#abbey island

[cmarswrites]

Ireland just holds my whole damn heart.

[what-shitfuckery-is-this-ew]

every monster high fancast is just:

Frankie: white woman

Draculaura: white woman

Cleo: white woman

Lagoona: white woman

Abbey: white woman

Ghoulia: white woman

Clawdeen: Zendaya

[bitletsanddrabbles]

[Fic] The Glory, the Shame

This is what happens when I try to come up with something to write at 7:00 am on Veteran's Day - you get Thomas and Peter sitting on @alex51324 's Island of the Gays philosophizing.

Not certain I'm going to include this one in the Island Sandbox, since it is now about twelve hours after I started, I am tired, and not at all certain it hits the right notes. But it's a thing and I wrote it, so here. Can be read as pre-relationship or just buddies, as you so feel moved.

Needless to say it is beta free. Also free of guppies, goldfish, loches, koi...okay, I'm going stop now before someone hurls a salmon at my head. On to the story instead.

-

Thomas sat on the bluff outside of town, a cigarette dangling in his fingers, watching the seagulls. A stiff wind was blowing, making his cheeks sting, but at least it wasn’t raining. Most of the village had decamped to the pub, intent on reducing Tully’s whisky supply to dregs. Thomas had thought about joining them, but his heart wasn’t quite in it.

A crunching noise alerted him to the fact he was about to have company. He looked up, half expecting it to be the herd of cattle they let roam the island south of the village, but it turned out to be Peter Fitzroy.

“Mind if I join you?” the one armed man asked.

“Sure,” Thomas replied. “The ground’s none too soft, though.”

“Probably better that way. Easier to dust off after.” Peter lowered himself to the ground with his usual easy cheer. “I take it the pub was a bit crowded for you?”

“Yeah.” Thomas took a drag off his cigarette. “Don’t get me wrong, I could use a pint or two about now. Maybe three or four, but there wasn’t even standing room in there.”

“I know what you mean.” Peter pulled out his own cigarettes and worked one out of the case. Even though he was perfectly capable of lighting it himself, Thomas lite it for him. Less hassle that way. For a minute the two of them just sat and smoked. Finally Peter said, “I thought it was a lovely service.”

“Yeah,” Thomas agreed. It touched on all of the key points without being soppy or condescending. Father Tim did a good job.” That was one problem with people who hadn’t actually been in the war. They could easily make it sound like they had been, like they knew exactly what the soldiers had been through when it was very clear they didn’t. It tended to lead to lofty proclamations about bravery and sacrifice that stank like the mud of the Somme, or sneering dismissal of the misery that had lead to missing limbs and haunting nightmares. Admittedly, Thomas had as little patience for the nightmares as the next person, but mostly because they interrupted his sleep and he did not like being woken up, thank you very much. He understood, but…well. His nightmares never disturbed anyone except himself.

“What did you think of the suggestion that we build our own war memorial, like villages are doing on the mainland?”

Thomas frowned at that one. “I’m not entirely certain. I wouldn’t fight it, of course. But I don’t know that it would help me any.”

The other man gave him a curious look at that. “Isn’t there anyone who’s gone that you want remembered?”

“Maybe.” Thomas took a slow drag and thought for a second before blowing out a long stream of smoke. There was Lord Flintshire’s valet, and a couple of other servants who had visited Downton frequently, but they’d been friends, not lovers. He didn’t know if anyone here would even know them. “I’m the one who didn’t know anyone in London, remember? Yeah, there were blokes I had it off with now and again, but never more than a couple of times. The people I’d really care about, well. They weren’t our sort. Seems a bit pointless to put them on there.”

“Hm. I suppose.” The other man allowed. “Then again, there are those of us who would want brothers on there, so I don’t know that it would have to be just our sort.”

“I still don’t know if any of my brothers made it through,” Thomas admitted. “I might be the last one standing.” He tried not to look at his gloved hand, but his eyes flickered to it involuntarily as he stretched his fingers.

Thankfully, the other man didn’t seem to notice. “Is there anyone you could write to find out? Or do you not want to?”

Thomas shrugged. “My sister, perhaps, if she’d write back to me. I don’t know that I’d bother, though. They might as well all be dead, as much as we pay attention to each other. Again, I don’t see that there’s anything to be gained by knowing.”

“That’s fair, I suppose.” The two of them lapsed into silence for a bit. Again, it was Peter who broke the silence. “What do you suppose Kit’s doing?”

“He planned on spending the day working on play bills for the theatre’s next production,” Thomas replied. “If he finishes that, he’ll probably read or something like that, I’d imagine. I’ve told him not to feel poorly about it, that he was well out of it, but. Well. No one likes to feel like they didn’t do their bit.”

“If they were clever they would.” Peter frowned, the expression out of place on his normally cheerful face. “I keep trying to tell Davy Hall that no one’s looking down on him for not serving, but you can tell he doesn’t believe it.”

“Davy?” Thomas looked askance at the other man. “You’re joking.” The other man shook his head. Thomas blinked, trying to wrap his head around it. “The man had rheumatic fever as a boy. The doctors expect him to drop dead of a hear attack or have his kidneys give out any day now, and he’s bemoaning the fact that he failed his physical and they wouldn’t let him go get shot at because his health might give out before the Germans got him?”

Peter gave a rueful sort of smile and a one sided shrug. “Apparently his brothers both died, so he really is the last one standing. And he’s here, so it’s not as if the line is going to continue. I think he feels as if, had he gone, one of his brothers might have survived.”

Thomas was aware of that sort of thinking, but he couldn’t imagine feeling that way about anything. He shook his head. “I’m sorry, even if I was expected to die young, I can not imagine feeling that suicidal.”

The comment earned him a sideways look that couldn’t decide whether to be fond or exasperated. “No, I can’t imagine you could. You’re too determined to live.”

His cigarette half way to his lips, Thomas froze. He slowly turned to look at the other man, gauging whether that comment had meant what he thought it did. When Peter lifted his eyebrows and shot a look at Thomas’s glove, that was a pretty clear answer. “Figured it out, have you?” Thomas replied, smiling tightly, trying to make a joke of it. He supposed if the other man was going to get him kicked off of the island, he’d have done it by now, and he didn’t seem like the sort for blackmail.

“Yeah.” Peter turned and crushed out his cigarette. “Several of us have. Me, Tully, Jessop, Rouse.”

“Dr R knows?” Thomas cringed. Oh, that couldn’t be good.

“He does.” The other man gave him a wan smile. “He doesn’t blame you, though. None of us do. If you get right down to it, you were the clever one, getting out of there rather than waiting for the Huns to drop a shell on your head.” He nodded to the glove and added, “Not to mention you could easily have died of infection. Difficult to call someone a coward when they’re doing something they know full well could kill them.”

“I wasn’t really thinking about that at the time,” Thomas admitted. It probably wasn’t the wisest thing he could do, but if Peter didn’t think poorly of him already, he doubted the truth would change that too much. “I just, I’d had it. I’d signed up to help save them that could be saved, not to die for a country that would just as soon kill me themselves. Or lock me away for two years and then let someone beat me to death when I got out, which is close enough.” He crushed out his own cigarette, then, after a moment’s thought, went to get another.

Peter shrugged. “You’re not wrong. And I still don’t blame you.” His eyebrows knit together and he asked, curiously, “Although, if I might ask, how did you manage it? It’s a difficult shot to manage yourself.”

“I didn’t manage it myself.” Thomas tucked his lighter away and blew smoke into the air. He would never understand how some people managed not to smoke. What did they do for their nerves? “I took myself out to a nice, quiet corner of the trench, lit m’self a cigarette, and then held my hand up over the wall. A German sniper took care of the rest for me.”

Oddly, that garnered a smile from the other man. “Well, that was nice of him. Did you send him a thank you note?”

“No,” Thomas scoffed, shaking his head. “I wasn’t exactly in any condition for it. Too much morphine. Who knows? By the time I was thinking clearly again, he was probably dead anyway.”

“Probably.”

They were quiet again, for a stretch. This time Thomas broke it. “How long have you known?”

“Several months now. We put it together about the time Gordon ran off.”

“Blimey.” Thomas blinked at that. “And it took this long for any of you to say something?”

Peter shrugged. “It didn’t seem important, really. After all, who decided it was cowardice? And who decided that cowardice was something to die over? A bunch of men who never left England, except on holiday? The men who wished they had the guts to do something like that?” He looked down at his own shoulder. “I may not have invited a German sniper to have a shot at me, but I wasn’t exactly crying when they told me I couldn’t carry a stretcher anymore.”

“I should think not.”

“We did our bit. Then we went home. It’s what we said we’d do.”

“Too right.”

“We’re just lucky we made it.” Peter gave a salute to the clouds. “To the Glorious Dead.”

“And the Inglorious Living,” Thomas added, giving his own salute.

The other man leaned in, resting the stump of his shoulder against Thomas’s. “Glorious or not, I’m just as glad to have you hear instead of lying under poppies in France.”

“Thanks.” Thomas smiled and looped an arm around the other mans’ back to help them both stabilise. “I could say the same.”

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Les bons anges sont faillibles - ils pèchent tous les jours et tombent du ciel comme des mouches.

- Anatole France

Mont Saint-Michel. What grace on earth looks like in stone.

According to legend, at the beginning of the 8th century, the Archangel Michael appeared to the bishop Aubert in a dream and instructed him to build a sanctuary on the rocky, inhospitable island in his honour. Understandably, it took two more alleged apparitions before the great bishop was convinced to go along with such a project.

[haveamagicalday]

Monster High Monster Mash! (Semi Finals 1)

This is a poll in the Monster High Monster Mash! All other polls in can be found here.

[illustratus]

Le Mont Saint-Michel, Normandy, France

[ciderjacks]

ok but holy shit the snake imagery in deadloch was so fucking GOOD IT WAS SO GOOD

(Spoilers for Deadloch ahead be warned if ur gonna watch it, I encourage you to scroll bc it’s really really good watching it unfold without spoilers)

Margaret Carruthers being represented as a snake (and as the devil at certain points but that’s less of the focus here) throughout the series was so SO good

Like we hear her say early on that the snakes have “taken over” the island (which is why she claims she won’t let anyone on it), then of course Fay and the kids refer to her and her family as Snakes

then as the story is building, the snakes stay a central theme within that storyline. No one can see the graveyard because it’s “been overrun with snakes”, which are an obvious parallel to her and her family colonizing the town. (It’s impossible to get rid of them, they make breeding with their cousins work, etc)

when Abbey is on the island too far up, she appears behind her and tells her not to go there “or else she’ll get bit”, in a really ominous threatening way, which makes sense because *spoiler warning* she fully killed her brother because he wanted to open up the island to the aboriginal people. It sounds like a threat because it is a threat. She is the snake. AND OF COURSE she then dies while trying to dig up her brothers body, because she (a white colonist) didn’t understand the land of wildlife enough to properly deal with the snakes, and so got bitten.

it’s so poetic and terrifying like there’s other stuff too I couldn’t describe all of it

She was also imo the scariest part of the show by far

[arcanetrivia]

It was thirty two years ago today, Monkey Island taught me how to play, It’s been going in and out of style But it’s guaranteed to raise a smile.

by polytelygames on Instagram

[dansnaturepictures]

12 of my favourite photos to take in December 2023 and month summary

The photos are of; Goldcrest at Lakeside Country Park, Blue Tit at Lakeside, Long-tailed Duck at Hayling Island Oysterbeds, mushrooms in Abbey Gardens, Roe Deer at Lakeside, turkey tail mushrooms at Fishlake Meadows, Silver-sided Sector spider at home, winter heliotrope at Lakeside, view at Winnall Moors, view at Southsea, view at Hayling Island and the stark looking rose bush in the garden with a few fading rose hips and yellow leaves.

December was a charming month packed full of wild wonder for me, a month where I had to do things a bit differently led to a huge focus on local areas and a couple of relatively fresh places for me visited and I saw some amazing wildlife to have a fitting end to an incredible year for me. In my birdwatching a final addition to my highest ever year list to bring my 2023 total a neat 220 came in the form of a bird I have a huge bond with and admiration for, the Black Redstart at Southsea Castle. This came a day after being mesmerised by wonderful views of the Long-tailed Duck and other birds at Hayling Island. Red Kite, Marsh Harrier, Stonechat, Rock Pipit, Nuthatch, Kingfisher, Jay, Mute Swan, Brent Geese, Red-breasted Merganser and Great White Egret were other key birds of my month. On my Lakeside walks the Goosanders continued to give with more fantastic sightings of them and the Common Gull was another welcome frequently seen winter visitor. Cormorant, fine views of Tufted Ducks, the cheery constant of Great Crested Grebes, Goldcrest, Green and Great Spotted Woodpecker, Jay, marvelous Redwings, Song Thrush, Wren, so many smashing moments seeing Long-tailed Tits, Kingfisher and Ring-necked Parakeet have been other key Lakeside sightings to bring me joy this month.

It has naturally quietened down for insects this month but I did manage a butterfly sightings with a probable Peacock seen quickly flying over at Lakeside and a hoverfly there on Christmas Eve. Grey Silverfish as well as frequent sightings of Long-bodied Cellar spider and the Silver-sided Sector spiders were interesting to see at home. It has been a memorable mammal month ending perhaps my greatest year of watching mammals with magical moments connecting with Roe Deers at Lakeside and Winnall Moors and a fair few Grey Squirrels and Brown Rats seen. Likewise with fungi a quieter month but multiple turkey tail sightings and some splendid candlesnuff fungi among others kept the interest up.

In a wet and relatively mild month a notable thing was how almost bizarre it was to notice things with plants a few weeks/months ahead of where they should be, from the verge at Lakeside bursting with winter heliotrope in flower and a violet to the hazel catkins beginning to adorn the landscape and the forsythia hedge out the front having a few flowers. Wild carrot and white deadnettle were two of a few of the summer/all season flowers I enjoyed in flower in places too. It was a great month of observing seed heads from fleabane to hogweed including gripping old man's beard and in an incredible fruit year bits of fruit still going like rose hips, hawthorn berries and holly berries. Mistletoe a key seasonal sight. Finally I enjoyed many breathtaking moments immersing myself in the outdoors at special sites taking in beautiful landscapes, with great sky scenes including the rainbow and the moon key to this month too. Happy New Year all!

[mercerislandbooks]

Book Chats: The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club

As it starts to warm up and the sunlight lingers later each day, my genre reading shifts. No more dense fantasy novels; instead, I want books that have summery vibes. Seaside settings and joyful moments. The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson is one such book. Lori read it months ago and has been mentioning it consistently since then—and while I don't often pick up historical fiction unprompted, I do enjoy it—so we decided to have a virtual chat about it to compare notes.

Constance Haverhill finds herself out of a job now that the Great War is over and the position she fell into as an estate bookkeeper for an old family friend is being returned to a man. She gets her severance in the form of a summer spent as companion to the recovering Mrs. Fog at a seaside village. Unsure how to occupy herself, she stumbles into a friendship with the lively Poppy Wirall and her gang of motorcycle girls who worked as delivery riders during the war. In their attempts to keep riding and stay employed, hijinks ensue, races are won, and a plane destined for parts is salvaged. But the shadow of the Great War looms over them all as some try to forget and everyone attempts to move on. In this time of change and recovery, Constance has to decide what she wants to make of her life now that women are expected to go back to the way things were before.

Becca: What is it that drew you to this book when you first picked it up? Lori: I think it had been compared to Downton Abbey, which I love and I am generally a fan of historical fiction. World War I and the period between the world wars has not been overdone as much at World War II fiction at this point, in my opinion, and I found the change in time period and setting at the seaside refreshing. Thanks for letting me talk you into trying it! Becca: I really enjoyed it, and our tastes overlap quite a bit, so it wasn't a hard sell. The seaside setting was just what I needed to carry me over into the warmer months. I've just started Downton Abbey for the first time (currently on season 2), and obviously there's a lot of overlap in themes and setting. Did you find this setting and premise to be unique, or is this a topic you read about fairly often in the historical fiction sphere? And how did you feel about the multiple points of view? Were they beneficial to the story, or did they get in the way? Lori: I have read several books this year so far that feature the suffrage movement and women's rights, and not on purpose but they just seem to follow after one another. The Gentleman's Gambit, A Suffragist's Guide to the Antarctic, recently The Stranger I Wed. So I wouldn't say I seek them out, but it's been interesting to keep reading about it. I like multiple POV if it serves the story, and I think it does for this book. It heightened the emotional impact and tension to have an interior view of Constance, Klaus, and Harris. What did you think? Becca: I always enjoy seeing similar things or the same events through multiple points of view. Harris and Constance provide us with a dual-POV romance, while Klaus gives us insight into the life a naturalized British citizen from Germany during that time. And all three of them exist in different, if overlapping, social classes, which added depth. I really loved the emphasis that Simonson placed on the part women played in the war, and how they were then displaced by the men who came home and needed their jobs back. It was a difficult thing to navigate, since there have always been women who have had to support themselves and their families. Lori: I know! I thought she did a great job highlighting that huge oversight when the party line is that all men must be employed at the expense of often more qualified women. Constance needs to work to support herself; she doesn't have anyone else or anything else to fall back on, and it was interesting how uncomfortable those conversations made the "upper class" people she was thrown amongst. Becca: This book definitely gives nods of acknowledgement to several of the British Empire's former colonies. There's a certain Indian government official that I love as a character, not to mention the old friends that Mrs. Fog reunites with in their time at Hazelbourne-on-the-Sea. Lori: Yes! I appreciated that (and I loved him too!). I wanted to visit Mrs. Fog's friends; their home made me think of a Rosamunde Pilcher novel. I think even though, overtly, this book is about women between the wars trying to find a way to forge their own destinies, there's also a current of confronting prejudice or intolerance that plays out in multiple situations and with varying results.  Becca: Agreed. While a large portion of this novel was light and fun (e.g. - the motorcycle races, the flying lessons, and the sheer joy of both), Simonson did an excellent job with some very difficult topics.

If you need a good, atmospheric lead-in to summer, The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club will be up on our staff picks shelves for the foreseeable future. Let us know if you read it; as always, we'd love to continue our book chat with you!

—Becca & Lori

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in 1871 – Birth of poet and playwright, John Millington Synge, in Dublin.

Birth of Irish playwright, poet and author John Millington Synge in Rathfarnham, Co Dublin. Synge was one of the leading lights of what was known as the Irish Literary Revival and along with William Butler Yeats and Lady Gregory, founding members of the Abbey Theatre. His most famous work is The Playboy of the Western World, a satirical comedy which exposed some of the flaws at the time not very…

[palior]

Awards 2022 : Movies

Second category: Movies that I saw this year.

Best Animated Movie Award - Turning Red

Period.

'Actually This Is Monsanto And You Should be Very Scared' Award - Goliath

Cyberpunk 2022.

Best Soap Commercial Placement Award - Belfast

I'm like Caitriona Balfe character, I like when things are where they are supposed to be.

Goodbye Award - Downton Abbey II : A New Era

Goodbye to the Downton Abbey upstairs/downstairs family, you have been a pleasant, albeit very uneven, plethora of characters to follow.

Misfire (and Character Assassination) Award - Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Excited to have Wanda on my screen again, I could only be gutted as to how she's been treated in this movie. Making her evil because a Necronomicon-lite book corrupted her to the point that her actions are not even from her own will. What a wasted opportunity.

Scared of Actually Being Queer Award - Thor : Love & Thunder

I don't understand how can Taika Waititi be in one of the best queer piece of media of this year (Our Flag Means Death) and then turn around and do...this. While claiming that the movie is "so gay". No, two rock dudes grabbing hands does not count as representation. And Valkyrie and Jane should have kissed. And the Gods Butcher arc and the Mighty Thor arc should have been two seperate movies.

Actually Queer Award - Fire Island

Pleasently surprised by what is essentialy 'Pride & Prejudice - The Gay Version'. Not only are the characters are as great as in the Jane Austen novel, it also doesn't shy away from doing social commentary about class and the gay community fuck ups.

Best High School Experience for the 1% - Do Revenge

SMG IS BACK ON MY SCREEN AGAIN§§§ OMG!!!!

Best Marvel New Format Award - Werewolf by Night

I really dig the new 'special' format that Marvel has been trying out this year. This one in particular was really enjoyable as a Halloween must watch.

Best Monster Design Award - Hellraiser

Sashay Away!

Best Mafia Movie (That Never Was) Award - Goncharov (1973)

"You will have to tell them I am sorry, for I have no sorrow left."

Best Movie Award - Everything Everywhere All at Once

The movie that puts to shame all the others that try to do multiverses. Full of earnestness, sorrow, fun, humor, love and with a Michelle Yeoh at the top of her game, this is THE movie to watch this year. Nothing matters :( Nothing matters o:)

[bitletsanddrabbles]

WIP It Was A Shitty Day So I Don't Care

Today can die and never repeat.

...okay, except for the part where the collector's dolls I wanted went up as preorder rather than straight sale, so I could get them. That part can repeat a lot.

The rest can die in a fire. So, as therapy, I am sharing this bitlet from the piece I'm currently arguing with:

Syl had been in two weeks ago crowing that they’d finally secured Mr Dexter - The Mr Dexter! - as the lead in Anthony and Cleopatra, in which Syl himself would be playing the female role, naturally. He’d then been in at least once a day until it was nearly time to start setting the paper reviewing the announcement, suggesting changes, and generally being a nuisance until Gordon had threatened to black his eye so that he’d look frightful on stage. When Syl had appealed to Thomas, the only other person present at the time, Thomas had pointed out that a black eye could be covered with makeup and it would be better to break Syl’s nose.

Needless to say, Thomas and Syl were once again not on speaking terms.

[xavierbautistagarcia]

An abbey, a castle, an island, a folk rock band

The island of Lindisfarne, with its castle-monastery, has the dubious honour of being the place that marks the beginning of the age of the Vikings, being the first monastery to be attacked by a fleet of these Scandinavian warriors in 793, who crossed the North Sea to Britain in search of the riches hidden in the Christian churches.

Lindisfarne or Holy Island is located on the north coast of Northumberland and owes its name to the fact that it was a place of passage for travellers from the kingdom of Lindsey, one of the small Anglo-Saxon states that emerged from the invasions from northern Europe from the 5th century onwards.

Tradition has it that the monastery was founded in the 7th century by St Aidan, an Irish monk commissioned by King Oswald of Bernicia, another Anglo-Saxon kingdom, to evangelise the northern lands of present-day England. Among its most famous members was Saint Cutbert, who became a prior before becoming a hermit in a cave.

Cutbert was appointed bishop of Lindisfarne in the late 7th century, but had to be persuaded by King Ecgfrith of Deira and later of Northumbria, heir kingdom to Bernicia, to take up the post. Soon after, however, he went into seclusion again and died in the Farne Islands.

His body was buried at Lindisfarne, but due to subsequent Danish raids a century later it was moved to Durham Cathedral to prevent it from being pillaged.

But Lindisfarne did not end with St Cutbert. Its scriptorium produced the Lindisfarne Gospels, which incorporated Old English commentaries in the 10th century, and are the first biblical texts in the English language.

However, the history of the monastery passes quietly through the history of unified England in the 9th century, with the Norman invasions of the 11th century, the successive dynastic wars, the Reformation, the revolutions and civil wars of the 17th century and the constitution of the United Kingdom in 1707.

Until 1968, when another Lindisfarne emerged, an English folk rock band, which incorporated traditional instruments to create a sound different from the pop and rock that prevailed at the time. Their career continued for decades with new additions and in the autumn of 2022 they were still able to tour the UK.

[theangelcatalogue]

OMGGGG

PLEASE DO MORE THE ISLAND OF THE LOVESICKNESS

LIKE NOAH, TYLER, TRENT, AND JUSTIN ARE SOME OF MY FAVS I WOULD LOVE TO SEE THEM AS YAHDERES

OH IT IS GOING TO HAVE

(spoiler, two of them is the 3 and 4 victim ;) )

[bigbrotherw]

If only there is a chance to turn this expedition into a reality.

Abbey of San Fruttuoso, Italy (by Roger)