#empire-of-stories

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

[wileycap]

AITA for striking my (M43) son (M20) when he rejected me as his father?

I understand that the title might have you thinking the worst, but please hear me out.

I didn't have a relationship with my son for basically all his life. This was due to my circumstances at the time: I went through a major personal tragedy and was severely injured, to the point of being on life support. To this day I have a lot of issues with my health.

I recently reconnected with my son. I immediately invited him to meet my boss (M92), in hopes that I could set him up with a job opportunity. I feel that this is significant. As far as I know, my son has been working in menial jobs in agriculture, but then apparently chose to leave that life and - to my shock - join a criminal syndicate.

I felt as if getting a good government job would be a way to turn over a new leaf in his life, especially given his past. However, he immediately became combative. I attempted to give him some guidance in managing his emotions, but he rejected that as well.

I'm sad to say that the argument became physical. Some blows were exchanged, but in the end, I was angry enough to strike him. I immediately felt very bad, and decided to offer him the government job on the spot. He rejected me again, and chose to leave very abruptly. I haven't had any contact with him since.

So, AITA?

Edit: Yes, I admit that to call it striking him was an understatement. To clarify, I cut off his hand.

Edit: However, I feel like it should be stated that I myself am a quadruple amputee and we have excellent healthcare.

Edit: I did not immediately identify myself as his father when we met. I think this was my mistake. I think he would have been much more receptive of my message had I done so. As it stands I only told him of our relationship after I had struck him.

Edit: My wife is not in the picture. To my knowledge she passed before his birth.

[alternativeulster]

can anyone hear me

[ruubesz-draws]

Showing off the babies

(I watched Ultraman Rising! It was good!)

Bonus:

From this

[kingoffantasy516]

Ok you know what, let's spread some positivity. Reblog this if you actually like Star Wars

And I am refering to all of star wars and not just select parts of it. Even if you have issues with parts of it, you still enjoy it.

[acourtofquestions]

“If you were to ask me what Throne of Glass is about…

I’d say it’s about the epic journey of a teenage assassin in a corrupt kingdom.

But if you were to ask me on a deeper level, I’d say…

It’s about how small acts of kindness can change the outcome of the world.

Money to a barmaid, waiting an extra minute to shoot, a warning in a competition, a cloak in a cold dungeon, a message on a wall, sharing your lavender soap.”

[vaguely-concerned]

sometimes I think of all the on-the-surface warm, well-meaning but deeply ineffectual advice and attention john gives harrow through harrow the ninth (make some soup and get some sleep! get a hobby! don't be so hard on yourself! self care harrow! as long as I need take no actual responsibility in this relationship whatsoever I would have loved to be your dad!) set up against the stark truth that with his other hand he has been staging her attempted horrific murder again and again and again like a living nightmare on the logic that it will 'put her down or fix her'. and then I find that I wish there is a hell. a special hell where twitch streamers turned necromantic death emperors go

[arrimorr]

My ocs, Sir and Ser, aka the eldritch malevolent policemen 😔

[wanderinggoddess]

Arun, in Mughal Era dress

(i had fun researching the fashion history so im gonna include a bit of info under the cut for anyone interested!)

First, Armand is dressed more typically for the upper class or royalty, but I wanted to paint him all dolled up. This would have been somewhat typical dress for Mughal Empire (roughly the 16th-18th centuries) royalty. Men of all classes would typically wear the Jama (the overcoat). I depicted this one as made of Dhaka Muslin, one of the finest and rarest fabrics produced from the Dhaka region. The technique has since been lost, but at the time was incredibly sought after. So much so that during the British colonizers would take the artisans and materials and force them into reproducing the fabric for little to know compensation. Dhaka Muslin was so fine that it was practically transparent, and was worn by members of the upperclass across the world. I read somewhere that it was used to dress statues of greek goddesses. Another little detail is that Armand's Jama is fastened to the right, typical of a Muslim man, rather than to the left (a Hindu man).

I based this loosely off of Caravaggio's Bachus and Depictions of Prince Salim.

All the info I got was from these three youtube videos, so it's not like any serious research!

[bizarrelittlemew]

calling it right now that season 3 starts like this

[rhapsoddity]

An impromptu meeting with Empire's Watcher council, surely Cuteguy can bring The Sheriff in right?

[blueiscoool]

A photo of the body casts of two adults and two children who died in what's now called the house of the golden bracelet in Pompeii. A new DNA analysis shows that these four people are not genetically related to one another. (Image credit: Archeological Park of Pompeii).

DNA Analysis Rewrites The Stories of People Buried in Pompeii

An ancient-DNA analysis of victims in Pompeii who died in Mount Vesuvius' eruption reveals some unusual relations between the people who died together.

Ancient DNA taken from the Pompeii victims of Mount Vesuvius' eruption nearly 2,000 years ago reveals that some people's relationships were not what they seemed, according to a new study.

For instance, an adult who was wearing a golden bracelet and holding a child on their lap was long thought to be a mother with her child. But the new DNA analysis revealed that, in reality, the duo were "an unrelated adult male and child," study co-author David Reich, a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School, said in a statement.

In another example, a couple who died in an embrace and were "thought to be sisters, or mother and daughter, were found to include at least one genetic male," Reich said. "These findings challenge traditional gender and familial assumptions."

In the study, published Thursday (Nov. 7) in the journal Current Biology, Reich and an international team of researchers looked at the genetics of five individuals who died during the A.D. 79 eruption that killed around 2,000 people.

When Mount Vesuvius erupted, it covered the surrounding area in a deadly layer of volcanic ash, pumice and pyroclastic flow, burying people alive and preserving the shapes of many bodies beneath the calcified layers of ash. The remains of the city were rediscovered only in the 1700s. In the following century, archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli perfected his plaster technique, in which he filled in the human-shaped holes left after the bodies had decomposed to create casts of the victims.

The casts of two people who died about 2,000 years ago in the house of the cryptoporticus in Pompeii. A new DNA analysis found that one individual was biologically male, but the sex of the other could not be determined. (Image credit: Archeological Park of Pompeii).

The casts allowed scholars to study the victims in their last moments and make hypotheses about their identities based on details such as their locations, positions and apparel. The problem with this approach, however, was that their interpretations were influenced by modern-day assumptions — for instance, that the four people at the house with the golden bracelet, which included the adult holding the child, were two parents with their children, when in reality none of them were genetically related, the researchers wrote in the study.

For their research, the team analyzed 14 casts and extracted DNA from fragmented skeletal remains in five of them. By analyzing this genetic material, the scientists determined the individuals' genetic relationships, sex and ancestry. The team concluded that the victims had a "diverse genomic background," primarily descending from recent eastern Mediterranean immigrants, per the statement, confirming the Roman Empire's multiethnic reality.

The cast of a person who died in the villa of the mysteries in Pompeii in A.D. 79. (Image credit: Archeological Park of Pompeii).

Our findings have significant implications for the interpretation of archaeological data and the understanding of ancient societies," study co-author Alissa Mittnik, an archaeogeneticist at Harvard Medical School and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany, said in the statement. "They highlight the importance of integrating genetic data with archaeological and historical information to avoid misinterpretations based on modern assumptions."

It's possible that past misconceptions led to the "exploitation of the casts as vehicles for storytelling," meaning that curators may have manipulated the victims' "poses and relative positioning" for exhibits, the team wrote in the study.

Sex misassignment is "not uncommon" in archaeology, Carles Lalueza-Fox, a biologist at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology (CSIC-UPF) in Barcelona who specializes in the study of ancient DNA but was not involved with the study, said in an email.

"Of course we look at the past with the cultural eyes of the present and this view is sometimes distorted; for me the discovery of a man with a golden bracelet trying to save an unrelated child is more interesting and culturally complex than assuming it was a mother and her child," Lalueza-Fox said.

By Margherita Bassi.

[azural83]

The way these would've slayed the box office if they were released today...

[ruubesz-draws]

Yeah, he don't bite. Instead, he'll atomic breath you

He's still a lil baby :)

This image just immediately made me think of them:

[princeyralsei]

Movie Sonic is gonna realize that Shadow is unaware of the existence of sequels to the original Star Wars movie and he will be horrified and intent on rectifying this immediately

[pedroam-bang]

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)