#Crib Notes

[everettdemorier]

Discover the brilliance of Everett De Morier, from Crib Notes to Insightful Narratives, in his journey as a top non-fiction author.

[blueskiesandstarrynights]

How the Grunch Cribbed Christmas (2023)

[kanekocribs]

KANEKO'S CRIB NOTES LXVI: A RACIST (?) METAPHOR FOR VENGEANCE

I'll be honest with you all, we're running out of cribs. Who knows what the landscape will look like next year. Only one thing is for sure: Kaneko's bare, spooky carcass will be on full display at least once more by our fine friends at Colopl.

LEPRECHAUN: An often controversial design because "why is an Irish fairy clad in a Union Jack boot, isn't that a bit insensitive to Ireland? "; however, Eirikr puts that argument to rest with an exhaustive look into the design's context. And yeah, Leprechaun's "scandalous" boot is clearly cribbed from the one used by the Spice Girls' Geri Halliwell.

HOMO GORLEO: There are two things to say about Metaphor's human designs. The first is that most seem to be inspired by the works of Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch, like Gorleo here, which iterates on a figure found on the center panel of Bosch's The Garden of Earthly Delights triptych.

HOMO AVADES: The second thing we can say about the Metaphor humans is that we're frustrated by the lack of transparency regarding who designed them. One would assume that would be Shigenori Soejima, but Atlus has been less than forthright about something so apparently obvious. For the time being, we'll just have to credit them to "Studio Zero Art Team." Avades itself is at least more clearly adapted from the central figure of the the right panel of Bosch's Garden.

NYAMI NYAMI: We've made light of Doi in the past for over-relying on Wikipedia as a source for things, and, hey, it happened again for Vengeance's Nyami Nyami, this time an image of a wood carving of the deity used on the JP Wikipedia page that Doi clearly saw while researching and used as a reference, not that we're faulting him for it!

AMABIE: A design actually borne out of Atlus piggybacking on a Japanese Amabie meme during the Covid-19 pandemic, Doi's Amabie is based on a 19th century woodblock print that's the genesis for virtually all modern depictions of her.

[agnesandhilda]

as far as christian-themed art goes I'm of the opinion that you cannot meaningfully appropriate mainline western catholicism (it's a massively powerful branch of a religion that has been spread by imperialism and that actively seeks out converts as a core tenet. how could you appropriate it?) but that it is possible to engage with it shallowly and that that's fair game to make fun of. I will not be taking questions at this time

[teathattast]

Something in your eyes

Makes me wanna lose myself

Makes me wanna lose myself

In your arms

There's something in your voice

Makes my heart beat fast

Hope this feeling lasts

The rest of my life

If you knew how lonely my life has been

And how long I've been so alone

If you knew how I wanted someone to come along

And change my life the way you've done

Feels like home to me

[carsonjonesfiance]

I can be against the military and against killing yourself. Pretty easily actually. Not sure what your point was

[justarandombrit]

The single thing that would've improved How The Grunch Cribbed Christmas would be, at the end, when Rudy gets arrested, Brian wearing the AVPM Quirrell prison costume.

[pyotrkochetkov]

what if we fucked in the hurricanes hockey branded jacuzzi at the invisalign arena practice facility

[the-whispers-of-death]

IM NOT JUDGING YOU ABOUT PREGNANT STONE I WANNA HEAR MORE ABOUT IT

Oh thank God.

I think Pregnant Stone = Soft Stone. He'd be singing softly to his baby bump, constantly caressing the bump. He plays his Bollywood vinyl albums for the baby. He cuts back on the amount of spicy food he eats. He no longer wakes up at four in the morning to start his day, instead he sleeps in later.

He cried happy tears upon seeing the ultrasound at his first appointment, babbling about how he'll love them so much. He buys so many parenting books, intent on not being like his father. While talking to the baby in his womb, he tells them that he'll love them no matter what. No matter what gender they are, no matter how eccentric they'll be.

I've always had a thought about him being able to stitch and knit, because they're important life skills, so he's knitting his own socks and baby blankets for the baby.

He definitely doesn't do much heavy-lifting around the house, since he's in his mid-thirties and that's when pregnancies are in the danger zone. But he's determined to ensure this pregnancy will go smooth and that both him and the baby makes it.

He sees the world in a bright light now, there's finally someone for him to fight for. Someone to fight to come home to. And he'll protect them as much as he can.

[oldmanontumbler]

Fucked up in the crib thinking about Crowley's prefactory essay to "The Scented Garden."

I've already written ~5 pages on it (not finished) and am not interested in transcribing my shallow, unreflective thoughts to Tumbler, but damn.

I know that if I start going in depth about it, I'll just start rambling again. But DAMN.

The fervid defense of gayness as not only natural, but sublime, and also none of straight peoples' business if they don't like it, don't understand it, or keep inventing reasons to refute it; the bold call and defense of "urnings, Sapphists, and bimetallists" - today's gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals (although Crowley does condescend that gay men are "inferior" to bisexuals; driven by insatiable desire rather than sense); the painfully on-point refutation to the argument of "if you like both sexes, why do you seek out homosexuality instead of settling for straightness?" and the subsequent lament that, try as a bisexual may to explain it, a heterosexual may never understand.

The elevation of same-sex relationships to something beautiful, something that G-d himself created and Jesus himself, with John, partook in; something that's stronger than the quarrel of "what nature intended" - that same old line, still spat a century later - the descriptions of what pleasure a man may offer a man or a woman, and what pleasure a woman may offer a woman or man; the "it's not gross - not moreso than straight sex - but if it's gross to you, just don't look! It doesn't concern you! And besides, we can always wash!" Every argument. Every statement.

The recounting of his own greatest romantic love, passion and regret and yearning not strong enough words to do it justice. The timeless paragraphs of

and

And of "there are enough of us, scattered all throughout the world, and we are blessed and happy to be as we are, and we don't think of you at all - but when we do, we merely think of how miserable you must be, and that God delivers you from this and into the same love and paradise we've found."

And of "it's not just laws, but society, that must be changed, because even if I can win in court, the stigma of being 'tainted' by gayness will be visible in everyone who knows it about you."

It's been a century.

And I'll leave you with these words, courtesy of our bimetallist:

Is there better poetry in the world than Wilde's "...on Adrian's gilded barge/The laughter of Antinous" or F....'s "the splendid Syrian youth with scarlet mouth/ Standing upon the summit of the world?"

Why, to kiss my boy is a canzonet, to suck him off a sonnet; his mouth is a madrigal, his lips are lyrics, and his eyes idylls; to be beneath him is an epithalamium, and on top of him an epic.

[homoqueerjewhobbit]

Look, technically, I'm like ¼ German (my German Jewish ancestors were so prescient they came to America 50 years before Hitler was born!)... Where was I going?

Oh right, I am personally offended by Neil Patrick Harris's accent on Doctor Who.

[helluvamystery]

You know what? I'll take it back. Bloober team did a good job on Silent Hill 2. The let's player I'm watching just made it out of the first other world section in the apartment building, and I felt such a sense of relief it made me realize just how tense I'd slowly gotten as it went. If there's one thing they're good at, it's environments, and they're using the original as a pretty strong guide so far.

[altschmerzes]

you've mentioned having other POVs coming up for wriggle up on dry land- would love to see any dani or sam pov snippets, if you've got em :eyes:

YES, i have some of a scene with sam i was working on earlier that i really love. i'll put most of it under a cut bc it's pretty long but i had a great time writing this and wanted to include like. the whole Section it was from.

Sam never used to be a morning person. It was always difficult to get himself out of bed, especially when he was small. His father had made up a song about it that he would sing when rousing Sam for the day. Ola would walk into his son’s room already singing it, quiet at first and then louder and louder the longer Sam insisted on burying his face in his pillow and refusing to acknowledge being awake. He’d always gotten up at the end, usually with a groaned insistence that his father stop embarrassing him because he’s up, he’s up, and there had been less complaining involved the older he got. It was easier to go along with once Sam understood the necessity of making use of what time the day afforded to him, especially with football and school and other things leaving him increasingly feeling like every moment of the day must be preciously guarded and budgeted appropriately.

Lately, though, his perspective on the earliest hours of the day has shifted significantly. Now, mornings are the one part of the day that belong only to Sam. He doesn’t struggle to greet them now, no matter how startling it is for his alarm to go off and how heavy his body feels as he lays in bed in the moments before rising. The resentment he had once felt with the relentlessness of the arrival of the new day and the necessity of getting up to participate in it is replaced with gratitude. When he first wakes, there are a few moments of listening to his alarm go off where Sam can almost hear the sound of Ola’s voice, singing the song he’d made up so many years ago. Mornings make him miss home, and his father in particular, with a fierceness that makes his chest ache, but he appreciates them for that. The homesickness hurts, the longing for the life he had loved so much and left behind to be here throbbing like his lungs are bruised, but the pain is a reminder of what is important to him and why. Not a day goes by that Sam doesn’t think of the things that are the most important to him, and he wouldn’t want to forget even if he could. The schedule of a Premier League footballer also makes praying on time complicated and difficult at points. This is especially the case when travelling for away matches against clubs whose facilities do not have a dedicated prayer room. Mornings though, the earliest parts of the morning before the sunrise, are Sam’s no matter what, and he holds them precious, going through the well-worn steps of Fajr alone in his house or a hotel room, always on time. He has developed an ever-growing fondness for the cold blue of the watery light that seeps across the horizon just before the sun rises, and for the way his mother always sends him a text when she had finished with her own prayers, every day without fail. There is no time difference between Lagos and London half of the year, and only one hour between them the other half. Although the exact time of the sun’s rising isn’t the same, it’s been a comfort to Sam never the less to think of his family and friends at home going about their lives in tandem with his, despite the difference separating them. When he kneels and presses his forehead to the fabric of the prayer mat the imam of his childhood mosque had presented him before he left, a gift from the community and a token of their pride in him, he imagines his mother and father alongside him doing the same. For those moments, it’s possible to believe that he never left.

[kanekocribs]

KANEKO’S CRIB NOTES LXV: SEVEN SEAS OF CRIBS

Halloween is on the approach, and what could this mean? Tricks, treats? Skeletons, witches, draculae? A child's laughter sounding lightly through the autumn leaves? No, it doesn't mean any of that GARBAGE- it's time for the annual outing of KANEKO'S CRIB NOTES! Please enjoy this smattering of delirious cribs that will make you think "damn, that's the thing that the other thing is based on".

NEZHA: The modern pop sensibility of Soul Hackers is on display in Nezha's Astro Boy inspired design, drawing a parallel between the two "rebuilt" child heroes. It's evident from the twin spikes and whatever the fuck that is, you know, his metallic underwear I suppose.

CHERUB: Following the probably erroneously designated 'Ophanim' from SMTII, and playing on Kaneko's documented fascination with angelkind as spacecraft, this Devil Summoner take on Cherub pushes the concept even further, borrowing a look from the cover of ancient alien classic The Spaceships of Ezekiel by Joseph F. Blumrich. Compare the cover to the Japanese edition that Kaneko was more likely familiar with!

SERAPH: The composition of Seraph's four heads and crossed arms is a likely homage to the iconic cover of 1974's Queen II. Slap that shit on your dorm room wall for a change!

TITANIA: Titania's appearance in SMTII is a slightly embellished take on this Brian Froud illustration of the ghostly Glaistig of Scotland. Thanks to Psiguy for originally sharing this ID from @yen_den, based on a post uploaded to the @theavalonians twitter account!

FIONN MAC CUMHAILL: In the spirit of equanimity, a last addition to the DOI'S CRIB NOTES series: Fionn Mac Cumhaill appears to be inspired by the dress of legendary illustrator J.C. Leyendecker's 'Cu Chulainn Riding His Chariot Into Battle' (1911), from the rectangular pattern of his mail-coat down to the telltale 'X' meander that runs along the fringe of either cloak.

[etruatcaelum]

[ @the-gray-maiden // for glynda ]

"You know, I'm glad you decided to stalk me."

She dredged a wan smile up from somewhere, cupping both hands around the mug of coffee the lone serving girl had slid across the counter just a moment ago. “I’ll admit,” Glynda said wryly, “I didn’t expect to find you here. But it’s always good to see a familiar face.” A beat. Her mouth curved down. “A friendly face.”

The edge in her tone wasn’t meant for Lia. Glynda could only hope it would be taken for mere fatigue—stress—goodness knew she had no shortage of both. She exhaled a lengthy sigh and watched the steam rising from her coffee dance. “I just came down to… well. It’s a few weeks since we last heard from Wintergreen. Times being what they are…”

None of the outlying communities to the north of Vale had been lost since the night Beacon fell—yet. Glynda felt the weight of that yet on her shoulders every day. But she’d arrived in the morning to find nothing amiss except that the local relay tower had been damaged by a recent storm, and that was quite easily fixed.

“Have you been,” she added curiously, “staying here? Or are you just passing through?”

[peaches2217]

Me, waking up from a dead sleep in a cold sweat: DAMMIT IT WAS CRADLE NOT A CRIB! I’M AN IDIOT!