#tempting fate in his old age XD

[giantkillerjack]

If media has taught me one thing, it's to never own a paperweight capable of causing traumatic brain injury.

My dad owned a heavy glass paperweight once that tapered into a sturdy sharp point on the top, and the fact that no one was murdered with this at all before his retirement from the lawfirm is the surest proof I have that this reality is in fact not fiction.

[anna-dreamer]

Private vs epic, or I just want my babies to be happy

I got into another ramble, tried to make it as consistent as i could. XD

Thinking about private vs epic, personal vs historical, mundane vs mythological, i also found there is an ultimate urge i have to see the epic heroes of Silmarillion on a simple human level. The hobbit level, if you will. As in, you never hear about Beren and Lúthien eating porridge, though I suppose they must have done now and again. I said it already that focus on the Private is my favorite and, i suspect, also the preference of many people in this fandom. And i realize this private vs epic is the ultimate difference between LotR, a novel, and the published Silmarillion, a whatever we agree it is. The characters bleeding from the latter into LotR are a curious thing. We do have Elrond, Galadriel, Glorfindel (maybe) etc, and for me they balance somewhere between private and epic; Glorfindel, if indeed it is him, being just a shamelessly OP easter egg. For me it also doesn't help that the work that encompasses the ‘legendary’ times of Arda, the times which simple folk of the Third Age consider mere fables, whatever we call this work, it is forever unfinished. (Not like it’s a bad thing for you can’t really have a distinct and finished mythology, even if you gather the most important parts and publish them as it is usually done. I know some scholarly people don’t appreciate Tolkien’s attempt of ‘real mythology’, i remember one million years ago my Folklore professor saying just this. But i personally find the Silmarillion quite enough of a mythology simply because it really doesn’t have to be a real one as long as we are invested in it as in a fictional world.) Anyway. The records of the times before being what they are, the characters there are not characters so much, but rather mosaic characteristics, collections of archetypes and collective traumas, pawns of Fate with a sparkle of free will. Having this you almost have to reinvent them for your own creative goals, basing your headcanons on scarce descriptions, invoking some reconstructive methods, or simply going with your gut feeling. Also, projecting. ^__^ And oh boy does the Private help here. If Maedhros was really tall he must have had occasional trouble fitting into door frames of smaller folk and maybe even hit his head once or twice. If Finrod and Andreth were best buds they might occasionally have had snowball fights, or library crawls, or what if they braided each other’s hair and put flowers and other ridiculous things into it! Not likely, but what if! Did Feanor’s family have a home theater? And if the little pretentious Maglor would write the music score, who would design the costumes and do the makeup? Would it all be a surprise for Mum when she returns tired from her workshop? Would Dad be appreciative and proud, aggressively so, so much that the kiddos would dread to do worse next time?..

Anyway. I started all this big pile of text to get to an idea. There is a point, somewhere there, where a subjective border lies between times of legend and simple mundane present. Between epic and private. People make events into legends to process their history, to put things into perspective. And to heal. I suspect similar ‘border’ does exist somewhere for elves like Elrond or Galadriel, those who are in the epic legends and at the same time are here. Eating porridge. They have without a doubt been doing this before, even in legendary times, but the thing is -- those were the times of great sorrow and heartache. There is a shit tone to process. And there is a tempting choice not to. One can instead turn into a porridge-less epic figure of old, ever solemn, grieving the losses thousands of years old, wallowing in one’s eternal sorrow. Instead of making a narrative of your past and getting to living one becomes a narrative themselves. A true living legend, only there is not much of a life in them. This, i suspect, is what happened to Maglor. Or should happen, if Elrond does not drag his ass to Imladris or if hobbits don’t stumble upon him one day. If there is hope for lost souls like him, Maglor has to separate his self from The Greatest Bard of The Noldor, The Lonely Voice Of Sorrow On Barren Shores. And accept some porridge. 

[dxmedstudent]

Answer the odd numbers!

Oh, wow, that’s a lot XD I’ll try to do as many as I can, but I shall try to keep it briefer than usual. If something is too difficult, then I’ll skip. Let’s go! 1) Spotify, SoundCloud, or Pandora? My friends are trying to get me into spotify, I tend to use soundcloud more, but my preferred way of finding new music has often ended up being accidentally leaving youtube on in a tab after a song finished, and having it cycle through sort-of related music.

3) what color are your eyes?Reasonably light brown. Someone was once nice enough to tell me they look like honey, when I’m in the sun.

5) what is your relationship status? Not where I see myself in the longterm.

7) what color hair do you have?Darkish brown. I dye it almost exactly the colour it naturally is. Or was, before the Grey Hair Fairy frosted my temples with some serious silver.

9) where do you shop?The high street, and online? Nowhere particularly fancy. Occasinally I’ll be tempted by something off etsy. 11) favorite social media accountIn terms of personally, I keep up with a lot of people I don’t see often through facebook. But I really enjoy the community we have here. 13) any siblings?A younger sister and a much younger brother. I’m the dorky, embarrasing but protective eldest.

15)favorite snapchat filter? Um… I don’t use snapchat often. Hmm. Anything that lets you transform two pictures at once, because then I can pull someone else in for a selfie! XD17) how many times a week do you shower?Weird question, but the answer is; as often as I can. You want to wash the hospital off you. 19) shoe size?Either 4, 41/2 or 5 in UK sizes (so between 37 and 38 in European sizes), no idea what that is in US measurements. It’s small enough that sometimes I end up in the kiddy section.

21) sandals or sneakers? Depends on for what. Sneakers are generally good for most things, but there are times when sandals are more appropriate.

23) describe your dream dateI don’t know about dream, but a nice lunch on a sunny day, followed by a trip to a gallery or a museum, or perhaps a nice walk is 1000 times better than catching drinks in a crowded bar. As for anyone who drags someone to excercise on a ‘date’…no. Just no. 25) what color socks are you wearing? They happen to be black socks with tigers on them.

27) do you have a job? what do you do? I sometimes give hope, I always give support, but I cannot always give life when time has run out.

29) whats the worst thing you have ever done? The thing I’m most cringey about is the time I offended a classmate in primary school. I must have been 7. They asked me why I didn’t invite them to my party, and I gave them a reason that was both untrue and rude, and in the end I invited them and I came. But I’m still not sure why I did that.

31) 3 favorite boy names

I don’t know. Names I prefer in guys I’m seeing? Or for future kids? Or characters? Because those answers would all be different…

33) favorite actor?Right now, let’s say Robin Williams and Emma Thompson. I could say more, but then we’d be here all day.

35)who is your celebrity crush?I’m going to have to be really, really cliche and say Tom Hiddleston. That voice would sound compelling even if it was just reading out his shopping list, and he has really nice hands. I also think Jensen Ackles is pretty ahem, delectable, too.

37) do you read a lot? whats your favorite book? I love to read, with a passion. But I go through periods where I read a lot, and others when I read much less. Picking one book would be an impossibility.

39) do you have a nickname? what is it? Trying to find one which isn’t some derivative of my name, or just plain weird is hard.

41) top 10 favorite songsThis would probably require too much thought to answer right now.

43) what is your skin type? (oily, dry, etc)Oily. Definitely wasn’t blessed on the skin front, but such is life. Weirdly, friends keep telling me they thinl I have clear skin, and I’m like ‘whose face have you been looking at?!’ Which just does to show that we’re the only ones who notice our own blemishes. Take for example, scars. I have a few (!!) on my face, and people can know me for years and not realise they are there. Then literally turn around one day and say “OMG, what happened to your FACE?” To which I reply… “Um, nothing? It’s always like this.”.

45) how many kids do you want? This is not something I’ve really thought about? Enough to keep each other company, but not so many that I’m spending the next 500 years changing nappies. So 2 or 3, I guess?

47) what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc) Whatever kind of house I can afford. I don’t realistically see myself affording to live in London, and I don’t realistically see any chance of a big house if I live in the UK. But such is life.

49) what was the last compliment you received?On one of my recent night shifts, one of the nurses asked me where I was from. And I told her (people don’t usually know, or care, much about my country, but I see no reason to lie), and she said “I wanted to know why, because you are so confident. The way you talk” And I was taken aback. “Confident? ME? Really?!?”. To which she replied, laughing “You think you are not?”.  All this time I’ve been quite reserved, and always told by my seniors that I ought to have more faith in my clinical decisionmaking and just be more assertive, it was quite surprising to find out that someone saw me bumbling along on my night shift and thought I looked and sounded confident. 51) how old were you when you found out santa wasn’t real?Probably around 7? I was apparently not amused. I can’t remember. In retrospect, perhaps it’s odd that I always knew about the birds and the bees but not about Santa.53) opinion on smoking?Not a good idea, but often understandable. Nearly always started when we are very young, in order to fit in or belong. I grew up with one parent being a smoker (they quit, yay!) and have friends who smoked since their teens, so I can understand how hard it is to give up, and what addiction means. But one thing I really don’t understand is grownups “socially smoking”. At all. It’s flirting with addiction, has no benefits, and just drains your money?  I feel that most people my age who indulge in social smoking really should probably know better. But then that applies to many things in our lives.

55) what is your dream job? To be a magical girl/superhero. Being a doctor who draws comics shall, however, suffice until I get called into service by a cute magical familiar.

57) do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels? I used to use them, but I wouldn’t say that I would stock up on the whole stash. Though I have a sad feeling that they chuck the ones you don’t use, so maybe we should all be taking them?

59) do you smile for pictures?I used to never smile for pictures, because I had over-large incisors with a noticeable gap in them, and felt really self-conscious about them for most of my life. Then I stopped caring. But lately I realised my teeth no longer look oversized, and the gap has kind of shrunken, a little to my dismay.

61) have you ever peed in the woods? Another bizarrre question. I don’t hang out in the woods, but if there were no toilets within reasonable access, then I would? Pee is aseptic and the entirety of nature does it, plus it’s hardly going to get in anyone’s way?

63) do you prefer chicken nuggets from Wendy’s or McDonalds?I don’t even think we HAVE Wendy’s, so I guess the golden arches win by default?65) what do you wear to bed? Pajamas, because it’s usually cold? Unless we’re talking about entertaining…

67) what are your hobbies?Answering memes and solving the internet’s problems. Sometimes I draw. 69) do you play an instrument?I cannot manipulate notes like I manipulate words. I sort of learned the recorder and piano a little bit, but despite lovely encouragement, I don’t have the time nor the patience it would take to be good at music. I find it a very attractive quality in others, though!

71) tea or coffee?Coffee in the morning, tea at teatime (duh) and hot chocolate at night.73) do you want to get married?I would like to end with a relationship that is stable, comfortable and friendship blended with being lovers. It’s not that a piece of paper has meaning, rather that being sure you want to be with someone for the forseeable future is what makes it special. Sometimes it takes being willing to discuss that bit of paper for both parties to truly know how sure they are to share each others’ lives. 75) are you going to change your last name when you get married? Definitely not intending to. Sometimes my last name is a pain, because nobody can spell it, or pronounce it. And it’s so long that hyphenating would make it even more of a pain than it already is. But I’m attached to my name, it’s a part of me and my ethnic identity, and definitely am not going into relationships with an idea that I “have to take my husband’s name”. They can take mine, if they wish. Perhaps I’d be tempted to if someone’s name was just incredibly awesome, who knows? I would rarely rule anything out before the fact. But I certainly don’t intend to.

77) do you miss anyone right now? Yep. Don’t we all?

79) do you believe in ghosts?I’ve never seen one, and I’d rather not, thanks. I believe in not tempting fate and staying in my own lane, paranormally speaking. 81) last person you calledFunnily enough, just a work colleague. I missed a call at work (we were both on call) , and called them after the shift, which is when I realised they’d called. Fortunately we’d already taken care of the situation.

83) regular oreos or golden oreos? What is a golden oreo? Regular, since I know no other kind.

85) what shirt are you wearing? The pajamas my aunt and recently deceased gran gave me for my last birthday.

87) are you outgoing or shy?Shy.

89) do you like your neighbors? My flatmates are OK, but keep themselves to themselves and work far too many shifts (no doubt they’d say the same about me!). I don’t know everyone else in the building. 91) have you ever been high? Who needs to be high when you’ve been a teenage girl?93) last thing you ate? Soba noodles. 95) summer or winter? Summer. It’s when you are warm and sunny, and can go for long rambling walks all day. Winter is too dark, I feel like I don’t get any sunlight at all in the winter

97) dark, milk, or white chocolate? All of the above. If I had to pick one, then dark?99) what is your zodiac sign?I’m a leo, but I never thought it represented me. People always assume Leos are brash, loud, confident  extroverts who wear leopard print and go to all the parties. Meanwhile, here I am with  a cat under my arm wondering why that’s meant to be me. Though, I really hate the idea of someone telling me what I’m meant to be like, horoscopes or life in general. Like, they don’t even know me. The nerve. So perhaps there’s a little bit of that kind of imperiousness about me, after all.