erstwhilesparrow

[erstwhilesparrow]

never in my life i wanted to eat a froglight more...

[erstwhilesparrow]

jan 21, 2025

time isn't real and it cannot hurt me. still hiding my wips behind exchanges i'm afraid, so onto...

what i've read

The Hypnotists by Gordon Korman: I hated this book when it first came out and I hate it now. It's not good. It's awful. I read the whole thing in an hour.

just... so much of @erstwhilesparrow's Outsiders SMP fic, mostly at their recommendations

"in its belly looking for joy", also by sparrow: Technically, I read this one twice this month.

"said not to repeat yesterday's mistakes" by @ellytraoflight: I love this fic and will love this fic forever. I consider it mandatory reading for E2 Joel or Sausage fans. Also it was written by my partner but that's mostly unrelated

"Break Like an Artist" by SlashMagpie: hey guys did you know i like eldritch horror hey guys did you know---

"Stray Signals" by daisycraft: There is never anything wrong with extremely formulaic tropefic. There is also nothing wrong with Martyn/Ren fic. This is both.

"at once, for once, with the universe", also by sparrow: Okay, look, my honest opinion is you should read every fic Sparrow's ever written ever, but if you're not going to do that, you should read at least one of them. Probably not this one, it's an acquired taste (that I have absolutely acquired). But one of them!

"in its own watered version of semaphore", still by sparrow: guys you should read sparrow's fics

"pray for rain, brace for whiskey", by --- you guessed it --- sparrow

"Briseis to Achilles" by Ovid: okay admittedly this one was for class

what i've watched

more Outsiders SMP!

more Hannibal (2013)!

a lot of Forged in Fire

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier

bonus: what i've played

oh my god guys you should play prince of persia: the lost crown

[erstwhilesparrow]

After he's done listening to the Archeologist's story, the Sheriff frowns.

"Well, that's not fair, is it?" Jimmy says.

"Fair?" Pix responds.

"Yeah, fair. It's not--it's not fair at all! You can't just end it with--they try to be friends for, for the first time ever. And the Codfather gets respect and the Count gets more mature. And they shake hands and, and share magic and stuff. But it turns out them being friends causes the end of the world? That's not fair! That's not a good story at all!" Jimmy says.

Pixlriffs shrugs. "I didn't make it up. It's what's been passed down, and the Ancient Capitol corroborates it to some extent. The Rapture was a very real event in the geological record, and what historical records survive from the Twelve Kingdoms era suggests at the very least some kind of symbolic rivalry between cod and salmon. Maybe a religious one? It's really all quite fascinating."

"Well, yes, but it's not really literal, that religion stuff, right?" Jimmy says. "I mean, uh, I don't know much about all this stuff, but it's like--don't tell Sausage, but Santa Pearla, she's not literal, right? She's like, the idea of the cycle of death and life and all that, but--"

"Recent excavations actually suggest that Empress Pearl was a real historical figure," Pixlriffs says excitedly. "I mean, it seems rather unlikely she caused all the fields in the Twelve Kingdoms to remain fertile until the Rapture on her own, but the number of statues and records we've found even today suggest that she was still a real person!"

Jimmy is silent. He crosses his arms and stares at Pixlriffs until, finally, Pix stops talking.

"It's still not fair," Jimmy says.

"It's not about being fair, it's about what actually happened," Pix says.

"Because the story as I told it went that they made friends to try to make the best of the rapture. And though all the rivers had dried up, the Codfather and the Count laid seeds in the desert, until one day we could go and build our towns there safe, because their seeds made a pond. And, er, that's not all literal either, you know? None of this is really--sorta like Joel is not literally a god, that'd be stupid," Jimmy says.

"Right," Pixlriffs says, nodding. "But we don't tell him that."

"But we don't tell him that," Jimmy agrees. "And I'm just saying that--it's not fair, saying that making up their differences is what made the world end. That's like, like if the moral was that we shouldn't bother even trying."

"I think you'll make yourself sad, looking for a moral in ruins," Pixlriffs says.

Jimmy swallows.

"That's stupid," he says. "That's stupid."

"That's life."

"And it's stupid. I'm going to go bother Joel."

"Good luck with that."

The Sheriff rides away. The Archeologist watches after him for a long time before sighing.

"...and good luck ending this one differently," he says, and he goes back to his dig.

[erstwhilesparrow]

40 min drawing warmup with Double Life Pearl

[erstwhilesparrow]

bahar orang's where things touch is, as my friend put it, much more sentimental than what i usually have the patience for, but i told her it was working on/for me in part because a lot of it contains echoes of how my friends talk+think+write and i am charmed that the book's discussion of what beauty is eventually arrives at the notion that beauty comes out of... triangulation? engagement? connections beyond the thing itself and awareness that those connections exist and staying in the weird malleable space between them? so it continues to work on/for me

[erstwhilesparrow]

We don't have to face giant 🪳 thanks to ancient Egyptians stood and fought against them.

[erstwhilesparrow]

it's about people you're utterly beholden to, or think you should be utterly beholden to even if they're exhausting and infuriating and most of the reason to stick together at this point is for the look of the thing. it's about having an awful glittering premonition that you're going to die in this place, tangled up with this person, and tearing yourself away from it is just as awful as staying in it. it's about having nothing and no one to give things to except these people and you have to keep giving because you've been promised it'll make meaning, make sense, make up for whatever you've lost, as long as you do this. it's about repeating how it's you and them against the world until it's instinct and reflex, until it's the kind of thing that can drive you straight into a stupid, meaningless death. it's about trading clothes.

anyway. "uncomplicated, unexamined, and entirely sincere belief in the primacy and sanctity of familial relationships" isn't a thing i can put on my exchange dnws because it's unenforceable and also anyone who would make a gift with that in it would kind of definitionally not realize they're doing it but maybe next time i do an exchange i should ask for scott/pearl incest au. if there's anything family's good for in fiction, it's suffocation and entanglement and never ever ever getting out+away alive.

[erstwhilesparrow]

anyway. "uncomplicated, unexamined, and entirely sincere belief in the primacy and sanctity of familial relationships" isn't a thing i can put on my exchange dnws because it's unenforceable and also anyone who would make a gift with that in it would kind of definitionally not realize they're doing it but maybe next time i do an exchange i should ask for scott/pearl incest au. if there's anything family's good for in fiction, it's suffocation and entanglement and never ever ever getting out+away alive.

[erstwhilesparrow]

Top Femslash Ships Bracket - FINALS

[erstwhilesparrow]

Every time Austin Walker says "we can't do this, we CANNOT do this! We HAVE to move on" in response to a weird side tangent one of his friends has initiated and then continues the side tangent with a comment he absolutely cannot hold inside of himself, a fairy gets its wings. 🥰

[erstwhilesparrow]

okay. wanting to delete every e1 fic i've ever written is . a new one.

[erstwhilesparrow]

The funeral procession of Henrik Ibsen, walking up Ullevålsveien from the church to the cemetery. 1906-06-01

A Funeral Procession… passing along Berkeley Street in Dublin.

The funeral of Ismail Gasprinsky, Bakhchisaray, 1914.

The funeral procession of French president Sadi Carnot. Image published in Finnish periodical Uusi Kuvalehti in July 1894.

Funeral_do_ator_Joaquim_de_Almeida_(1921)

The Funeral of Lord Trịnh Tùng from Recueil de Plusieurs Relations et Traites by J.B.Tavernier, Chevalier and Baron D'Aubonne 1679.

The lying in state of King Edward VII, showing guards surrounding his coffin at Westminster Hall 17 MAY 1910

Maharaja Ranjit Singh's funeral. ca. 1840, paint on paper, The British Museum. Pahari-Sikh, from the family workshop of Purkhu of Kangra

Marc Antony's Oration at Caesar's Funeral by George Edward Robertson

*All Art from WikiCommons

[erstwhilesparrow]

Happy Ten Year Anniversary Friends At the Table!

Moonrise in ghosts - Jean Dubuffet | Camille Monet On Her Deathbed - Claude Monet |Ghosts of UFA - Richard Hamilton | Orfeova Smrt - Emil Filla | Ghost Dance (The Vision of Life) - Ralph Blakelock | Introduction. Picture from the magazine Vampire - Boris Kustodiev | Death Knight - Salvador Dali | Death of the Striker - Vasile Dobrian | Mitsukuni Defying the Skeleton Spectre Invoked by Princess Takiyasha - Utagawa Kuniyoshi | Lace and Ghosts - Victor Hugo

[erstwhilesparrow]

grian saying those are just holes in his face, not eyes, and i thought abt coraline

[erstwhilesparrow]

being a humanities major who’s friends with stem majors is so funny because you’ll ask your friends what they’re doing today and they’re like “UGH it’s so stressful i have to stabilize the reactor core for my nuclear power midterm and then i have to build the supercomputer from i have no mouth yet i must scream for my electrical engineering homework :/ what about you” and you’re like “oh well i have to read a fun little book and write an essay about gender.” and they still think you have it worse

[erstwhilesparrow]

[erstwhilesparrow]

Milan Kunc (Czech, 1944) - Slit II (1986)