#Andrew Douglas-Home

[thefollyflaneuse]

The Temple at The Lees, Coldstream, Borders

In the border town of Coldstream a footpath leads from a lodge down to the river Tweed. The route passes an ice-house shaded by trees before a stroll along the riverbank brings one to an elegant stone temple. The Temple ornamented the landscape of a grand Georgian mansion called The Lees, which was largely pulled down in the 1970s. The Lees (sometimes just Lees) was the seat of the interrelated…

[imthefailedartist]

Looking at my bookshelf today I realize I've made a huge dent in my Owned To Be Read books. It used to one shelf of read books now its three.

To be honest. If I consolidated all of the read books that are on their category or genre shelves, it'd be four.

[walks-the-ages]

ah, can't find the original post to respond to it, and tumblr was refusing to let me actually post with the usual bullshit of "sorry there was an error processing your post" . anyways.

If you see a post going around about Jewish restaurants being targeted for harassment by pro-palestine protestors "solely for being Jewish", stop what you are doing and actually look up the incident in question, because that is not what happened at Goldie's restaurant!

Full article below for accessiblity, and because we all know Tumblr only looks at headlines and doesn't click links to news articles.

Long post!

Bolding is my own for emphasis.

A protest against a top Israel-born chef was called antisemitic. Staff tell a different story

Wilfred ChanFri 8 Dec 2023 16.55 GMTFirst published on Fri 8 Dec 2023 12.00 GMT

The 21-second clip went viral almost as soon as it was posted early on Sunday evening. It showed hundreds of protesters, some with Palestinian flags, united in a rhyming chant: “Goldie, Goldie, you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide!”

They were protesting outside Goldie, a vegan falafel restaurant owned by Michael Solomonov, the Israel-born celebrity chef best known for Zahav, an Israeli-themed restaurant widely considered one of the United States’ finest eateries. It was one brief stop along a march traversing Philadelphia that lasted about three hours.

Many of the protesters hadn’t even returned home from the march when the condemnations began to pour in. The Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, posted on X: “Tonight in Philly, we saw a blatant act of antisemitism – not a peaceful protest. A restaurant was targeted and mobbed because its owner is Jewish and Israeli. This hate and bigotry is reminiscent of a dark time in history.”

Even the White House piled on: it was “antisemitic and completely unjustifiable to target restaurants that serve Israeli food over disagreements with Israeli policy”, said the deputy press secretary, Andrew Bates. Douglas Emhoff, husband of Vice-President Kamala Harris, wrote on X that he had spoken with Solomonov and “told him @POTUS, @VP, and the entire Biden-Harris Administration will continue to have his back”.

It was the apex of a saga that has resulted in at least three workers fired from Solomonov’s restaurants over, as they see it, their pro-Palestine activism coming into conflict with their bosses’ views and policies, and at least one other worker who has resigned in protest – thrusting the renowned Israeli eateries into the thick of bitter US disagreements over the Israel-Hamas war.

The street protest against Goldie has sparked heated debate. As the war on Gaza rages on, with over 17,000 people killed in Gaza since 7 October – 70% of them women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry – are Israel-linked businesses in the US implicated? Was Solomonov, a chef who has credited Palestinian influences in his cooking, an appropriate target?

Interviews with protesters and current and former employees at Solomonov’s restaurants paint a more complex version of events than what the video clip may have suggested. They reject the notion that Goldie was singled out because of the owners’ ethnicity, arguing that their objections stem from management using the restaurants to fundraise for Israel after 7 October in spite of worker concerns. Activists also say their protest shines a necessary spotlight on the political commitments of one of the highest-profile restaurateurs in the United States.

Tensions at work

There were political tensions simmering at Solomonov’s restaurants before Sunday’s march. The Guardian spoke to three Goldie workers who say they were fired due to their pro-Palestine advocacy: two who wore Palestinian flag pins in violation of a newly announced dress code that forbade non-Goldie branded adornments, and another who tweeted in support of Sunday’s street protest.

Their discomfort at work began following a fundraiser in October, during which Solomonov and his business partner Steve Cook announced they would donate all of the restaurant group’s profits from one day, over $100,000, to United Hatzalah, an Israeli medical non-profit that has supplied the Israel Defense Forces with protective and medical gear during the current war against Hamas.

And in early November, Solomonov’s Zahav hosted a private fundraiser by a prominent political action committee dedicated to supporting political candidates “who reflect Jewish values”. Attendees at the event, which has not been previously reported, included the Michigan governor, Gretchen Whitmer; and dozens of other pro-Israel officials and lobbyists, according to a current Zahav employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The employee said that in recent weeks, Solomonov had also booked and paid for multiple, lavish private dinners at Zahav for IDF members preparing to deploy to fight for Israel.

“The amount of material support that we’ve lended to pro-Israel causes and Israeli military personnel has been really discomforting,” the Zahav worker told the Guardian.

In an email to workers on Wednesday, Solomonov and Cook apologized for not communicating about their political stances with staff more directly. The pair had sought to “avoid discussing politics at work … to make everyone as comfortable as possible in the restaurant,” the owners wrote. “But perhaps we created a void that had the opposite effect. For that, we are sorry.”

The fraught politics of food

The protest and its fallout have produced the biggest controversy ever faced by Solomonov, one of America’s most prominent Israeli cultural figures and someone who for years has cast himself as a culinary bridge between Israel, Palestine, and the United States.

Solomonov’s brother, a soldier in the Israel Defense Forces, was killed in 2003 by Hezbollah snipers; Solomonov wrote in his first cookbook, Zahav, that the tragedy made him briefly consider joining Israel’s army. Instead, he decided to channel his emotion into food, something he found allowed him to “expose people to a side of Israel that had nothing to do with politics”. That led him and Cook, an investment banker-turned-restaurateur, to found Zahav in 2008, followed by other prominent Israeli-themed eateries: Dizengoff, Goldie, K’Far, and Laser Wolf, under a restaurant group called CookNSolo. In 2017, Israel’s ministry of tourism named him a culinary ambassador.

The restaurants have never been completely free from controversy. Debates over the origins and ownership of Middle Eastern food have raged for years; many culinary experts have argued that Palestinian contributions to Mediterranean cuisine have been used by Israeli chefs without sufficient respect or acknowledgement. Yet while Solomonov and Cook have always branded their food as Israeli, their menus and cookbooks cite Palestinian influences on many dishes. For years, Solomonov also spoke of his friendship with the Palestinian writer and cookbook author Reem Kassis – though the two are no longer speaking, according to the New York Times.

But the conflicts aren’t just over cultural appropriation. They’re about “the way Israel as a state has weaponized food against the Palestinian people”, says the Palestinian American chef Reem Assil, who owns Reem’s, a Arab street food joint in San Francisco. “Even before these last 60 days, Israel has restricted what Gazans can access in terms of food and water. They target bakeries, they target farms, they target markets. They uproot our olive trees, they make it illegal for us to forge our own ingredients, like za’atar.” The UN warned last month that Israel’s military operations in Gaza had put residents there at “immediate” risk of starvation.

A controversial fundraiser

Since the 7 October attacks, Solomonov has publicly sought to caveat his support for Israel. “I personally believe in the right of Palestinians to have their own state, and the right for self-determination, and I don’t deny those things,” he said at an event last month in New Jersey, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. “And I believe the Israeli government oftentimes does things that I would not do at all … and it can be quite damaging.”

But internally, Solomonov and Cook were using their restaurants to steer resources toward Israel.

On 10 October, Solomonov and Cook announced a fundraiser that would donate all the profits across CookNSolo restaurants on 12 October to United Hatzalah. “It is not associated with any military,” the restaurant group assured staff in a Slack message – something that simply wasn’t true, workers soon realized with alarm.

Goldie staff were caught off guard because they considered the restaurant a politically progressive institution. The vegan falafel restaurant proudly displayed an LGBTQ flag and Black Lives Matter flag on its wall. Many of the workers were young and identified as queer. There was a casual dress code: Noah Wood, a 25-year-old who uses they/them pronouns, said they did shifts at Goldie while wearing hats with slogans supporting indigenous rights.

The night before CookNSolo’s fundraiser, Goldie’s store manager at the time, 24-year-old Sophie Hamilton, says she discovered public videos by United Hatzalah about how the non-profit supplied protective gear to IDF soldiers. She rushed off an email to Goldie’s general manager, Emma Richards, saying she felt “deeply betrayed and misled”. “I feel like I’ve been left with no choice but to refuse to come to work tomorrow unless [CookNSolo] commits to also raising donations for a Palestinian humanitarian organization, of course with no connection to any military.”

But Hamilton’s suggestion was ignored, and Richards simply told her someone would cover her shift the next day.

When Hamilton returned to work, she decided to keep working but while wearing a small Palestinian flag pin. “There’s just a point where you can’t leave your humanity at the door,” she said. No customers complained, but two weeks later, management announced a new rule: staff were not to wear stickers, pins, or patches that were not Goldie-branded.

Wood, the other server, started wearing a Palestinian flag pin in open defiance of the new rule. Another worker, June, 24, wore a green shirt, black pants, and a red bandana – a reference to the colors of Palestinian flag.

On 15 November, the restaurant asked Hamilton to send Wood home for violating the dress code. Hamilton refused, and the next day they were both fired, Hamilton for “poor performance for failing to enforce the uniform policy”. Wood was not given any official reason, they say.

In the Wednesday email to staff, the owners wrote: “We recognize that people have different views on the war between Israel and Hamas, and we respect your rights to your own views. Many of our guests have passionate feelings about the current conflict and, knowing that not all of you feel the same way, our approach is to simply avoid discussing politics at work.”

They did not provide details on the firings beyond writing: “It is also important for you to hear directly from us that we have never terminated employees based on their support for Palestine.”

The owners added: “We think it’s important to say that our support of Israel is not unqualified. We have plenty of criticisms, particularly in the way that the government has stymied the prospects for Palestinian statehood in recent years.”

In a statement shared with the Guardian, United Hatzalah’s senior vice-president for international operations, Michael Brown, said that the nonprofit and the IDF “often train together, especially when conducting mass casualty training drills, or search and rescue training drills in order to hone our skills and help the IDF sharpen theirs, as well as to allow for an easier flow of collaborative life saving efforts should the need ever arise in the field, similar to what happened during October 7th.”

The restaurant group declined to respond to a detailed list of questions by the Guardian about the fired workers, but a spokeswoman said in a statement: “CookNSolo exists to create community through food. We are committed to fostering an open, safe, and supportive workplace for all of our employees who have varying backgrounds and political views. Like many hospitality companies, we have standard policies for our employees, which we consistently enforce.” Solomonov declined, through a representative, a direct request for an interview.

Justin Sadowsky, an attorney at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights non-profit, says the firings of Goldie workers are the first time he’s heard of restaurant workers allegedly fired for supporting Palestine since 7 October. “We’ve seen it in hospitals, we’ve seen it at large corporations, we’ve seen it in law firms, but it’s sort of spilling into everywhere,” he said. The organization says it’s received a “staggering” 2,171 requests for help and reports of bias in the 57 days since the Israel-Hamas war began, equalling nearly half of the total complaints it handled in all of 2022.

Call for a boycott

Meanwhile, CookNSolo’s fundraiser for United Hatzalah had caught the attention of local activists in a group called the Philadelphia Free Palestine Coalition. The activists weren’t in touch with the restaurant workers, but drew the same conclusion: by funneling restaurant proceeds toward a group associated with the IDF, CookNSolo was complicit in Israel’s war crimes.

In mid-October, the activists called for a boycott. Natalie Abulhawa, a Palestinian American organizer at the Free Palestine Coalition, helped write an Instagram post for the boycott that named three of Solomonov’s restaurants – Goldie, Zahav, and Laser Wolf – as well as a number of other Middle Eastern restaurants in the city. “Restaurants and businesses claiming to sell ‘Israeli’ food, fruits, vegetables, and products are part of an ongoing colonial campaign of stealing, appropriating, and profiting off of Palestinian food and culture as a means of erasing Palestinian existence,” the call read.

The boycott made waves in the food world, and Solomonov addressed it at a closed-door event in November at a New Jersey Jewish Community Center. Speaking to the crowd of several hundred, he called the boycott misguided, adding that it wasn’t affecting his sales, according to the Inquirer. While acknowledging that “part of Israeli food is Palestinian influenced”, he argued that any suggestion that Israeli food was stolen from Palestinians was akin to saying Israelis “don’t have a right to be there”. Solomonov added that his restaurants credited Palestinian influences on their menus and claimed Zahav imported more Palestinian wines than any other Philadelphia eatery.

But privately, Solomonov and Cook were using their restaurants to platform Israel’s war effort. On 1 November, Zahav hosted a fundraiser by a major political action committee called Democratic Jewish Outreach Pennsylvania, whose guests included Whitmer and as many as 80 other pro-Israel officials and lobbyists, according to the unnamed Zahav employee. “It was an explicitly pro-Israel reception and speeches made were about that support,” the employee said.

The employee said that Whitmer, who delivered a keynote, opened with the Jewish expression of solidarity “Am Yisrael Chai”, or “the people of Israel live”, and called for providing material support to Israel, and that Solomonov, who was in the audience, was afterward “emphatically talking and thanking all of the attendees”.

In the following weeks, the employee became even more disturbed as Solomonov hosted and paid for at least two private dinners at Zahav for small groups of Israelis, including soldiers who were preparing to fly home to fight the Gaza war. Solomonov explained with “a level of reverence” that the restaurant would cover the bill because of the diners’ roles in the Israeli military, the employee says.

These events, in addition to the firings of Goldie staff, have made many of Zahav’s staff deeply uncomfortable. “Most of the employees here are not particularly interested in the support of Israel,” the employee said, but the workers fear retaliation if they speak out. CookNSolo declined to comment on the events at Zahav.

A clip goes viral

Pennsylvania’s Jewish and Muslim communities have been on edge since the Israel-Hamas war began. On Monday, a Jewish daycare in Philadelphia reported that vandals had spray-painted “Free Palestine” and other graffiti on its windows. On Tuesday, a pair of students sued the University of Pennsylvania, claiming it had become an “incubation lab for virulent anti-Jewish hatred”. Last week, a South Philadelphia mosque reported that it had been vandalized by anti-Muslim graffiti. And last month, a man was arrested for pointing a gun and yelling racial slurs against a group of pro-Palestine demonstrators at the state’s capitol.

The Goldie protest also followed a growing number of incidents that have entangled Middle Eastern food businesses. Palestinian restaurants such as New York City’s Ayat have reported being flooded with negative reviews since the war began; last month, an ex-Obama aide was charged with a hate crime for harassing a halal food street vendor.

But Goldie’s attempts to head off pro-Palestinian activism were futile.

On 3 December, the Free Palestine Coalition led hundreds of protesters in an evening of marches around Philadelphia to renew calls for a ceasefire. Starting from Rittenhouse Square in Philly’s Center City neighborhood, the march took a wrong turn, which brought it past Goldie, says Abulhawa. The encounter with the falafel restaurant wasn’t planned, she says, “but we ran with it”.

June, who is Jewish, was one of the employees working inside Goldie that night, and said the protest – which lasted just a few minutes – was completely peaceful: “There was nothing violent, no hint of antisemitism.” The store was devoid of guests when the marchers arrived, though one customer came in partway through to pickup an online order and displayed no reaction. June even thought about going outside to join the protest, but thought better of it and instead quietly chanted along to the slogans from inside the store.

Someone placed two small stickers on Goldie’s door and window. One read, “Free Palestine,” and another contained a statistic about the number of children Israel had killed in Gaza (Abulhawa says that whoever placed the stickers were not asked to do so by protest organizers). One protester briefly posed in front of the door with a Palestine flag. Then the protest shuffled on.

A few minutes later, a user named Jordan Van Glish posted a 21-second clip of the protest to X, where it quickly went viral. Comments flooded in: “Once again proving that this is about hating Jews,” one user wrote. Stop Antisemitism, a prominent pro-Israel group, posted that it was a “failure” that no anti-riot police were dispatched and no protesters were arrested.

But Philadelphia’s police force told the Guardian that officers observing the march “did not see, hear, or record any threats to persons inside or outside Goldie”, and the department received “no 911 calls or complaints” during the event.

Some marchers have acknowledged how the clip, taken out of context, could have been misinterpreted. “I’d say in hindsight, maybe [the organizers] should have spent another minute explaining why we were stopping there,” says Joe Piette, a photographer who joined the protest. “It would have been better to explain some of the details of the owner of that restaurant. Our mistake was not explaining it on the spot.”

June felt that frustration when they got home that night and saw the clip gaining traction. “So I felt like I should give the context that was missing from that tweet,” they said. June published a post explaining that the restaurant group had raised money for Israel-linked causes and punished pro-Palestine employees. “If you don’t want to be directly funding genocide, you should probably stay away from Goldie” and other CookNSolo restaurants, they wrote.

On Monday, June got a phone call while on the bus to work: they were fired as well. The manager gave no explanation, but June didn’t need to ask why. “Honestly, I didn’t really feel that bad or surprised,” they said. “I had no pride in this job.”

High-profile officials have continued to argue that the protesters were motivated by antisemitism. Governor Shapiro doubled down on his tweet after visiting Goldie and meeting with Solomonov on Wednesday. “A mob protested a restaurant simply because it’s owned by a Jewish person,” the governor claimed. “That is the kind of antisemitic tropes that we saw in 1930s Germany, and it’s the kind of thing we should not tolerate.” In a statement to the Guardian, his office reiterated: “This was not a peaceful protest”.

Two days after the march, Tess Rauscher, a 25-year-old barista at the CookNSolo-owned Israeli cafe K’Far, resigned, citing the company’s fundraiser and firing of Goldie workers, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. “It was these actions, not the identity of the owner, that changed the nature of my job,” she said.

This article was amended on 8 December 2023 to delete an incorrect reference to a manager taking down an LGBTQ+ flag. Also references to Governor Josh Shapiro attending an event at Zahav on 1 November were deleted. Governor Shapiro’s office have said he was not at the event.

[end article]

TL;DR:

Goldie's restaurant and 2 other restaurants owned by the same famous Israeli chef were part of a general boycott starting in October.

The famous israeli chef, Michael Solomonov, has been directly funding the Israeli military with fundraisers at his various owned resteraunts (including donating over $100,000 in a single day)

Michael Solomonov has also hosted multiple, lavish "going away parties" free of charge for people deploying to go fight in Gaza (you know, just, going on over to help commit genocide!)

Multiple staff were fired for being pro-palestine, including for wearing pins with the Palestinian flag, or wearing the colors of the palestinian flag to work.

June, A jewish staff member who was working when the protestors arrived outside the restaurant, did not feel threatened in any way, affirmed it was a completely peaceful protest, and actually considered stopping their work to go out and join the march, but ultimately decided to stay for the rest of their shift and quietly chant along with the protestors. They were fired a few days later, and not given any explanation.

[elusiveclownbox]

SOME ANDREIL/NEIL/ANDREW CODED SONGS (in my humble opinion)(with links to listen)

(because i have the biggest brainrot, they’re also just great songs so please give them a listen!)

Neath The Grove Is A Heart

Yaelokre

“Home is where we are now. Home is where you are. Home is where I am standing. Where I'Il be staying forever now”

this entire post is just gonna be my biased interpretations of songs but honestly the entire song gives vibes to me…the places that one would refer to as “home” being a constant ever changing cycle of different places, never being able to stay and settle in a physical place. but finding a home in someone else.

Room By Room

Shayfer James (I’ve almost exclusively been listening to him, so the rest of the songs are his oops)

“If the keys in my hand turned a lock of your hair I would walk through the glance, but I'd stop at the stare. And I'd follow it down To the very last step and I'd wait by the room where your secrets are kept”

THOSE ARE THE FIRST LYRICS cmon mannnn,,,learning the brutal past of someone you love as they allow you in, do i even need to say it?

First Date

Shayfer James

“Tell me your story, and I'll tell you mine, I think we will get along fine. Tell me your riddle, I'll tell you my rhyme, I think we will get along fine. And if the rules change, don't hesitate to say you've had enough of me”

It’s literally the whole beginning of their relationship, a truth for truth, trade for trade. The game of, maybe not necessarily originally trust, but of mutual understanding that grows into trust and respect.

Your Father’s Son

Shayfer James

“So if you're any good at bluffing, I suggest you do it quick 'cause everyone is next to nothing, and every tock will have a tick. It fits so well. What you've become is your father's son which will never be much of anyone”

Oh Neil, you poor boy cowering in the shadow of your father, his legacy locked within your image and the face you share with him. No matter what new name and identity you create, you know your father will never be far behind, you will always be his son. At least, that’s how it used to be.

Learning to Be Lost

Shayfer James

“I am a plagiarized autobiography of wreckage, a shipwreck in sheep's clothes. Be patient with me, I am learning to be lost. Don't be gentle. Never gentle. Be mindful of me, I will sink at any cost”

This I feel resonates more with Andrew, but one could argue resonates with both. They both have tortured pasts that are unspeakable to almost all but each other, but Andrew shoves that past and those memories behind a face of calm indifference and apathy. But they are both navigating a relationship with each other that they are unfamiliar with, and didn’t necessarily intend to enter. As they reveal bit and bit of their pasts, they don’t want pity or sympathy, their pasts are what created them and they refuse to be treated as though they are broken, especially Andrew.

Lullaby

Shayfer James & Kate Douglas

“People can't be trusted and we have to fight to stay alive. We'll always be the enemy, oh. Eye for eye and limb for limb, The blood that I've been swimming in, oh. Mother, I've grown tired of this. Mother, I've grown tired of this. There's beauty and there's empathy, some people might've cared for me. I hid my heart, and stayed inside, instead of moving with the tide”

THIS IS ALLLLL NEIL BABYYY. Blindly continuing to follow his mother’s words and advice, she kept him safe for so long after all (in her own way). He trusted that she loved him, wanted to protect him, but he missed out on so much because of her. Missed out on friends and life in general, people who might have been able to actually help him. If it wasn’t for meeting people more stubborn than him, for wanting to just exist for once, he could’ve been on the run and never settling for so much longer. Or have died.

Carve A Smile

Shayfer James

“And with every kiss you make a better man of me. The safe disguise of accidental lies won’t hide us here, no more, my dear. And I would sacrifice the air that makes my body breathe, if it keeps you safe”

They are both so willing to put themselves in harms way to protect the other, even before they came to realize just how much the other meant to them. Andrew with the intention of winning, and Neil half the time not caring if he ends up dead as long as Andrew is alright.

PLEASE DROP YOUR OWN SONG REQS i love good music.

anyway if anyone has actually made it to this point thank you for listening to my babbling. I can associate any and every song i listen to to whatever i am currently hyper fixating on and i need to express it outwardly. Hopefully yall like the music at least, even if you disagree with my interpretations!

[thatstheproblemwithnapkinman]

i want to preface this with a few things

dick grayson is my favourite character. i am not here to slander him or talk bad about those who like him

fanon is what got me into dc. i have grown since and now have a substantial comic collection (at least for the few months i've been collecting). i still enjoy fanon but i am a canon person

with all of that said...

a pointless rant about dick grayson in fanon

sources listed at the bottom

this discourse surrounding dc, the batfam in particular, has really been irking my lately. i don't know why, it just has. i see so much around these characters and the way fans interact with each other here on hellsite and on tiktok (i avoid twitter like middle-aged cis white british dads avoid talking about their feelings) and i just wanna scream about it

the erasure of dick grayson's character

dick grayson isn't a himbo

this is particularly common in fanfictions given that the barrier of entry is non-existent but the idea that dick is a silly, ditzy, idiot that can't cook is arguably the complete opposite of his character

i have a feeling this idea stems from the nature of dick as nightwing, the cracking jokes whilst fighting, the appearance of not taking things seriously (when he in fact does, just not as outwardly as the likes of batman). this in and of itself is ridiculous given that a similar character, peter parker aka spider-man, also crack jokes and honestly is very similar to dick in the way he is as a hero, and yet, for the most part, is still taken seriously and isn't diminished to the same level that dick is

which could come down to public knowledge of the character

let's be honest, the majority of the public could tell you who peter parker is, have probably seen at least one live action iteration of the character, if not all 3 iconic versions (maguire, garfield, holland) most (and please forgive me for using generations) millenials and gen z can define their teen years based on which spider-man was coming out. which they went to the cinema to see. all live-action appearances are:

the amazing spider-man ('77-'79) played by nicholas hammond

spider-man (also japanese spider-man) ('78-'79) played by Shinji Tōdō

spider-man (1, 2, 3)('02, '04, '07) played by tobey maguire

the amazing spider-man (1, 2)('12, '14) played by andrew garfield

spider-man (homecoming, far from home, no way home)('17, '19, '21) played by tom holland

given that dick has just as many live action appearances, stretching back to before spider-man had even debuted in the comics:

the batman serial ('43) played by douglas croft

the batman and robin serial ('49) played by jonny duncan

batman ('66-'68) played by burt ward

batman forever ('95) and Batman & Robin ('97) played by chris o'donnell

titans ('18-'23) played by brenton thwaites

EDIT: in my excitement i never included the first comic appearances of either character. dick debuted on the 6th march 1940 in detective comics #38, peter debuted on 5th june 1962 in amazing fantasy #15

(i am not talking about animated appearances as for both peter and dick they are much less known to the general public than live action)

i'd say i was surprised to see the same number of appearances, but by comparing when the show/movie came out, you can see a clear difference

every live action spider-man project listed has occurred within the past 50 years, with the movies being in relatively consistent from 2002 onwards. dick grayson is more sporadic, 2 appearances in the 40s, again in the 60s, again in the 90s, and finally in the late 10s. no wonder he's less well known when you have to go back to the 90s for a movie version and even then it isn't really dick grayson (in terms of characterisation)

most people can tell you there's batman and robin, and maybe just maybe they can tell you robin is dick grayson, but that's about it. mention nightwing and they blank. and don't even try to tell someone that there's been more that one robin, it won't end well

i can hear people yelling "but dick is a sidekick and peter isn't"

yes, that is true, but dick hasn't been a sidekick since the early 80s, after he'd been around for over 4 decades. that's a pretty old sidekick. but yes, this does hold some merit but given that dick is a lot older it's interesting. and with the most recent live action appearance being titans, a show that spends the first 2 seasons exploring dick's journey from sidekick to standalone hero, it does pose some questions

that was a long tangent to basically say that an equivalent character in personality isn't erased so much in fanfiction because they have more recent and bigger exposure (probably)

also, random, but in my research i came across this list of best teen heroes and look

fig 1. image showing spider-man and dick grayson in positions 1 and 2 relatively in a fan voted list of best teen heroes, spider-man having 3446 votes and dick grayson having 3191 votes

anyway, back to the rant

a wayne family adventures (WFA) tangent

i see people blaming WFA for this but i really don't think that is the case. he may not be the same as his comic counterpart but he is not out of character. everything he does is still very much him. examples include:

comforting duke after ana broke up with him (ep. 10)

helping damian make a friend (ep. 24)

being torn between his brothers (ep. 27-28)

teasing bruce after zatanna made him superman (ep. 54)

teasing helena into swapping weapons (ep. 63) i just like this one

organising everyone back to the manor when he realised alfred was left on his own during thanksgiving (ep. 68)

picking the rainbow suit for bruce (ep. 77)

talking to a little girl who just lost her parents (ep. 80-81)

annoying wally (ep. 84) birdflash time

helping duke with the kidnapping threat (ep. 99) also like this one

competing with jason over lian and roy (ep. 108)

making tim do all the work in his apartment (ep. 111) + haley

comforting and helping damian when he doubts himself (ep. 113) arguably my favourite episode

ok that was most of them BUT seriously WFA is not the problem here

there's no "fix" for this, i just wanted to tell people to stop blaming WFA for everything wrong with new comic fans; you can enjoy WFA and enjoy the comics, the aren't mutually exclusive

WFA doesn't erase him, they just choose what to show in the limited time you get with him. the only thing i remember being "wrong" is that dick can't cook (ep. 17 - top chef)

and yeah, WFA does play into the golden retriever vibes fanon dick has... in one episode, specifically the haley episode (ep. 111) see below. if it takes 111 episodes to fall on a fanon trope, i think that is fine. if you want to include ep. 17, that's 2 episodes out of 116! that's pretty good going. even the comics have more ooc moments (see the current nightwing run)

fig. 2 screenshot from wayne family adventures showing dick grayson smiling and saying "thank you" whilst a tail wags in the background

fanfiction

unsurprisingly, fanfiction is probably to blame but don't think i'm blaming authors (i kinda am but stick with me here)

i don't think writing a comic canon charatcer should be required, but i do think writers should disclose when they haven't read the comics. from experience, i get not annoyed, but have a "ugh" moment when i read a fic and the character is ooc, but if the author has stated in the notes that they haven't read a comic and the character is probably ooc, i am still going to read the fic

ooc or not, if a fic has a decent plot, at least 6th grade (UK year 7) level writing, and not "want to punch them in the face" characters, i'll enjoy it. throw in a popular trope and it'll be a favourite

and if you tell people "hey, this is probably ooc from the comic canon" they can't get mad or blame authors... just saying

i mean the whole reason this is "the problem" is that people get mad over ooc in fan works. like i'm sorry, have you read gotham war?!?!? the current nightwing run?!?!? lots of ooc in the comics themselves

tl;dr

fanfiction is the root of all evil

no, but seriously, dick's, mis-characterisation is a product of his prevalence in media, the material people have, and a lack of disclaiming ooc in fanfics. the last point could be a solution, but honestly expecting fanfic authors to do that is ridiculous

this rant was for nothing, hope you enjoyed wasting your time

i did tell you it was pointless

(i should've called this section a conclusion bc the word count is 1559 and that is insane. it's literally longer than the essay i have due in next week that i'm only half way through)

(also, this was supposed to be the first part of a longer post about how dick is over-sexualised but at that word count i'm splitting it up)

sources

list of live action dick grayson

list of live action spider-man actors

used for dates of spider-man films in the correct order

wayne family adventures

[scotianostra]

7th July 1297 saw an "official" or nobles' rebellion surrender to the English at Irvine.

*Dates differ by a few days of this.

Little has been written about this event sometimes called The Capitulation of Irvine, part of this in my opinion is that we don’t like talking about defeats, which this was, even if it was more of a stand-0ff. The second reason, again in my opinion is the main history during this ear comes from a couple of sources, Blind Harry’s poem, The Wallace, and John Barbour’s The Bruce. Wallace wouldn’t have featured it due to him not being involved and The Bruce because it wasn’t a glorious occasion for our future King.

The most notable event in 1297 was the victory by a Scots army led by William Wallace and Andrew de Moray at Stirling Brig, but Wallace and Moray were not the only Scottish nobles rebelling against the English that year. In fact, they were among the least powerful of the Scots’ leaders. Another revolt further south fizzled out, its leaders negotiating a peace rather than fight the English.

James Steward was Scotland’s Lord High Steward and a Young Robert Bruce felt aggrieved by the English rule. As powerful landowners, they had controlled south-western Scotland before the invasion. They had not supported Balliol in his resistance to Edward and had expected to be rewarded. Edward was suspicious of both men and had relieved them of their roles. He handed control of the south-west to the English lord, Henry Percy.

Angry at being snubbed by Edward, Bruce and Steward raised an armed revolt against English rule. Under the guidance of Bishop Wishart of Glasgow, they and their allied nobles began to gather an army at Irvine. Percy’s response however, caught them by surprise. He rode north with a small force whilst the main English army was still gathering - catching the Scottish nobles unprepared.

Faced with such professionalism, the disorganised Scottish nobles surrendered without a fight. The negotiations at Irvine dragged on for several weeks – some historians say this was a plan by the Scottish nobles to pin down English forces and buy time for the simultaneous rebellion of William Wallace to grow and spread…

If so, this wasn’t appreciated at the time. Wallace was said to be so angry at Wishart’s surrender that he personally raided the bishop’s home and ransacked his treasury.

Most of the Scottish Nobles at Irvine were treated leniently, with the exception of one man, the treatment of whom arguably gave rise to one of our greatest warriors taking arms against the English. The man was Sir William the Hardy, Lord of Douglas. Sometimes called the Bold, William had been held prisoner by the English twice and has earlier taken arms with Wallace and Moray at Sanquhar, Durisdeer and later Scone Abbey, he was possibly the most senior noble to have been a part of Wallace’s early skirmishes with the English, there isn’t any real detail about his capture, but by the time of Stirling brig he was being held at Berwick Castle in what became known as the Douglas Tower' from there he was taken to The Tower of London on 12th October 1297 where he met his end on 24th January 1298 due to mistreatment.

England would pay later at the hands of the man the English called The Black Douglas, Williams son.

There is loads more about all this from the learned pen of Dr Callum Watson, who is a Steward at Blackness Castle, and previously served as the Battle Coordinator at the Battle of Bannockburn Visitor Centre. Callum pulls no punches in his appraisal of this event it's title "Bottle Merchants: The Capitulation at Irvine, 1297" says it all.

http://drcallumwatson.blogspot.com/.../bottle-merchants...

[brokehorrorfan]

The Amityville Horror (2005) will be released on 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray on September 3 via Scream Factory. The supernatural horror film is a remake of the 1979 film of the same name, itself based on Jay Anson's 1977 novel.

Produced by Platinum Dunes, Andrew Douglas (Mindhunter) directs from a script by Scott Kosar (The Machinist, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre). Ryan Reynolds, Melissa George, Philip Baker Hall, Chloe Grace Moretz, Jesse James, Jimmy Bennett, and Rachel Nichols star.

The Amityville Horror has been newly scanned in 4K from the original digital intermediate film negative with Dolby Vision. Special features are listed below.

Disc 1 - 4K UHD:

Audio commentary by actor Ryan Reynolds and producers Andrew Form and Brad Fuller

Disc 2 - Blu-ray:

Audio commentary by actor Ryan Reynolds and producers Andrew Form and Brad Fuller

Houses Don't Kill People: Revisiting The Amityville Horror - Interviews with director Andrew Douglas and composer Steve Jablonsky (new)

Deleted scenes with optional commentary by actor Ryan Reynolds and producers Andrew Form and Brad Fuller

The Source of Evil: Making The Amityville Horror

On-Set Peeks - Behind-the-scenes featurettes

Home Movies

Scare Reel

Theatrical trailer

In November 1974, a family of six was brutally murdered in this home. A year later, an unsuspecting young couple, George and Kathy Lutz, move their family in — only to find that a murderous presence still haunts the house. What follows is 28 days of unimaginable fear.

Pre-order The Amityville Horror.

[alwayschasingrainbows]

Inspired by one of @lizzy-bonnet 's wonderful posts about Elizabeth Murray (THANK YOU!), I decided to try and do some research to answer the question that had been bothering me (and probably only me!):

How old were the Murrays, when their youngest sister (Juliet) was born?

Let me start with quoting Douglas Starr: "Elizabeth and Laura and Wallace and Oliver and Ruth were old Archibald Murray’s children. His first wife was their mother. When he was sixty he married again—a young slip of a girl—who died when your mother was born. Juliet was twenty years younger than her half-family, as she used to call them." (Emily of New Moon).

So, here we go (my very own order):

I. Elizabeth Murray: about 26-27.

"Aunt Elizabeth was nearly seventy." [...] "You will be twenty-four your next birthday," said Aunt Elizabeth." (Emily's Quest).

So, let's say she is about 69-70 when Emily is 23, which would make her about 46-47, when Emily is born.

We don't know for sure how old Juliet was when she gave birth to Emily. Yet, her age might be guessed... at least, a bit.

Douglas tells 11 year old Emily: “I met her [Juliet] twelve years ago, when I was sub-editor of the Enterprise up in Charlottetown and she was in her last year at Queen’s." (Emily of New Moon). Queens is a two-year course, and if Juliet attended it right after Shrewsbury High School, she would be around 19 when she met Douglas and 20 when Emily was born.

Elizabeth also gives such an older sister's vibes. She rules the family and even orders Wallace to "leave this child [Emily] alone". (Emily of New Moon).

II. Wallace Murray: 23-26.

"Your Uncle Wallace might, seeing as he reckons himself the head of the family. He’s only got a grown-up daughter."

So, I would say, he is the second oldest (and a first-born son). He seems to think he is the head of the family, which would be understandable if he was the oldest son. There is not much more evidence, but I would say he might have been 1-3 years younger than Elizabeth (so, 23-26).

III. (or IV?) Oliver Murray: 19-25.

Not much evidence here, either, but one of Oliver's children - Andrew - is only a year or two older than Emily and another unnamed child (probably daughter) gets married, when Emily is 20: "Emily, just home from an interminable week's visit at Uncle Oliver's, where a cousin had been getting married" (Emily's Quest).

So, at least a couple of his kids are about Emily's age (which doesn't really prove anything, due to the fact his own father was 61, when his last child was born).

Yet, Oliver is old enough to have "bristly white moustache." when Emily meets him, so I would say he is probably older than Ruth. He seems to be in his early to mid 50s, when he meets Emily (so, 39-44, when Emily is born?). I think he is Wallace's younger brother (he doesn't have the importance of a self-proclaimed "head of the family").

I always thought that New Moon was going to belong to Andrew, not because he was the oldest son's male child, but because Uncle Wallace didn't have a son, only a daughter (and girls did not inherit anything then). On the other hand, Elizabeth ruled The New Moon, so maybe it was not the matter of gender...

IV. Ruth Dutton: about 22.

When Emily is about sixteen (the night she and Perry get caught "kissing"), we learn that:

"Ruth Murray," he said, "do you remember the story that got around forty years ago about you and Fred Blair? Do you?" [...] "When she was a girl of eighteen she had been trapped in a very ugly situation."

So, Ruth is about 58, when Emily is 16 (42, when Emily is born, and 22 at Juliet's birth). She seems to be a bit younger than Oliver (although not sure about it).

V. Laura Murray: 14-18.

She and Dr Burnley were believed to have been romantically involved with one another, before Beatrice Mitchell came along. Ilse was the same age as Emily and Dr. Burnley was 36, when she was born. Aunt Laura was probably around Dr Burnley's own age, perhaps few years younger, or older.

So I would say: 34-38, when Emily was born:

"Rhoda said once that Aunt Elizabeth hoped Dr. Burnley and Aunt Laura would make a match of it—which, you know means get married—but that is not so."

"Beatrice Mitchell—one of the Shrewsbury Mitchells. She was only eighteen when Allan married her. He was thirty-five." (Emily of New Moon).

It would make her the youngest. Actually, it fits her character: she seems meek, gentle, delicate and visibly younger than the rest.

She looks to be in her 40s, when she meets Emily for the first time: "She was almost pretty, with her delicate features and the heavy coils of pale, sleek, fair hair, faintly greyed, pinned closely all around her head." (Emily of New Moon).

Her hair doesn't turn white before the winter Emily is so sick: "Laura Murray, whose hair had turned from ash to snow that winter, went to her room and knelt down by her bed to thank God." (Emily's Quest).

So, that is how I picture The Murrays' ages!

Please, feel free to disagree :).

[sashabarkov]

The Other Kind of Jets: A Cursed Airplane’s Effect on the National Hockey League

Road games are undeniably an important part of an NHL team’s schedule. Finding ways to win on the road is crucial, and that means considering everything up to and including the mode of transport. Most NHL teams charter VIP-configured large passenger aircraft for travel (with the notable exception of the Detroit Red Wings, who share use of the last remaining McDonnell Douglas MD-81 with the Detroit Tigers); this reduces costs for teams, as they don’t have to be responsible for aircraft maintenance and the planes are free to transport other teams around during homestands. But one particular plane has been having an unfortunate effect on teams this season, leading to speculation that this aircraft might be somehow cursed.

N803TJ is a Boeing 737-400 owned and operated by aviation charter company iAero Airways (previously Swift Air). It is a 29 year old aircraft, first delivered to LOT Polish Airlines in 1993 under the registration number SP-LLB. Aside from a four month lease to AeroSvit Airlines (a now-defunct Ukranian airline) from December 2003 to April 2004, it remained in service with LOT until its withdrawal from the LOT fleet on November 6, 2012. Swift Air purchased the aircraft in 2013, reconfigured the cabin for VIP charter use, and registered it in the United States as N803TJ.

It is unknown at which point the aircraft became cursed—or indead, if it has always been a blighted beast.

Fig. 1. N803TJ during takeoff at Fayetteville Drake Field (FYV) in Arkansas in February 2020. It was transporting the University of Missouri men’s basketball team, who had just lost to the Arkansas Razorbacks. Photo by Andrew Hutnyan.

But how do we know that N803TJ is cursed?

The record for road games across the NHL at this point in the season is 69-75-11, or a points percentage of 0.481. This is slightly lower than the 0.500, indicative of home ice advantage, but teams are still winning a nice amount of road games.

The record for road games when N803TJ is involved in transport, however, is a stunning 1-9-0, or 0.100, well below the league average. Only one team in the league has a worse road percentage at this point (the Ottawa Senators, who have lost all four of their road games so far). The Pittsburgh Penguins, who relied on N803TJ during their western Canada road trip, proceeded to lose four games straight on that trip and have struggled ever since. Additionally, when the Boston Bruins seized the sole road victory for a team transported by N803TJ, their opponent was the Penguins, who were coming off that long road trip on N803TJ, and though the Bruins snatched an overtime victory, they still had two players leave the game due to injury. N803TJ’s curse is not easily thwarted.

Table 1. Travel around the NHL using N803TJ as of the morning of 11/03/2022. The Bruins play an N803TJ-affected game in New York later today.

So what can teams do about this? Well, for one, they can avoid N803TJ. The majority of the league charters flights either from Delta Airlines or from Air Canada, and as such those teams have no reason to worry about an aircraft owned and operated by iAero Airways. However, for those teams that do charter from iAero, there is little to be done to avoid N803TJ, as aircraft are dispatched as needed and refusing to use an aircraft would not be met kindly by iAero due to the negative impact on their flight coordination and resource management. Affected teams would be advised to look into methods of cursebreaking and protection instead, for though N803TJ and its curse might be unavoidable, it is not all-powerful and the effects can certainly be mitigated.

Perhaps someone will break the curse this season. Until then, keep an eye on N803TJ and remember: where the Blighted Beast goes, sorrow shall soon follow.

[omgellendean]

The text of the letter and names of the celebrities that signed it under the cut.

"October 23, 2023 

Dear President Biden,

We are heartened by Friday’s release of the two American hostages, Judith Ranaan and her daughter Natalie Ranaan and by today’s release of two Israelis, Nurit Cooper and Yocheved Lifshitz, whose husbands remain in captivity.

But our relief is tempered by our overwhelming concern that 220 innocent people, including 30 children, remain captive by terrorists, threatened with torture and death. They were taken by Hamas in the savage massacre of October 7, where over 1,400 Israelis were slaughtered - women raped, families burned alive, and infants beheaded. 

Thank you for your unshakable moral conviction, leadership, and support for the Jewish people, who have been terrorized by Hamas since the group’s founding over 35 years ago, and for the Palestinians, who have also been terrorized, oppressed, and victimized by Hamas for the last 17 years that the group has been governing Gaza.

We all want the same thing: Freedom for Israelis and Palestinians to live side by side in peace. Freedom from the brutal violence spread by Hamas. And most urgently, in this moment, freedom for the hostages. 

We urge everyone to not rest until all hostages are released. No hostage can be left behind. Whether American, Argentinian, Australian, Azerbaijani, Brazilian, British, Canadian, Chilean, Chinese, Danish, Dutch, Eritrean, Filipino, French, German, Indian, Israeli, Italian, Kazakh, Mexican, Panamanian, Paraguayan, Peruvian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, South African, Spanish, Sri Lankan, Thai, Ukrainian, Uzbekistani or otherwise, we need to bring them home. 

Sincerely, 

Aaron Bay-Schuck Aaron Sorkin Adam Berkowitz  Adam Goodman Adam Levine Adam & Jackie Sandler Adee Drexler  Alan Grubman Alex Aja Alex Edelman Alexandra Shiva Ali Wentworth Alison Statter Allan Loeb Alona Tal Amy Chozick Amy Pascal Amy Schumer Amy Sherman Palladino Andrew Singer Andy Cohen Angela Robinson Ant Hines Anthony Russo  Antonio Campos Ari Dayan Ari Greenburg Ariel Martin  Arik Kneller Aron Coleite Ashley Levinson Asif Satchu Aubrey Plaza Barbara Hershey Barry Diller Barry Josephson Barry Levinson Barry Rosenstein Beau Flynn Behati Prinsloo Bella Thorne Ben Stiller Ben Turner Ben Winston Ben Younger Billy Crystal Blair Kohan Bob Odenkirk Bobbi Brown Bobby Kotick Brad Falchuk Brad Slater Bradley Cooper Bradley Fischer Brett Gelman Brian Grazer Bridget Everett Brooke Shields Bruna Papandrea Cameron Curtis

Carin Sage Casey Neistat Cazzie David Charles Randolph  Charles Roven Chelsea Handler Chloe Fineman Chris Fischer Chris Jericho Chris Pine Chris Rock Christian Carino Cindi Berger Claire Coffee Colleen Camp Constance Wu Cory Litwin Courteney Cox Craig Silverstein Dame Maureen Lipman Dan Aloni Dan Mazer  Dan Rosenweig Dan Swimer Dana Goldberg Dana Klein Daniel Glass

Daniel Palladino

Danielle Bernstein

Danny A. Abeckaser

Danny Cohen

Danny Strong

Daphne Kastner

David Alan Grier

David Baddiel

David Bernad

David Chang

David Ellison

David Geffen

David Gilmour &

Polly Sampson

David Goodman

David Joseph

David Kohan

David Lowery

David Oyelowo

David Schwimmer

Dawn Porter

Dean Cain Deborah Lee Furness Deborah Snyder Debra Messing Diane Von Furstenberg Donny Deutsch Doug Liman Douglas Chabbott Eddy Kitsis Edgar Ramirez Eli Roth Elisabeth Shue Elizabeth Himelstein Embeth Davidtz Emmanuelle Chriqui  Eric Andre Erik Feig Erin Foster Eugene Levy Evan Jonigkeit Evan Winiker Ewan McGregor Francis Benhamou Francis Lawrence Fred Raskin Gabe Turner Gail Berman Gal Gadot Gary Barber Gene Stupinski Genevieve Angelson Gideon Raff Gina Gershon Ginnifer Goodwin  Grant Singer Greg Berlanti Guy Nattiv Guy Oseary Gwyneth Paltrow Hannah Fidell Hannah Graf Harlan Coben Harold Brown Harvey Keitel Helen Mirren Henrietta Conrad Henry Winkler

Heidi Jo Markel Holland Taylor Howard Gordon Iain Morris Imran Ahmed Inbar Lavi Isla Fisher JD Lifshitz Jack Black Jackie Sandler Jake Graf Jake Kasdan  James Brolin James Corden Jamie Ray Newman Jaron Varsano Jason Blum Jason Fuchs Jason Reitman Jason Segel Jason Sudeikis

Jason Biggs &

Jenny Mollen Biggs

Jeanne Newman

Jeff Goldblum

Jeff Levin

Jeff Rake

Jeffrey Best

Jen Joel

Jennifer Morrison

Jeremy Piven

Jerry Seinfeld 

Jesse Itzler

Jesse Plemons

Jesse Sisgold

Jessica Biel

Jessica Elbaum

Jessica Seinfeld

Jill Littman

Jimmy Carr

Jody Gerson

Joe Hipps

Joe Quinn

Joe Russo

Joe Tippett

Joel Fields 

Joey King

John Landgraf 

John Slattery

Jon Bernthal

Jon Glickman Jon Hamm Jon Harmon Feldman  Jon Liebman Jon Watts Jon Weinbach  Jonathan Baruch Jonathan Groff  Jonathan Marc Sherman Jonathan Ross Jonathan Steinberg Jonathan Tisch Jonathan Tropper Jordan Peele Josh Brolin Josh Charles Josh Dallas Josh Goldstine Josh Greenstein Josh Grode Josh Singer Judd Apatow Judge Judy Sheindlin Julia Fox  Julia Garner Julia Lester  Julianna Margulies Julie Greenwald Julie Rudd Julie Singer  Juliette Lewis Jullian Morris Justin Theroux Justin Timberlake KJ Steinberg Karen Pollock Karlie Kloss Katy Perry Kelley Lynch Kevin Kane Kevin Zegers Kirsten Dunst Kitao Sakurai Kristen Schaal Kristin Chenoweth Lana Del Rey Laura Benanti  Laura Dern Laura Pradelska Lauren Schuker Blum Laurence Mark  Laurie David Lea Michele Lee Eisenberg Leo Pearlman  Leslie Siebert Liev Schreiber Limor Gott  Lina Esco Liz Garbus Lizanne Rosenstein Lizzie Tisch Lorraine Schwartz Lynn Harris Lyor Cohen Madonna Mandana Dayani Mara Buxbaum

Marc Webb

Marco Perego

Maria Dizzia

Mark Feuerstein

Mark Foster

Mark Scheinberg

Mark Shedletsky

Martin Short

Mary Elizabeth Winstead

Mary McCormack

Mathew Rosengart

Matt Geller 

Matt Lucas

Matt Miller

Matthew Bronfman

Matthew Hiltzik

Matthew Weiner

Matti Leshem

Max Mutchnik

Maya Lasry

Meaghan Oppenheimer

Melissa Zukerman

Melissa rudderman 

Michael Aloni Michael Ellenberg Michael Green Michael Rapino Neil Blair Neil Druckmann Neil Paris Nicola Peltz Nicole Avant Nina Jacobson Noa Kirel  Noa Tishby Noah Oppenheim Noah Schnapp Noreena Hertz Octavia Spencer Odeya Rush Olivia Wilde Oran Zegman Orlando Bloom Pasha Kovalev Pattie LuPone Patty Jenkins Paul Haas Paul Pflug Paul & Julie Rudd Peter Baynham  Peter Traugott Rachel Douglas Rachel Riley Rafi Marmor Ram Bergman Raphael Margulies  Rebecca Angelo Rebecca Mall Regina Spektor Reinaldo Marcus Green Rich Statter Richard Jenkins Richard Kind Rick Hoffman Rick Rosen Rita Ora Rob Rinder Robert Newman Roger Birnbaum Roger Green Rosie O’Donnell Ross Duffer Ryan Feldman Sacha Baron Cohen Sam Levinson Sam Trammell Sara Berman Sara Foster Sarah Baker Sarah Bremner Sarah Cooper Sarah Paulson Sarah Treem Scott Braun Scott Braun Scott Neustadter Scott Tenley Sean Combs Sean Levy  Seth Meyers Seth Oster Shannon Watts Shari Redstone Sharon Jackson Sharon Stone Shauna Perlman Shawn Levy Sheila Nevins Shira Haas Simon Sebag Montefiore Simon Tikhman Skylar Astin  Stacey Snider Stephen Fry Steve Agee Steve Rifkind Sting & Trudie Styler  Susanna Felleman Susie Arons  Taika Waititi Thomas Kail Tiffany Haddish Todd Lieberman Todd Moscowitz Todd Waldman Tom Freston Tom Werner Tomer Capone  Tracy Ann Oberman Trudie Styler Tyler Henry Tyler James Williams Tyler Perry Vanessa Bayer  Veronica Grazer Veronica Smiley Whitney Wolfe Herd Will Ferrell Will Graham Yamanieka Saunders Yariv Milchan Ynon Kreiz Zack Snyder Zoe Saldana Zoey Deutch Zosia Mamet

[butterflyintochains]

Hockey Names That Go Hard

Just a fun little post of some hockey player names that I think are really cool or fascinating.

Kristopher Pierre Joseph Irwin Letang - Tanger, one question, why so many middle names?

Erik Sven Gunnar Karlsson - Go off, viking king!

Oliver Oscar Emanuel Ekman-Larsson

Rickard Lars Gunnar Roland Rakell

Cal Clutterbuck

Nino Niederreiter

Zemgus Girgensons

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen

Jack St.Ivany - romance movie character much?

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins

Leon Draisaitl

Mirolsav Satan (yeah, I know it was shah-tahn, but it's still cool)

Rick Rypien (rest in peace, Rypper)

Andreas Athanasiou

Justin Abdelkader (originating from Arabic! Abdul-Qadir)

Jeff Beukeboom

Kevin Shattenkirk

Juraj Slafkovsky

Arber Xhekaj

Darius Kasparaitis

Slater Koekkoek

Ilya Kovalchuk

Alexander Ovechkin

Evgeni Malkin

Jack Studnicka

Rod Brind'Amor

Zach Whitecloud

Elias Fredrik Pettersson - if EK is a viking king, Petey is a viking prince

Teddy Blueger

Magnus Hellberg - love ya, Chopper!

Jesperi Kotkaniemi

Elvis Merzlikins

Igor Shesterkin

Mika Zibanejad

Carter Verhaeghe

Shayne Ghostisbehere

Sergei Gonchar

Zach-Aston Reese

Thatcher Douglas Demko

Garnet Hathaway

Gabriel Landeskog - awesome name for a gorgeous man.

Sidney Patrick Crosby - Irish af and I love it sm.

Patrice Bergeron

Brad Marchand

Daniel Hans Sedin and Henrik Lars Sedin - my beloved super twins!

Zdeno Chara - brief, blunt, and fucking massive.

Andrew Mangiapane

Mats Zuccarello

Teuvo Teravainen

Sergei Bobrovsky

Andrei Vasilevskiy

Rasmus Ristolainen

Dustin Byfuglien - no idea how you get buff-lin from that, but oh well.

Joel Eriksson-Ek

Jonathan Huberdeau - also sounds like a hockey booktok mc.

Kailer Yamamoto

Dakota Joshua - my beloved

Evgeny Kuznetsov

Vincent Desharnais- welcome to Vancouver, Vinny!!

Taro Tsujimoto - if you know, you know!

Henri Jokiharju

Kasperi Kapanen - cat boy extraordinaire!

Jarome Iginla - I know he has like, a million, middle names but I'm not typing all that out.

Nils Hoglander - or, pardon me: Nils - Big Hog - Hoglander!!!

Jonathan Quick - sounds like a superhero!

Rob Klinkhammer

Anze Kopitar

Jaromir Jagr - a badass name for an equally badass man.

Bill Quackenbush

Jordin Tootoo

Jonathan Cheechoo

Radek Bonk, and his son, Oliver Bonk

Jonathan Lekkerimaki - our baby swede!

Gino Odjik - rest in peace, big man!

Ulf Niklas Alexander Edler - miss you, Eagle!! Please come home to us, dad!

Bowie Horvat - Take care of him, Islanders.

If anyone has any others, chuck them in the replies or reblogs!

[gravalicious]

One of the most powerful tactics adopted by the New Right in its campaign against anti-racism was to portray anti-racist policies as an interference with individual freedom of thought, choice and action and to present itself, on the other hand, as the true defender of individual liberty. Thus, anti-racism was described by Andrew Alexander, Daily Mail political commentator, as nothing less than a 'new inquisition' (Daily Mail, 24 October 1983), while for Ray Honeyford writing in the Salisbury Review it was a 'new and insidious form of intolerance', a 'latter-day inverted McCarthyism' (Honeyford, 1983). Paul Johnson too claimed that it was a 'McCarthyite witch-hunt' which would eventually lead to race relations inspectors entering homes and libraries to censor books and to the censorship of newspapers (Daily Mail, 17 June 1985). Johnson also compared anti-racism to fascism claiming that the 'secondary racism' of the 'race relations fanatics' was more insidious than the racism of the fascist National Front (17 June 1985) and similar sentiments were expressed by Peregrine Worsthorne in the Sunday Telegraph less than two weeks later (30 June 1985). A few months later government ministers joined in these denunciations. At the Conservative Party conference, Home Secretary Douglas Hurd described council leaders Bernie Grant and Ted Knight as 'just as surely as the National Front ... the high priests of race hatred' while Party chairman Norman Tebbit attacked the 'divisive racism preached by the black power merchants of the extreme left' which was, he said, 'as objectionable and destructive as that preached by the white racists of the National Front'.

Paul Gordon - A Dirty War: the New Right and Local Authority Anti-Racism (1990)

[undetectorist]

hi! 😊 for the end-of-year book asks -- 2, 3, 17 por favor

omg i totally forgot that i queued that, thank you for asking my love!

2. did you reread anything? what?

omg, DID i. back when i was incredibly depressed in march/april, i found it really difficult to read anything new, partly because i wanted to be comforted and soothed, and partly because i was in a state of mind where i couldn't summon up new opinions on things. i wanted to read books where i knew how i'd feel at the end of them. and then i ended up rereading lots more as the year went on. anyway here's my reread list:

persuasion by jane austen

less by andrew sean greer

watership down by richard adams

the lord of the rings by j. r. r. tolkien

the earthsea quartet by ursula k. le guin

our mutual friend by charles dickens

a people's green new deal by max ajl

home by marilynne robinson

the wolves of willoughby chase by joan aiken

i hotel by karen tei yamashita

red white and royal blue by casey mcquiston

emma by jane austen

a room with a view by e. m. forster

the topeka school by ben lerner

gideon the ninth, harrow the ninth and nona the ninth by tamsyn muir

good omens by terry pratchett & neil gaiman

have his carcase by dorothy l. sayers

the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy by douglas adams

confabulations by john berger

piranesi by susanna clarke

the left hand of darkness by ursula k. le guin

whew.

3. what were your top five books of the year?

cloudstreet by tim winton

decolonial marxism by walter rodney

nothing to see here by kevin wilson

tom lake by ann patchett

in the woods by tana french

17. did any books surprise you with how good they were?

YES, nothing to see here knocked me out with how incredible it was and how much i needed to read it at the time. was also very much taken with beyond black by hilary mantel, which isn't necessarily a surprise but i was nervous to try her non-historical fiction books because i love her historical fiction so much!

[antebellumite]

What do the Antebellum Guys get at Starbucks? ANSWERED!

TO BE READ IN THAT ANNOYING WATCHMOJO VOICE:

Daniel Webster orders black coffee and secretly drinks alcohol instead!

Henry Clay orders caramel mocha latte with whipped cream and with ice!

John Calhoun orders water!

Robert Hayne orders a pink drink!

William Fessenden orders wine!

Benjamin Brown French buys milk! Just milk.

Charles Sumner buys food and plain coffee!

Stephen Douglas tries to order an espresso, but the employee wisely never delivers it to him!

Thomas Benton buys a manly fruit smoothie.

Nicholas Biddle buys a frappachino, but he spills it all on the floor so he has to buy another one.

Andrew Jackson just eats ground coffee beans.

James K. Polk orders black coffee!

Sarah Polk goes to church! And gets free wine!

Martin Van Buren eats whipped cream. Just whipped cream. Because Democrats are weird.

John Randolph yells at the barista because he is a horrible customer.

John Crittenden orders a latte but with a german-style mug.

Willaim Seward orders a normal coffee. With sugar.

Theodore Frelinghuysen quotes scripture and buys bread.

John Quincy Adams has wisely chosen to go drink boba instead.

John Tyler gets a restraining order on himself for flirting with the barista and making one too many sexual suggestions. This is because John Tyler is a creep.

Preston Brooks also gets a restraining order on himself.

Millard Fillmore buys a cake pop.

So does Abraham Lincoln.

Zachary Taylor orders cinnamon latte!

John C. Breckenridge is kicked out for smoking.

Franklin Pierce buys a dragon drink.

William Harrison doesn't drink anything. He's only here because it's cold outside.

William Harrison is also there to keep an eye on John Tyler.

Abraham Lincoln also has a restraining order on Andrew Jackson.

John C. Fremont and Jesse Fremont buy the entire Starbucks Industry. Thankfully, they only abuse this power to give themselves pumpkin spice lattes year round.

James Buchanan attempts to order but changes his mind over and over again.

The Eatons' don't care what they order, as long as it's aesthetic enough to post onto TikTok and they also use one straw and between the two of them. Weirdos.

Floride Calhoun and the rest of Washington City glare murderously from the outside.

Lucretia Clay forgoes Starbucks and drinks homemade tea!

Rachel Jackson drinks a latte, and watches as her rabid husband scarfs down beans. She uh, might also want to see a doctor.

Meanwhile, Sam Howe, Frederick Douglass, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and Wendell Phillips are all sitting at one table eating breakfast.

They are all glaring and being glared at by William Garrison, Theodore Parker, Oliver Wendell Holmes and Julia Howe at another table eating breakfast.

James Henry Hammond is rotting in jail.

Henry Longfellow doesn't drink anything and stays home.

THAT'S ALL FOLKS! ARE YOU SATISFIED WITH THESE RESULTS? TELL US IN THE COMMENT SECTION BELOW AND PLEASE LIKE AND SUSCRIBE!

[lovecharged]

writing up all the starters i owe and a few replies today so, like for a starter from one of my newer muses hidden under the cut;

caspian newton | nicholas galitzine fc. twenty six. cis man. he / him. bisexual (preference for milfs/dilfs). aspiring musician / unemployed. rupert's younger brother.

rupert’s younger brother who’s finally escaped their (wealthy, picture perfect but neglectful) parents’ clutches. now living with his older brother – who hasn’t quite perfected life, but has a better grasp on the real world than he does. spoilt and bratty, but cannot possibly live with his parent’s indifference or judgement anymore (think jill from friends). has a garage band with three of his english boarding school buddies….they’re obviously all so gritty. they play in rupert’s garage, much to his chagrin. lowkey they do love each other a great deal, and his older brother is relieved he found a way out…or woke up, even remotely. determined to get him into the real world, even if he’s oblivious to it, after living in a neglectful bubble with his in home nanny all his life, living off his father’s cards. flirts with anyone older than he is. ignorant but only because he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. needs a wake up call.

clifford vasilis | tom holland & andrew scott fc. twenty six - forty six. time traveller / priest (verse dependent cult leader). cis man. he / him. bisexual (preference for men). time traveller's wife inspired. dougie's younger brother. maurice's older brother.

maurice vasilis | joshua bassett & ben whishaw fc. twenty two - forty two. time traveller / journalist. non binary. he / they. bisexual. time traveller's wife inspired. clifford and dougie's younger brother.

douglas 'dougie' vasilis | nicholas galitzine & hamish linklater fc. twenty seven - forty seven. time traveller / app developer + ceo. cis man. he / him. bisexual. time traveller's wife inspired. clifford and maurice's older brother.

banks taylor | austin butler & tom hiddleston fc. thirty two. cis man. he / him. music producer. kai's younger brother. kian, lucas, hollie and max's cousin. declan and julie's nephew.

malachai 'kai' taylor | tom austen & jude law fc. thirty six - forty six. cis man. he / him. bodyguard. banks' older brother. kian, lucas, hollie and max's cousin. declan and julie's nephew.

florencia ‘flo’ vega | camila morrone fc. twenty five. cis woman. she / her. soprano / opera singer. bisexual.

born to a working class family, flo has been interested in singing since before she could even walk or talk. even her mumblings sounded melodic. her family knew that she had a gift the very first time she partook in a school show, and she sung her little heart out. it seemed like she must’ve been bigger on the inside, because her lungs were incredibly strong. the issue was money. a daunting struggle, yet one both parents took on head on. they found her a singing coach, and they became like an aunt / second mother to her. she showed tenacity and a willingness to try hard and never, ever give up. whilst she wasn’t particularly academic, and she struggled with dyslexia, she tried hard at school, so that she was able to take part in all the school shows. she joined every amateur group going, and performed however and whenever she could, just to perform. she took to busking on the street, simply loving the experience and the buzz she got from it, not expecting it to get her anywhere. it was all for the fun of it, for her joy of performing. through her passion, her hardwork and determination, she won a scholarship, which allowed her to work with some of the greatest and brightest within the industry. since then, she’s played a plethora of roles in opera companies, all of which have inspired her to reach for the stars. she likes to have fun, but is deathly protective of her voice, so she can be relatively quiet outside of the theatre. there’s a shyness to her that plenty don’t understand, but what they really don’t understand is that when she’s on stage; she’s a free bird, she’s someone else, someone new. in person…she’s just flo.

[syn4k]

do your thing, word boy

hell yeah. ok so this one isn't gonna be put under a cut because i hate you all and you WILL read my words, boy

most of our writing style inspo comes from books! wow! words influence words! who woulda thought

the one singular novel that i can say with confidence is the most like our writing style is All the Light we Cannot See by Anthony Doerr.

ATLWCS (god what an ugly abbreviation i'm never using that again) is a story told from two viewpoints- one of a girl living in France, the other a boy in Germany. set pre-and-during-and-post WWII, the two spin ever and ever closer to each other over the course of the war. there's shockingly little romance in it and the focus is on the life of these two children, for children they are, rather than their deaths.

i cannot explain the plot, for it circles back in on itself and everything is connected and gods it's so GOOD. the author according to the information on the inside jacket of the cover spent 10 years researching this and i can tell. houugh.

here's a picture of the 3rd or 4th chapter. we have read this book about 7 or 8 times by now, as you can tell from the dog-eared page

the lilting, rolling pace, the casual insertion of details that make the whole world come alive, and of course the STUNNING descriptions really made an impression on us when we first read this.

i will admit that we did not buy this book, we took it home in our backpack one day in 6th grade after flying through the first few chapters and it never found its way back. we've changed schools three times since then. the book has not.

for me, what really makes this so incredible is just how.. casual the writing is? it effortlessly explains the minutiae of life by outlining a couple key points. we saw that and we were like oh my god that's so good. i HAVE to do that.

-:-

in second place for Books that Irreversibly Changed our Brain Chemistry is The Places beyond the Maps by Douglas Kaine McKelvey.

set in Andrew Peterson's fictional fantasy world of Aerwiar, the story follows the path of a man who lost his daughter to a twisted evil and who had lost himself to grief, resigning himself to the fact that she was beyond all knowledge (to him) dead. swearing an oath to bring her home or bring her justice and failing both, he goes as a wanderer in the long wilderness and eventually finds his way to meet his Maker Himself.

needless to say, we are currently reading this out to a friend and the writing style is *impeccable.*

where Doerr's prose is clear and smooth, utterly graceful and allowing the reader to glimpse clearly the truths that lie deep underneath like the seafloor upon which all else is viewed, McKelvey's is haunting and etched with some undefinable grief through which, occasionally, one can divine the simple truth at the center of all things.

needless to say, being put at the end of a collection of fairly lighthearted short stories matching the tone of the original saga, this novella hit us like a fucking Train and we have been stealing some of his long, rambling, impossibly patient descriptions for our own works for a while now. no you can't get this on its own and without missing out on some massively important context which would require an entire rant about the wingfeather saga on its own but that's another ask entirely and ANYWAYS continuing on

we've actually been leaning heavily on this specific description of loss within the self for our characterization of Pixl in Ashes! if you've read the book and if you look closely enough, you'll see some parallels there :]

-:-

this doesn't have as much influence on our writing as a whole but i'd like to give an honorable mention to anne carson in third place who effortlessly blends the present and the past in glowing verse and- ok. Ok let me share some screenshots from her translation of the play Antigone and one singular picture from her translations of Sappho's poetry and you'll see what i mean

how will i ever be normal about this. spoiler alert i won't and i'm happy about it. like. gestures vaguely. one day we will be able to focus enough on this to make a whole post about it but for now i think that's it, thanks for coming to my ted talk lol