners and take your sunglasses off."

And with that warning, she escorts him into the belly of the beast.

"We'll have one more guest for dinner," Ava announces to the room. "Most of you have already met Dieter, but I'll leave you to get reacquainted and set another place at the table."

"Play nice," Ava grins, leaning in to kiss his cheek and giving his hand a quick squeeze before scurrying out of the room like the traitor she is.

He can do this. He can. He's an Oscar winning actor for fucks sake. How bad can one family dinner possibly be?

Three hours later he's hating himself for putting that thought into the universe. Turns out it can be so, so incredibly bad.

Dinner itself was fine, delicious even- the turkey was moist, the potatoes were smooth and buttery, the pumpkin cheesecake was downright sinful.

But the conversation has been downright atrocious. If someone had given Conrad Greene a list of topics not to talk about at a family gathering, he's tried his damnedest to hit every single one of them.

He's watched Ava's mother masterfully try to steer them into safer conversational waters time and time again, he's listened to all the praise of Drew and the newspaper he can stomach while Ava's own accomplishments get brushed off as inconsequential and she withdraws farther and farther into herself. Even Harry is not exempt from his great grandfather's ire and he watches the bright eyed kid who'd met him at the door deflate like an old party balloon.

Dieter has always thought his own childhood was shitty, but it's nothing compared to this. Sure, he may have never known his dad and his mom may have ditched him, but between his grandparents and Ms. Rose, he'd never once felt anything less than accepted for exactly who he was. Or pressured to be someone he wasn't.

By the time the table is cleared and after dinner coffees are served, his back is starting to hurt from the damned uncomfortable dining chairs, his jaw hurts from clenching his teeth and his fucking knee hurts from how often Ava has dug her nails in to stop him from saying something he most likely shouldn't.

And he's had about enough. Of all of it.

"Are you staying here?" He leans in to ask Ava.

"No," she shakes her head. "I've been staying at Drew's."

"Great. Did you drive here separately?"

"Yeah, Harry wanted to ride in your Porsche."

"Even better. We're leaving," he announces, pushing his chair back from the table.

"Dieter--"

"We're leaving, Ava. Say your goodbyes and grab your things."

Ava leads Dieter up the side stairs and into the little loft apartment over Drew's garage where she used to live and where she's been staying for the last few days.

"I'm sorry. It didn't....it wasn't always like that," she says as she kicks off her heels. It's the first thing she's said since they left her grandfather's house and Dieter's heart aches for her.

"Ava, honey, you don't have anything to be sorry for. None of that shit is your fault. He's a bitter old man with fucked up ideas of how the world should work."

"Growing up....before my grandmother died....it was different. She tempered him I guess," she shrugs, taking off her pearls and tucking them safely in a little velvet pouch she puts in her make up bag.

"What was she like?" He asks, coming up behind her at the bathroom counter, beginning to hunt for and remove all the pins keeping her hair pulled back.

"She liked to cook and work in her garden, and take Drew and I bargain shopping. She was always smiling or laughing. A little bit mischievous. People gravitated to her. She would've liked you a lot."

"You think so?"

"I do," Ava smiles softly at him, meeting his eyes in the mirror. "I wish she would've gotten to know Harry, she would've gotten a kick out of him."

"He's a pretty cool kid," Dieter grins. "Clever, quick-witted. You sure he's not actually yours?"

"Positive," Ava laughs, spinning to face him. "But I did spend a lot of time with him when he was younger. Guess I rubbed off on him."

"Hey, that's not a bad thing, you know that, right? You're incredibly brilliant, Ava. It's their loss if they can't see it."

"I know. I'm working on it...."

"And, you know what else?" he grins, cupping her face in his hands and adopting a ridiculous southern accent. "You deserve to be kissed and often and by someone who knows how."

"And I suppose you think you're the proper person?"

"I might be....if the right moment ever came."

"What about now, Rhett?"

"Thanks not your line, Scarlett."

"Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

"That's not your line either."

"Hey, Bravo....shut up and kiss me already."

And he does.

[autumnweeen]

Tree healer/lumberjack Draco helping Hermione with a problematic oak tree in her property. I love love love tree magic and anything in a cozy forest setting ♥️ This is a work in progress and I can’t wait to see where this story goes.

[adarkrainbow]

The Yaga journal: Witches and demons of Eastern Europe

The next article I’ll translate from the issue (I won’t translate all of them since some are not very relevant for this blog) is “Baba Yaga, witches, and the ambiguous demons of oriental Europe” by Stamatis Zochios.

The article opens by praising the 1863′s “Reasoned dictionary of the living russian language”. by scholar, lexicograph and folklorist Vladimir Dahl, which is one of the first “systematic essays” that collects the linguistic treasures of Russia. By collecting more than thirty thousand proverbs and sayings, insisting on the popular and oral language, the Dictionary notably talked about various terms of Russian folklore; domovoi, rusalka, leshii... And when it reaches Baba Yaga, the Dictionary calls her : сказочное страшилищ (skazochnoe strashilishh) , that is to say “monster of fairytales”.But the article wonders about this denomination... Indeed, for many people (such as Bogatyrev) Baba Yaga, like other characters of Russian fairytales (Kochtcheï or Zmey Gorynych) do not exist in popular demonology, and is thus exclusively a character of fairy tales, in which she fulfills very specific functions (aggressor, donator if we take back Propp’s system). But the author of this article wonder if Baba Yaga can’t actually be found in “other folkloric genres” - maybe she is present in legends, in popular beliefs, in superstitions and incantations. 

Baba Yaga, as depicted in the roleplaying game “Vampire: The Masquerade”

For example, in a 19th century book by Piotr Efimenko called “Material for ethnography of the Russian population of the Arkhangelsk province”, there is an incantation recorded about a man who wante to seduce/make a woman fall in love with him. During this incantation the man invokes the “demons that served Herod”, Sava, Koldun and Asaul and then - the incantation continues by talking about “three times nine girls” under an oak tree”, to which Baba Yaga brings light. The ritual is about burning wood with the light brought by Baba Yaga, so that the girl may “burn with love” in return. Efimenko also mentions another “old spell for love” that goes like this: “In the middle of the field there are 77 pans of red copper, and on each of them there are 77 Egi-Babas. Each 77 Egi-Babas have 77 daughters with each 77 staffs and 77 brooms. Me, servant of God (insert the man’s name here) beg the daughters of the Egi-Babas. I salute you, daughters of Egi-Babas, and make the servant of God (insert name of the girl here) fall inlove, and bring her to the servant of God (insert name of the man here).” The fact Baba Yaga appears in magical incantations proves that she doesn’t exist merely in fairytales, but was also part of the folk-religion alongside the leshii, rusalka, kikimora and domovoi. However two details have to be insisted upon.

One: the variation of the name Baba Yaga, as the plural “Egi-Babas”. The name Baba Yaga appears in numerous different languages. In Russian and Ukrainian we find Баба-Язя, Язя, Язі-баба, Гадра ; in Polish jędza, babojędza ; in Czech  jezinka, Ježibaba meaning “witch, woman of the forest”, in Serbian  баба jега ; in Slovanian jaga baba, ježi baba ...  Baba is not a problem in itself. Baba, comes from the old Slavic  баба and is a diminutive of  бабушка (babyshka), “grand-mother” - which means all at the same time a “peasant woman”, “a midwife”, a (school mistress? the article is a bit unclear here), a “stone statue of a pagan deity”, and in general a woman, young or old. Of course, while the alternate meanings cannot be ignored, the main meaning for Baba Yaga’s name is “old woman”. Then comes “Yaga” and its variations, “Egi”, “Jedzi”, “Jedza”, which is more problematic. In Fasmer’s etymology dictionary, he thinks it comes from the proto-Slagic (j)ega, meaning “wrath” or “horror”. Most dictionaries take back this etymology, and consider it a mix of the term baba,  старуха (staruha), “old woman”, and of  яга, злая (zlaia), “evil, pain, torment, problem”. So it would mean  злая женщина (zlaja zhenshhina), “the woman of evil”, “the tormenting woman”. However this interpretation of Yaga as “pain” is deemed restrictive by the author of this article.

Aleksandr Afanassiev, in his “Poetic concepts of the Slavs on nature”, proposed a different etymology coming from the anskrit “ahi”, meaning “snake”. Thus, Baba Yaga would be originally a snake-woman similar to the lamia and drangua of the Neo-hellenistic fairytales and Albanian beliefs. Slavic folklore seems to push towards this direction since sometimes Baba Yaga is the mother of three demon-like daughters (who sometimes can be princesses, with one marrying the hero), and of a son-snake that will be killed by the hero. Slovakian fairytales tale back the link with snakes, as they call the sons of Jezi-Baba “demon snakes”. On top of that, an incantation from the 18th century to banish snakes talks about Yaga Zmeia Bura (Yaga the brown snake): “I will send Yaga the brown snake after you. Yaga the brown snake will cover your wound with wool.” According to Polivka, “jaza” is a countryside term to talk about a mythical snake that humans never see, and that turns every seven years into a winged seven-headed serpent. With all that being said, it becomes clear (at least to the author of this article) that one of the versions of Yaga is the drakaina, the female dragon with human characteristics. These entities are usually depicted with the head and torso of women, but the lower body of a snake. They are a big feature of the mythologies of the Eurasian lands - in France the most famous example is Mélusine, the half-snake half-woman queen, whose story was recorded between the end of the 14th century and the beginning of the 15th by Jean d’Arras (in his prose novel La Noble Histoire de Lusignan) and by Couldrette (in the poetic work Roman de Mélusine). For some scholars, these hybrid womans are derived from the Mother Goddess figure, and by their physical duality manifest their double nature of benevolence-malevolence, aggressor-donator. 

If we come back to the incantation of Efimenko, we notice that the 77 daughters of Baba Yaga each have a “metly”, a “broom”. This object isn’t just the broom Baba Yaga uses alongside her mortar and pestle to travel around - it is also the main attribute of the witches, and the witch with her broom is a motif prevalent in numerous textes of Western Europe between the 15th and 16th centuries. Already in medieval literature examples of this topic could be found: in the French works “Perceforest” and “Champion des dames”, the old witches are described flyng on staffs or brooms, turning into birds, to either eat little children or go to witches’ sabbaths. Baba Yaga travels similarly: Afanassiev noted that she goes to gathering of witches while riding a mortar, with a pestle in one hand and a broom in the other. Federowsky noted that Baba Yaga was supposed to be either the “aunt” or the “mistress” of all witches. Baba Yaga herself in often called an old witch, numerous dictionaries explaining her name as meaning старуха-колдунья (staruha-koldun’ja), which literaly means old witch. Even more precisely, she is an old witch who kidnaps children in order to devour their flesh and drink their blood. We find back in other countries of Europe this myth of the “bogeywoman cannibal-witch”, especially dangerous towards newborns and mothers, as the “strix” or “strige”. According to Polivka, in his 1922 article about the supernatural in Slovakian fairytales, the  ježibaba is the same being as the striga/strige. And he also ties these two beings to the bosorka, a creature found in Slovakia, in eastern Moravia, and in Wallachia, and which means originally a witch or a sorceress, but that in folklore took a role similar to the striga or  ježibaba. 

Vinogradova, in a study of the figure of the bosorka, described this Carpathian-Ukrainian witch as a being that attacked people in different ways. For example she stole the milk from the cows - a recurring theme of witches tales in Western Europe (mentionned by Luther in his texts as to one of the reasons witches had to be put to death), but that also corresponds to a tale of the Baba Yaga where she is depicted as sucking the milk out of the breast of a young woman (an AT 519 tale, “The Strong Woman as Bride”). In conclusion, the striga-bosorka is clearly related to the Slovakian version of Baba Yaga, the  Ježibaba. The  Ježibaba, a figure of Western Slavic folklore, also appears as numerous local variations. She is Jenzibaba, Jendzibaba, Endzibaba, Jazibaba, and in Poland she is either “jedza-baba” (the very wicked woman) or “jedzona, jedza-baba, jagababa” (witch). However this Slovakian witch isn’t always evil: in three fairytales,  Ježibaba is a helper bringing gifts, appearing as a trio of sisters (with a clear nod to the three fatae, the three moirae or the three fairies of traditional fairytales) who help the hero escape an ogre who hunts him. They help him by gifting him with food, and then lending him their magical dogs. And in other farytale, the three sisters help a lazy girl spin threads. 

In this last case,  Ježibaba is tied to the action of spinning. It isn’t a surprise as Baba Yaga herself is often depicted spinning wool or owning a loom ; and several times she asks the young girls who arrive at her home to spin for her (AT 480, The Spinning-Woman by the Spring) - AND in some variations, her isba doesn’t stand on chicken legs, but rather on a spindle. This relationship between the female supernatural figure (fairy or witch) and the action of spinning is very typical of European folkore. In several Eastern Slavic traditions, the figure of Paraskeva-Piatnitsa (or Pyatnitsa-Prascovia, who is often related to Baba Yaga), is an important saint, personification of Friday and protectress of crops - and she punishes women who dare spin on the fifth day of the week. Sometimes it is a strong punishment: she will deform the fingers of the woman who dares spin the friday, which relates her to the naroua (or naroue, narova, narove) a nocturnal fairy of Isère and Savoie in France, who manifests during the Twelve Days of Christmas and enters home to punish those that work at midnight or during holidays - especially spinners and lacemakers. In a Savoie folktales she is said to beat up lacemakers until almost killing them, hits them on the fingers with her wand, beats them up with a beef’s leg or a beef’s nerves, and attacks children with both a cow’s leg in one hand and a beef’s leg in another. These bans are also found in the Greek version of Piatnitsa: Agia Paraskevi, Saint Paraskevi, who punishes the spinners that work on Thursday’s nights, during Friday, or during the feast-day of the Saint (26 of July). But her punishment is to force them to eat the flesh of a corpse. Finally, we find the link between spinning and the demonic woman/witch/fairy through the Romanian cousin of Baba Yaga - Baba Cloanta, who says that she is ugly because she spinned too much during her life. And it all ties back to the “Perceforest” tale mentionned above - in the text, the witches, described as old matrons disheveled and bearded, not only fly around on staffs and little wooden chairs, but also by riding on spindles and reels/spools.  

Another typical example of “demonic woman” often compared and related to Baba Yaga is the character known as “Perchta” in her Alpine-Germanic form, Baba Pehtra in Slovenia, or Pechtrababajaga according to a Russian neologism. The name Perchta, Berchta, Percht, Bercht comes from the old high German “beraht”, of the Old German “behrt” and of the root “berhto-”, which is tied to the French “brillant” and the English “brilliant”. So Berchta, or Perchta, would mean “the brilliant one”, “the bringer of light”. Why such a positive name for a malevolent character?

In 1468, the Thesaurus pauperum, written by John XXI, compares two fairies with a cult in medieval France, “Satia” and “dame Abonde”, with another mythological woman: Perchta. The Thesaurus pauperum describes “another type of superstition and idolatry” which consists in leaving at night recipients with food and drinks, destined to ladies that are supposed to visit the house - dame Abonde or Satia, that is also known as “dame Percht” or “Perchtum”, who comes with her whole “troop”. In exchange of finding these open recipients, the ladies will thenfill them regularly, bringing with them riches and abundance. “Many believed that it is during the holy nights, between the birth of Jesus and the night of the Epiphany, that these ladies, led by Perchta, visit homes”, and thus during these nights, people leave on the table bread, chesse, milk, meat, eggs, wine and water, alongside spoons, plates, cups, knives, so that when lady Perchta and her group visit the house, they find everything prepared for them, and bless the house in return with prosperity. So the text cannot be more explict: peasants prepared meals at night for the visit of lady Perchta, it is the custom of the “mensas ornare”, to prepare the table in honor of a lady visiting houses at night. If she finds offerings - cuttlery, drinks, food, especially sugary food - she rewards the house with riches. Else, she punishes the inhabitants of the home.

But Perchta doesn’t just punish for this missing meal. Several stories also describe Perchta looking everywhere in the house she visits, checking every corner to spot any “irregularity”. The most serious of those sins is tied to spinning: the woman of the house is forced to stop her work before midnight, or to not work on a holiday - especially an important holiday of the Twelve Days, such as Christmas or the Epiphany. If the woman is spotted working ; or if Perchta doesn’t found the house cleaned up and tidied up ; or if the flax is not spinned, the goddess (Perchta) will punish the woman. This is why she was called “Spinnstubenfrau”, “the woman of the spinning room”. It is also a nickname of a German spirit known as Berchta - as Spinnstubenfrau, she takes the shape of an old witch who appears in people’s houses during the winter months. She is the guardian spirit of barns and of the spinning-room, who always check work is properly and correctly done. And her punishment was quite brutal: she split open the belly of her victim, and replaces the entrails with garbage. Thomas Hill in his article “Perchta the Belly Slitther” sees in this punishment the remnants of old chamanic-initiation rite ; which would tie to it an analysis done by Andrey Toporkov concerning the “cooking of the child” by Baba Yaga in the storyes of the type AT 327 C or F. In these tales a boy (it might be Ivashka, Zhikharko, Filyushka...) arrives at Baba Yag’s isba, and the witch asks her daughter to cook the boy. The boy makes sure he can’t be pushed in the oven by taking a wrong body posture, and convinces the girl to show him how he should enter the oven. Baba Yaga shows him to do so, enters the oven, and the boy finds the door behind her, trapping Baba Yaga in the fire. According to Toporkov, we can find behind this story an old ritual according to which a baby was placed three times in an oven to give it strength. (The article reminds that Vladimir Propp did highlight the function of Baba Yaga as an “initiation rite” in fairytales - and how Propp considered that Baba Yaga is a caricature of the leader of the rite of passage in primitive societies). And finally, in a tale of Yakutia, the Ega-Baba is described as a chaman, invoked to resurrect a killed person. The author of the article concludes that the first link between Yaga and Perchta is that they are witches/goddesses that can be protectress, but have a demonic/punishment-aspect that can be balanced by a benevolent/initiation-aspect. But it doesn’t stop here.

The Twelve Days are celebrations in honor of Perchta, practiced in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Still today, “Percht” is a term used to call masked person who haunt at night the villages of High-Styria or the land of Salzbourg: they visit houses while wearing masks, clothed in tatters and holding brooms. During these celebrations, young people either dress up as beautiful girls in traditional costumes (the schöne Perchten), either as ugly old woman (die schiache Perchten). These last ones are inspired by the numerous depictions of Perchta as an old woman, or sometimes a human-animal hybrid, with revolting trait - most prominent of them being the feet of a goose. This could explain in Serbia the existence of a Baba Jaga/Baba Jega with a chicken feet, or even the chicken feet carrying the isba of Baba Yaga. This deformation also recalls a figure of the French region of Franche-Comté, Tante Arie (Aunt Arie), another supernatural woman of the Twelve Days tied to spinning. The second most prominent trait of the “old Perchta” is an iron nose - already in the 14th century, Martin of Amberg wrote about “Percht mit der eisnen nasen”, “Percht with an iron nose”. Yaga also sometimes hag an iron nose, and this is why she was associated with other figures of Carpathian or Western Ukraine folklores - such as Zalizna baba or Zaliznonosa baba, the “old woman of iron”, who lives in a palace standing on duck legs ; there is also Vasorru Baba, the iron-nosed woman of Hungaria. Or Huld - another Spinsstubenfrau, often related to Perchta, but who has more sinister connotations. Huld has an enormous nose according to Luther, and Grimm notes that sometimes she appears as a witch with one very long tooth. This last characteristic if also recurring in Eastern Europe’s mythologies: in Serbia Gvozdenzuba (Iron Teeth) is said to burn the bad spinners ; and Baba Yaga is sometimes described with one or several long teeth, often in iron. But it is another aspect of the myths of Huld, also known as Holda or Frau Holle, that led the scholar Potebnja to relate her to Perchta and Baba Yaga.

According to German folk-belief, Huld (or often Perchta) shakes her pillowcases filled with feathers, which causes the snow or the frost ; and thunder rumbles when she moves her linen spool. It is also said that the Milky Way was spinned with her spinning wheel - and thus she controls the weather. In a very similar function, the Baba Jaudocha of Western Ukraine (also called Baba Dochia, Odochia, Eudochia, Dochita, Baba Odotia, a name coming from the Greek Eudokia) is often associated with Baba Yaga, and she also creates snow by moving either her twelve pillows, or her fur coat. According to Afanassiev, the Bielorussians believed that behind the thunderclouds, you could find Baba Yaga with her broom, her mortar, her magic carpet, her flying horses or her seven-league boots. For the Slovakians, Yaga could create bad or beautiful weather. In Russia, she is sometimes called ярою, бурою, дикою , “jaroju, buroju, dikoju”, a name connected to thunderstorms. Sometimes Yaga and her daughters appear as flying snakes - and the  полет змея, the “polet smeja”, the “flight of the snake” was believed to cause storms, thunder and earthquakes. In a popular folk-song, Yaga is called the witch of winter: “Sun, you saw the old Yaga, Baba Yaga, the winter witch, this ferocious woman, she escaped spring, she fled away from the just, she brought cold in a bag, she shook cold on earth, she tripped and rolled down the hill.” Finally, for Potebnia, the duality and ambiguity of Baba Yaga, who steals away and yet gives, can be related to the duality of the cloud, who fertilizes the land in summer, and brings rain in winter. Baba Yaga is a solar goddess as much as a chthonian goddess - she conjointly protects births, and yet is a psychopomp causing death. 

It seems, through these examples, that Baba Yaga is a goddess - or to be precise, a spirit of nature. Sometimes she is a leshachikha, the wife of the “leshii”, the spirit of the forest, and she herself is a spirit of the woods, living alone in an isolated isba deep in the thick forests. She is thus often paralleled with Muma Padurii, the Mother of the Forest of Romanian folklore, who lives in a hut above rooster’s legs, surrounded by a fence covered in skulls, and who steals children away (in tales of the type AT 327 A, Hansel and Gretel). This aspect of Baba Yaga as a spirit of the forest, and more generally as a “genius loci” (spirit of the place) also makes her similar to another very important figure of Slavic folklore: Полудница  (Poludnica), the “woman of noon”. She is an old woman with long thick hair, wearing rags, and who lives in reeds and nettles ; or she can rather be a very beautiful maiden dressed in white, who punishes those that work at noon. She especially appears in rye fields, and protects the harvest. In other tales, she rather sucks away the life-force of the fields - which would relate her to some stories where Baba Yaga runs through rye fields (either with a scarf of her head, or with her hair flowing behind her). Poludnica can also look like Baya Yaga: Roger Caillois, in his article “Spectres de midi dans la démonologie slave” (Noon wraiths in the Slavic demonology), mentionned that Poludnica was a liminal deity of fields, to which one chanted  полудница во ржи, покажи рубежи, куда хошь побѣжи !, “Poludnicaa in the rye - show the limits - and go where you want.” This liminal aspects reminds of an aspect of Baba Yaga as a genius loci, tied to a specific place that she defends. It is an aspect found as Baba Yaga, Baba Gorbata, Polydnitsa and Pozhinalka: Baba Yaga is either a benevolent spirit that protects the place and the harvest ; either she is a malevolent sprit that absorbs the life-force of the harvest and destroys it. This is why she must be chased away, and thus it explains a Slovanian song that people sing during the holiday of Jurij (the feast day of Saint George), the 23rd of April, an agrarian holiday for the resurrection of nature: Zelenga Jurja (Green George), we guide, butter and eggs we ask, the Baba Yaga we banish, the Spring we spread!”. This chant was tied with a ritual sacrifice: the mannequin of an old woman had to be burned. As such, Baba Yaga and her avatars, was a spirt that had to be hunted down or banned - which is a custom found all over Europe, but especially in Slavic Europe. At the end of the harvest, several magical formulas were used to push away or cut into pieces the “old woman” ; and we can think back of Frazer’s work on the figure of the “Hag” (which in the English languages means as much an old woman as a malevolent spirit), who is herself a dual figure. In a village of Styria, the Mother of wheat, is said to be dressed in white and to be born from the last wheat bundle. She can be seen at midnight in wheat fields, that she crosses to fertilize ; but if she is angry against a farmer, she will dry up all of his wheat. But then the old woman must be sacrificed - just like in the feast of Jurij.

The author concludes that the “folkloric” aspect of Baba Yaga stays relatively unknown in the Western world and the non-russophone lands. The most detailed and complete work the author could find about it is Andreas Johns’ book “Baba Yaga: The Ambiguous Mother and Witch of the Russian Folktale”. The author of the article tried to prove that, as Johns said, the Baba Yaga is fundamentaly ambiguous - at the same time a kidnaping witch, a psychopomp, a cannibal, a protectress of birth, a guardian of places, a spirit of nature and harvests... And that she is part of an entire web and system of demon-feminine figures that create a mythology ensemble with common characteristic - very present in Eastern Europe, but still existing on the continent as a whole. 

[sundayoaks]

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ੭ ❛ i've got my eye on you ,, ✦

†　．　sunday oak 　　　　　— rp account ୧

charmony festival org ࣪⠀head of oak family ܢ˙ ✩

𓇼 ₊ ㅤ my inbox is always open for inquires and negotiations. 　　─  read: requests and chats

⟡ when is this set? most of my posts default to pre 2.2, but feel free to send anything that would be post 2.2 ! you might have to specify which version you want, though.

⟡ boundaries? basic dni stuff. i wont discuss anything heavily controversial or problematic. as for shipping boundaries, i'm fine with anything that's legal and morally okay. i don't mind rarepairs/crackship stuff. i'm fine with both platonic and romantic messages.

— the person behind ? @sundaycentric

#✦⠀─⠀sunday 　in character posts #✦⠀─⠀monday　out of character posts #✦⠀─⠀letters 　responses to inbox

— anons (seperated by . )

🦋 . 🌊 . 💌 anon . alder . 💫 anon . dior . 🌙 anon .

[lemonhemlock]

My all time favorite angle of the Valyrian gods versus the Faith debate, is that a lot of the fics/takes around it by Team Black seem to like the Old Gods (which fair enough, I too like the creepy trees. team stark 5ever) or at least play lip service to it to make the Faith of Seven seem less cool (no one has the vision for how insane fantasy Catholicism can be except for GRRM himself) but also including Targaryen characters being respectful/kinda into the Old Gods, which KILLS me. I blame the wildly non-canonical weirwood in the Red Keep’s godswood in the show. It drives me INSANE. What is that doing there!!!!!! The Red Keep has no weirwood!!! Who planted it there???? You telling me that Maegor or Jaehaerys took the time to plant a weirwood for the Old Gods???? If I see one more fic where a Targaryen marries someone not of the old gods under a weirwood tree I’m going to kill someone.

I’m SO defensive of the weirwoods because I know none of them have delved into the fucked up human sacrifices that likely created weirwoods plus the rich symbolism that they create (hello Sansa in the Eyrie, I love you), the erasure of the North-South religious and cultural divide, and acting like the Targs would be so cool with the Old Gods for no reason is driving me nuts.

I just hate the show’s weirwood tree, it makes no sense. I will never find peace as long as I keep seeing scenes from the show set under it.

(Sorry for being insane in your inbox again )

Don't worry about it, your inbox drops lead to interesting discussions! 💚

Totally agree with you on the Old Gods & the unsavory blood ritualistic imagery (like hanging entrails from the branches of weirwood trees). I mean, it may sound heavy metal, but if we're supposed to be critical about religion,* this should definitely come under the magnifying glass, too. As is the super creepy idea that Bloodraven is spying on everyone using the weirwoodnet and manipulating historical events like that.

I also don't see why Targaryens should be Old Gods fanboys either - what could they possibly gain from this? It's such a fanon interpretation, because the old religion doesn't have any organized structure that could act as a political actor. There's this projection happening, because Christianity has flaws IRL and a fraught history, when people encounter its fantasy equivalent, they automatically think any other religion is better. I'm waiting for Cult of Starry Wisdom acolytes to come out of the woodwork and preach how much better Nyarlathotep is than the Seven Gods puts together.

As for the godswood in the Red Keep - Ned tells us it has an ancient, huge oak. That kind of tree can only grow like that over a very long period of time. There's no mention of a weirwood in KL that could have been cut down; also I don't think you can plant weirwood trees? Else I think people would do it more often in the North. I honestly think it's there just for nostalgia reasons for the audience. Though I wonder if George agreed with this addition and why. Maybe the lack of a weirwood in KL was an in-universe limitation he imposed on Bloodraven's power?

*at least that's what they think they're doing, by writing all these critical essays on how problematic the Faith is, but they never bother to do a comparative analysis with the other religions available in-universe. Or they peddle their own headcanons as fact, like how supposedly Valyrian society would have been so much less sexist than Faith-worshippers, ergo their religion should reflect that.

[evilcare]

Do fans not get tired of having the same conversations over and over again? It’s been 3,000 years since tvd died and y’all are still having the same redundant ass arguments about Klaus’s interest in her. Klaus started courting Care Bear for three reasons.

1) Because he wanted to sway her to his side and against the MF gang. (She was Tyler’s loyal girlfriend/and he probably heard Tyler talk about how she helped him through his transition)

2) He was bored and up for a little fun after finally killing his father. So he turned his focus onto something else. (Creating hybrids was his goal for centuries, he achieved that and keeping the white oak stake from entering his heart was the focus, he probably would have killed bet if he approached her while Mikeal was alive and probably would have killed her out of fear of having a weakness🤷🏽‍♀️)

3) Because he found her intriguing and beautiful and wanted the satisfaction of stealing something of Tyler’s for his betrayal.

And then he later ob, fell in love with her. When he started to recognize that, he bit her and tried to watch her die (yes it was problematic), and it backfires and he comes to the realization that he does care enough about her to not let her die. And to say that what he felt for her was crush is a reach.

This is canon. There’s literally no point in arguing over it. He was over a thousand years old, his interest in women is not to one party of women and he has (obviously) slept with a lot of women over the years. Who Klaus fucked before he met Caroline is irrelevant. His interest in Caroline does not contradict anything regardless of the reaching claims because it was the first time we’ve seen him genuinely interested in someone that has no connection into what his goals were like, breaking his curse or what loyalty they had to him(he could have used her to get information on the Salvatore’s next plan against him) It’s called having layers people. His relationship with Caroline actually added layers to his character and to Caroline’s as well. He encouraged her vampirism and she encouraged Klaus’s humanity. Why this considered to be such a crime committed in the tvdu, I don’t know. But damn. Who gives a damn.

And the way y’all make it out to be like she’s not good enough for him because she likes to plan parties and do NORMAL activities is crazy. It’s fine to enjoy parties, care about things like dresses or high school gpa. That doesn’t make Caroline shallow for having an interest in traditional feminine things or how perfect her prom dress had to be. Caroline is a perfectionist and wanted the proper high school prom before she graduated for the first time.

And do not mistake his behavior on TO as IC for him. It’s the complete opposite. i don’t see how klaus spilling his guts out to a rando who he sees as a means to an end for his appetite as in character or letting the Judas live after she ruined his plans of a hybrid army.

And another thing I see. “Caroline is not mature enough to be in a relationship with Klaus.” Now, be for real. We know full and damn well that Klaus(who I love dearly) is immature. And Caroline is mature considering how she handled everything that was thrown her way. I don’t wanna get into this conversation, I’m tired. I’ll just do it another time whatever.

[hidden-elytras]

I know this is day 3 info, but i went through and compiled the quiz to consolidate the weights for the answers as I didn't notice it done here.

Everything is under a cut because it is long

Q1 - "Pick a block type" "Smooth Quartz" - 3 pt "Diamond Block" - 4 pt "Oak Wood" - 2 pt "Dirt" - 1 pt

Q2 -"Pick a floor type" "Dark Oak Planks" - 4 pt "Dirt" - 1 pt "some quartz" - 3 pt "Blackstone brick", - 2 pt

Q3 -"How do you secure your home?" "Make it all unbreakable!" - 2 pt "Create a trapped maze that leads to the entrance to confuse unwanted visitors" - 4 pt “I live in people's walls so I don't have to worry about that." - 3 pt "A locked door with a key, like a normal person." - 1 pt

Q4 -"You've been put in charge of an egg! Where do you house them?" "I give them everything I own, which isn't much but they know they're loved. I can sleep outside." - 2 pt "Build a gigantic mansion just for them, treat them like royalty!" - 4 pt "100% sealed bunker with multiple passcoded doors, no windows. If no one knows they're alive no one can kill them." - 3 pt "My child is freerange and can sleep wherever they want. " - 1 pt

Q5 -"Pick a decorative object" "Globe" - 3 pt "Painting" - 4 pt "Potted plant" - 2 pt "pop corn machine" - 1 pt

Q6 -"Pick a couch" "Red couch" - 4 pt "Purple couch" - 2 pt "Blue couch" - 3 pt "Green couch" - 4pt

Q7 -"Pick a thing to collect" "Gold" - 4 pt "Rocks" - 1 pt "Furniture" -2 pt "Classified information" - 3 pt

Q8 -"Cucurucho is coming to visit! What do you do?" "Make them a cup of tea and bake some cookies, have a nice time!" - 2 pt "I have prepared a guillotine at my front door. We will see the results soon." - 3 pt "We spend the visit in silence, but I'm fairly sure they're quietly judging my taste in furniture."- 1 pt "I answer their questions at the door and they leave, the rest of my day is uneventful." - 4pt

Q9 -"What about your garden? What's in there?" "A collection of turtles that keep breeding to a problematic amount." - 1 pt "A beautiful flower garden, carefully tended to!" - 4 pt "A lavacast stretching into the horizon. My neighbors can't stand it but no one can stop me." - 3 pt "It's a humble garden with some grass, a tree, and a pond. " - 2 pt

Q10 -"Looks like you've abducted a federation worker! What do you do?" "I keep them deep underground in a cold cell. They will never see the light of day, but they're still alive." - 3 pt "They can wander the house freely, the only thing keeping them there is their fear of what might happen if they leave. I feel bad." - 2pt "Once I get what I want from them, I kill them. When the investigators come, I serve them a wonderful meaty stew. There is no evidence." - 4 pt "Oh my god what do I do I didn't mean to end up like this and now i've gone so far I don't know how to undo my mistakes." - 1 pt

And the results:

score 40 : Potential Investor - A guest-to-be! You must have a great interest in investing into the island… How about we talk business sometime? We'll surely be able to find you a residence here that perfectly fits to your tastes!

score 37 to 39 : Cucurucho - Wow! Perfection 🙂

score 34 to 36 : S-Rank Worker - Above and beyond, you're a REALLY big deal. Usually leading things behind the scenes more, you're the reason the "machine" exists- and you decide who will be the cogs. Do you feel guilt? Or are you proud of your actions? You must've done some unsavoury things to rise up to this rank.

score 29 to 33 : A-Rank Worker - Cream of the crop! You're often leading the ranks below you, and they can depend on you to manage the place and keep things going smoothly. If they can't do it, you'll step in and do it yourself.

score 24 to 28 : B-Rank Worker - Most often in the role of the security around the island. Your colleagues and island guests can depend on you to keep the place secure and protected. If anything happens, they should be able to come to you to solve it! Stay safe out there.

score 19 to 23 : C-Rank Worker - Filling out this quiz during your break huh? Hard-working and doing your best, you're most like a C-rank worker! Put on a hard hat and your visibility gear. You've got some friends in the federation, but you're still on the road to greatness. Just keep at it, bud!

score 14 to 18 : Island Guest - You're one of the people that was invited to the island as a guest! Your chaotic and unlawful nature means you cause much trouble around the place, but your love for exploration and a great creative spirit also causes you to make some incredible structures! Please stop causing so much trouble.

score 10 to 13 : D-Rank Worker - Expendable and in great numbers, you aren't given any free will. Why were you even filling out this quiz? Get back to work.

Each answer is given a score of 1 - 4. The scores from each question is added up and then whatever range you fall under is the result you get from the quiz.

Another important note - Almost each result can be gained from multiple different answers EXCEPT for "Potential Investor" Which can only be gotten from scoring a 40.

[skullhaver]

well, well, well... you obviously know I want you to discourse on how my hubristic wizard boyfriend is problematic. XD

Our game's version of Galsariad Ardyth:

classic wizard hubris. if he stumbled upon a book titled "Forbidden Spells," he would not fucking hesitate

very judgmental re: intelligence. straight-up thinks he is smarter than most people and will not give others' the time of day if he thinks they're beneath him. his respect for Oak directly correlates to the weight he places on a combination of book-smarts, problem-solving ability, and intellectual creativity

skipped the required wizard ethics courses at the Marble Tomes. his ethics vibe check is pretty solid for some things, but he has a lot of examined assumptions about how the world works

related: limited class-consciousness. he grew up lower middle class and on some level knows he was simply extremely lucky to get where he is today, but also, he does NOT want to look or sound poor by any metric