#i dream of either eating mammoth

[housecow]

If you could have any extinct animal as a pet/companion, what would you choose and why?

god this is a hard question… part of me wants to go for the easy answer of smthn like mononykus

but then. idk the permian ammonites are so cute 🥺🥺 i want one of these guys (below) floating around in a lil aquarium. maybe w some trilobites?? 🥺

or….. i’m partial towards other weird synapsids. i’d be one of those ppl keeping a dimetrodon or edaphosaurus (below) until it’s too big and could potentially eat me <33

HOWEVER. my ultimate choice is one of the channel islands dwarf mammoths thank you very much!!! i’d name her roberta and we would be besties

[danielsdecanter]

beautifully unconventional - part four

pairing: daniel ricciardo x f!singer reader

warnings: brief alcohol mention, bit of smooching but no explicit smut this chapter! 

word count: 3.5k (i couldn’t stop myself) 

summary: daniel ricciardo is famously a music fan. you’re the lead singer of one of his favourite bands. match made in heaven - right?

author’s note: i’m so sorry for the wait on this! i kept adding to it and i wrote it over the course of a good few days so apologies if it seems a bit jumpy. it’s also unbeta’d this time around because i’m an eager beaver, so if anyone spots any mistakes or has any feedback, as always please drop me a message! this gets kinda dialogue heavy in places (but i love writing dialogue) so i hope you all enjoy some tooth-rotting domesticity anyways x

read part one here | part two here | read part three here

the following morning had felt like nothing short of a dream. 

daniel had woken up first and found your head pillowed on his chest as you continued to sleep soundly. he’d shifted slightly to take a better look at you in his arms, which had caused you to stir a little, a soft little noise escaping you. however, all you’d done was nuzzle closer into him, and he was sure that if he’d died in that very instant, he’d have died a happy man.

you came round about thirty minutes later, blinking once and then twice before looking up to see daniel’s sleepy brown eyes regarding you with the dopiest smile. before you’d even been able to say good morning, he’d leant down to press a soft kiss to your lips that you couldn’t help but smile into. you finally exchanged your morning greetings before falling into an easy silence as you let your body fully wake up - the rumble of your stomach a few moments later being a tell-tale sign that it was absolutely breakfast-in-bed o’clock. daniel had rolled out from underneath the covers in search of the room service menu and you couldn’t help but let your eyes roam over his body, checking for any remnants of last night on his skin. 

“there’s some marks on your back” you’d told him. 

he just grinned and told you he didn’t care. 

he asked what you wanted for breakfast, and you’d simply said that you didn’t give a fuck as long as it was food. you didn’t see, as you sank back into the pillows, but he grinned. you were truly a woman after his own heart. 

it wasn’t long until the food came and you both ate together, flicking through the various hotel tv channels for some background noise, before settling on some screaming-match morning talk show that had you both giggling as you filled your faces with the various breakfast foods daniel had added to the mammoth order. there were fruits and cereals, pastries and toast, eggs and bacon, and more. he’d gone all out, and you’d blushed as he’d told you that he’d tried to order a bit of everything as he didn’t know what you liked yet. 

yet.

such a simple word and yet one that spoke of a future. a future in which he knew your breakfast order off by heart, and you’d presumably know his. you wondered if he preferred coffee or tea. if coffee, how did he take it? maybe he wasn’t a hot drink guy. you wanted to find out - you were sure you would. 

you’d showered once you were done eating, separately, as despite the temptation to go for rounds three and four under the steamy water, daniel absolutely couldn’t miss his flight to mexico city later that morning. you redressed in the clothes (his clothes) that you’d slept in, partly out of comfort but mostly because you wanted to keep them for yourself. they smelled more like him than they did of you, and not knowing when you’d next see each other, it only felt like a fair exchange. you also made sure to ‘borrow’ the complimentary hotel slippers to get you down to the lobby and to your uber, not trusting your boots after last night. 

it was a quick goodbye in the end, rushed by the impending arrival of your respective rides and the sensible move to not leave together. the last thing either of you needed right now was wagging tongues. you’d kissed at the door of his room and made him promise to text you as soon as he’d landed later on that day, needing to know he was safe and sound. 

he did. 

- - -

your tour had come to its end a couple of days after your last meeting and you’d all headed back home (which was currently london) more or less straight away, all desperate for some home comforts. it made keeping up with daniel in the mexican grand prix all that more complicated as you fought off the jet lag that came with spending weeks in a different time zone. you managed though, texting him excitedly throughout the race even though you knew he wouldn’t see the messages until long after the chequered flag. you clapped happily as he crossed the line in a respectable 5th place, somehow managing to secure a fastest lap point too. grabbing your phone, you quickly text him ​​again, your messages this time accompanied with a selfie of you tucked up on the sofa with a soft blanket around your shoulders, beaming with pride. 

‘well done!!! i’m so proud of you, you smashed it 🧡’

what you hadn’t expected was a facetime call from him as you lay in bed an hour or so later. you accepted in an instant and your heart jumped at the sight of him in his fireproofs, a sheen of sweat still visible across his forehead and the happiest smile. you’d ended up speaking for ages, the battle to stay awake growing by the minute. you’d propped your phone up on the pillow next to you so you could easily lie and talk to him, but as time went on your eyes grew heavier and heavier. the next morning you could hardly remember if you’d said good night or if you’d fallen asleep on him, but you didn’t care. there was a text from him on your phone that simply read:

‘sleep tight, beautiful x’

that was the first thing you saw, and it was all you needed to know. 

- - -

the texting and facetimes continued from then on, your eyes lighting up every time his name flashed up on screen. it was a few days into november when he rang one evening - on audio only. you didn’t even get the chance to say hi. 

“are you still in london?” he’d asked. his voice sounded a little distant, far away. was he on speakerphone? wait, was he driving? 

“hello to you too - yeah i am, why?” you replied, unsure of whether to be concerned or excited by his questioning. 

“i had to come over for some last minute sim work before brazil, can i cook you dinner tonight?”

“can you cook?” 

he laughed. 

“that’s for me to know and you to find out” 

“you’re not filling me with confidence here ricciardo, but sure, that’d be really nice” you said, amusement evident in your voice. 

“perfect - text me your address and i’ll pick you up. i reckon i can be with you in about an hour, is that ok?” 

“that’s fine - see you soon daniel”

fuck - was this your first proper date? you laughed nervously to yourself before bolting up the stairs of your house to find something to wear. 

- - -

you were stood, staring out the front window of your notting hill townhouse, wringing your hands nervously when a simply gorgeous blue mclaren pulled up outside. you didn’t need to know much about cars to know that that was not only very expensive, but also very nice. the butterflies in your stomach increased tenfold but your nerves dissipated as you watched daniel duck across the passenger seat to look up at your home, meeting your gaze as he did. you gave a quick wave and made a beeline for the door, being sure to give yourself a once over in the mirror before heading out to meet him. 

in hindsight, you should have guessed that the car would have scissor doors. of course it would when it looked like that. maybe if you’d put two and two together a little quicker you wouldn’t have practically jumped out of your skin when your door flicked upwards which naturally made daniel howl with laughter. 

“you alright there?” he asked, giggling at the look of sheer terror that had flashed across your face. 

you could only splutter a laugh of disbelief as you slipped into the passenger seat. “they’re lethal, they are” you mused, looking across at him with a wry smile. 

“cool though, aren’t they?” 

with that, he leaned over the centre console to give you a flurry of kisses, clearly excited to see you again. you were sure there were literal hearts in your eyes when he pulled away in order to start the car back up, the music he’d been listening to kicking back in. 

“should only take about fifteen minutes to get to mine” 

that was your cue to settle back into the leather of the seat and flash him a cheeky grin. 

“off you go then”

as he did, you made a mental note to apologise to your neighbours for the noise of his revs when you set off. you could picture the annoyed nextdoor app post now. oh well. worth it.

- - -

daniel was right about the drive to his, it didn’t take long at all and the two of you chatted casually as he navigated the busy london streets with ease. you knew when to keep quiet (when he was trying not to engage in literal warfare with a swerving cyclist) and when to laugh (three consecutive sets of traffic lights turning to red just as you approached them). before you knew it, you were pulling into the underground car park of a luxurious looking apartment complex. this time, you were prepared for the doors springing up - less so for daniel having already bolted it around to your side to give you a hand out. 

“enchanté” he said, with a shit eating grin, as he helped you up to your feet, before placing a kiss to the back of your hand. 

“i’m sure you have a superpower…” you mused, outloud. 

“that i’m incredibly charming?”

you rolled your eyes. 

“that if literally anyone else did that i’d find it the cringiest thing in the world but somehow you…” you trailed off, taking a deep breath, realising you were about to open the door to him being insufferably annoying. “...yes. you make it charming”

he practically fist pumped the air with his free hand, before laughing and pulling you in close to walk you through to the stairwell. 

“i’m only on the third floor here so there’s no point taking the lift” he told you. “race you?”

“daniel, i will absolutely eat shit -” you didn’t have time to finish before he’d launched himself off ahead of you, taking two steps at a time. 

“you’re a dickhead!” you yelled, affectionately, setting off after him. there was no hope however, as by the time you’d found the third floor, there he was, doubled over laughing. you couldn’t even be mad, as the sound of his laughter was infectious. holding out a hand to him as you caught your breath, he took it without a moment’s hesitation, pulling you into his side in one easy movement. 

“c’mon” he said softly, as he began to lead you down the corridor towards his apartment. once inside, the first thing you noted was just how clean it was, both in a tidy sense and in a ‘minimalist’ way if you could call it that. it felt more like a place to stay rather than a place in which you could call home. 

“this is a proper bachelor pad…” you said with a gentle smile, keen to make sure he knew you weren’t unimpressed so to speak, just surprised at the lack of character behind the four walls for a guy who was full of it (character, that was). “i have the strongest urge to make you a photo collage for a wall or something…”

“oh i have plenty of photos up in my place in monaco - that’s my real home, aside from perth of course…” he replied, leading you through to the mammoth open plan kitchen space, pulling out a stool for you at the counter. 

“i still think you should have some photos up - home can be wherever you want it to be after all..” 

“very true, mademoiselle…” he pondered with a fond smile as he waltzed over to the fridge to start pulling ingredients out. “can i get you a glass of wine? red or white? or pink?” 

“white’ll be fine…”

you stay at the kitchen island as you watch him begin to focus on cooking. from the ingredients on the counter you’ve done the mental arithmetic required to figure out that he’s making spaghetti bolognese - a classic. he makes a comment about not being able to cook much but having this mastered to perfection and you wouldn’t be a fool to believe him. you’ve watched him carefully chop the onions and garlic, as well as fresh tomatoes and plenty of seasoning. the mince is being carefully browned while he works on the sauce and you’re almost impressed.

almost.

it all goes horribly wrong when he cooks the pasta - the easiest bit - at least you thought it was. he’d distracted himself having a near on verbal altercation with alexa when she wouldn’t play the song he wanted, and forgotten that he’d dropped the spaghetti into the boiling water. it was only when you started sniffing at the smell of something burning that you both looked over to see that the ends of the spaghetti strands had turned - there was no easy way to say it - black, as they’d stuck to the rim of the pan. you covered your mouth to stifle your laughter as he rushed to the stove, turning off the heat in a desperate attempt to salvage the key component of your dinner, but there was no luck. 

“oh sweetheart…” you said with a sad smile at the sight of him looking practically dejected at the steaming pot. 

“it was all going so well…” he muttered. you slipped off your stool and made your way over to him, wine glass in hand. 

“it was, angel…” you agreed, as you wrapped your free arm around his middle before pushing up on your tiptoes to drop a soft kiss to the tip of his nose. “here’s what we’re gonna do…” 

you began listing off your plan as you started digging around in his kitchen for some kind of tupperware container, telling daniel how you were going to put the lovely sauce in the freezer once it had cooled so he could make dinner for you again next time and in the meantime, you were going to order pizza for the two of you.

“no you’re not, i said i’d do dinner…” 

“daniel, you’ve just spent almost an hour doing dinner, the least i can do is order a pizza as a thank you - and as dinner cos i’m fucking starving” you couldn’t help but add. 

“alright fine - but you’re tasting my spaghetti one day…” he replied, leaning down to plant a soft kiss on your lips.

“and i look forward to it…” 

with that you found yourself sat in his arms on his stupidly large sofa while you scrolled through various food delivery apps on your phone, deciding that the only pizza good enough for this evening would be that from your favourite pizza place. once ordered, you turned your attention back to the aussie who was currently holding you as if you were his own teddy bear. 

“i missed you, you know…” you say softly, taking one of his hands and fiddling casually with his rings. 

“say that again?” he teases with a grin against your ear, his stubble tickling slightly. 

“i missed you, daniel…”​​

“good” he says simply. “because i missed you too” 

you giggle happily, twisting in his arms to kiss him properly, neither of you stopping until you’re rudely interrupted by the buzzing of your phone, letting you know your pizzas were downstairs.

“i’ll fetch them” he practically jumps up. “i’ll be right back…” 

- - -

the next couple of hours are spent lounging together, eating your pizzas straight from their boxes. daniel’s put some music on in the background but you hardly notice it, instead enjoying finding out more and more about the other as you munch away. when you’re both too full to eat any more, the boxes are quickly brushed aside to the coffee table, allowing you both to remain exactly where you are. daniel has a hand on your leg, his thumb casually stroking as you chat. 

your attention to him is only disturbed when you hear one of your band’s own songs come on shuffle, head jerking up in recognition. before you can say anything, you’ve clocked daniel looking at you with a smug grin on his face. 

“i wasn’t joking when i said i was a fan back at your show, you know?”

the only indication that you were blushing was the heat that you could feel blaring from your cheeks. you hadn’t given daniel listening to your music much thought if you were being honest - it didn’t really matter to you either way whether he liked it or not - it was him who was the most important part of the equation. however knowing that this had come on, that he clearly was a fan, if the way he was looking at you and miming along to the lyrics was anything to go off, made your head spin slightly. 

“maybe i’ll give you a private concert one day” you said softly, beaming up at him. 

“i’d love that - you would have to hear me singing along though…” 

“i’ll teach you” it felt like the obvious offer, as you lay your head back on his shoulder, swaying in his arms ever so slightly to your own song. 

“i’ll get my people to talk to your people” 

you laughed. he made everything so easy. 

he kisses you then, a hand moving to cup your cheek as he holds you close. this was different to the kisses of your last encounter. gone was the urgency, the primal need to feel the other, taste them. this was slow, almost gentle. you had time to breathe, to touch, as your lips moved together. that’s where you stayed for you weren’t sure how long, neither one of you wanting to be the first to pull away. 

eventually, daniel did. 

“look i - i want us to go to bed but i need to get on a plane again and have to leave in - fuck - in four hours” the disappointment was obvious on his face. it was sweet. 

“that’s okay” you replied gently, a small smile on your lips as his thumb brushed across your cheek.

“i mean…” he continued, almost as if he hadn’t heard what you’d said. “you could still stay if you want, i just won’t be here when you wake up, and you’d have to see yourself out - the door would lock itself when you left anyway and…”

it was your turn to interrupt this time.

“daniel, do you want me to stay?” 

he nodded, his big brown eyes blinking like a lost puppy. 

“then i’ll stay”

the smile that lights up his face would stay with you forever. 

- - -

he leads you through to his bedroom, practically chucking his clothes at you once you’re in there for you to wear to bed. you didn’t mind - if anything, you wanted to be that girl who slowly built up a collection of the guy they were seeing’s clothes, especially when they were his. the colder weather meant that this time you were kindly provided with a hoodie, which you were sure was his own merchandise, and a pair of jogging bottoms which were definitely too big. seeing you in his clothes again made something bloom in daniel’s chest, as he watched you twirl in front of the mirror in his room, giggling as you tried to keep the joggers from falling down. 

“come on you muppet, get into bed with me” he laughed, and you were all too happy to oblige. you crawled over the sheets (crisp and freshly washed having not been slept in for who knows how long), before tucking yourself in next to him. 

“feels good to do this again” you admitted, relishing in the feeling of being able to fall asleep in his arms again. 

“it does, doesn’t it?” he replied with a sleepy sigh, pulling you in tighter and pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose, like you’d done with him earlier. it made you smile. 

“sleep well, daniel..” 

- - -

you barely register his alarm go off, but it’s enough to pull you from your sleep for a moment or two. his lips brush against yours, as he tells you to go back to sleep. you register yourself nodding, making a soft little noise of affirmation before settling back into the covers. you stir again a few minutes later as you hear him drag his suitcase through the door, banging it as he does. 

“sorry!” he whispers through to you. 

“don’t worry…” you murmur back in reply, barely cracking your eyes open in an attempt to hang onto your sleep. before you can ask he speaks again, almost as if he knows what you’re going to say. 

“i’ll text you when i land, i promise”

you smile.

“thank you - be safe…” 

as you hear the front door close, you’re already half asleep again, falling back into the land of nod in a matter of minutes. 

he texts you before he lands, but you don’t see it until you wake up. 

new message from: daniel 🧡

see you soon, princess x

[tastesoftamriel]

what are some popular pie dishes that the different races make ? :o

Pies can certainly be found in every Province, and vary widely in flavours, fillings, and textures! Sweet or savoury, small or big enough to serve at a feast, these are some of my favourite pie dishes across Tamriel.

Altmer

Aside from the Summerset Rainbow Pie, there are also indrik cheese and shallot pies, enveloped in a delicate butter puff pastry, are a stellar example of High Elf pastry genius. The shallots are caramelised with a splash of cider vinegar, and mixed with a fluffy indrik (or goat, for the more affordable option) cheese mixture seasoned with pink peppercorns and topped with flambéed peaches. The pastry is buttery but not greasy, and is thick enough to contain the filling while also airy. Typically, a pie serves two for dinner perfectly, paired with with a good white wine.

Argonians

One of the specialties of Black Marsh is a delicious chicken-and-seafood pot pie, made with a crisp and crumbly saltrice crust and baked in a deep clay dish. Tender pieces of chicken, fish, and shellfish are seasoned with an array of spices such as cumin and saffron, as well as a few vegetables like watercress, carrots, and potatoes. It's surprisingly hearty for Argonian cuisine!

Bosmer

The undisputed masters of the meat pie, even when the Green Pact is an obstacle! For those who aren't as strict, using imported wheat flour and local butter to make pastry is the best choice for those unaccustomed to Bosmer cuisine. More devout Wood Elves prefer to use a ground insect-based "flour" to make their pie crusts, resulting in a nuttier, slightly drier dough. In either case, pies are stuffed with everything from chunky smoked ham in blood gravy to beef and timber mammoth cheese sauce. Be sure to try them all!

Bretons

High Rock is home to the infamous macaroni and cheese pie, which sounds awfully gratuitous (it is) but is an absolutely moreish bite. The "pie" is simply a baked, congealed macaroni and cheese in a form, served warm or cold. The thick cheese sauce that holds it all together is often spruced up with everything from humble cracked peppercorns and spinach to more extravagant additions like truffle oil, smoked herring, and roasted peppers.

Dunmer

Pies aren't quite a cornerstone of Dunmeri cuisine in the same way as other cultures, but sweet marshmerrow hand-pies are an exception which can be found at any event or gathering for dessert or a snack. The marshmerrow plant, native to Morrowind, has delicious flesh reminiscent in flavour to marshmallows, and tastes excellent when mixed with rhubarb or apples and baked into a flaky saltrice pastry. Also great for snacking on the go!

Imperials

Rumare Slaughterfish Pie is a classic Imperial dish, but open-faced dessert pies, somewhat akin to a crostata, are also a common feature of Cyrodiilic cuisine. Generally, fruit fillings are baked into a caramelised biscuit-based crust and served either hot or cold with cream or ice cream. My personal favourite is a chilled Dunmeri-inspired chocolate and raspberry pie from Cheydinhal with sweet rum-soaked comberries and freshly whipped cream!

Khajiit

The Khajiit love pies both sweet and savoury, and sometimes a combination of both! One of the most unusual and delicious examples I've encountered is a flaky pie with chunks of beef and bacon, with a rich and meaty gravy flavoured with moon sugar salted caramel. Of course, you're thinking that Khajiit are insane for putting salted caramel in their meat pies, but it really works together!

Nords

Mammoth pie with juniper berries is one of my signature dishes, inspired by the humble traditional Nord mammoth snout pie. When cooked right, snout can be tender like beef, but with a firmer texture. I mix it into a thick stew with juniper berries, leeks, mushrooms, and onions, and pop that into a crisp all-butter pie crust.

Orcs

Honeyed wolf pie is a well-known New Life Festival treat which originates on the island of Betnikh, but today we're bringing attention to Orcish potato pie. If you like potatoes, this will be your dream dish! The pie is made from thin, stacked layers of potato with a zesty tarragon, onion, and garlic cream sauce, then topped with fluffy mashed potatoes. It is often served as a side for (you guessed it) baked jacket potatoes. Sure to put you in a coma after eating, but extraordinarily satisfying.

Redguards

Aside from my often-stolen recipe for Goatherd's Pie, you will also find a delicious cheese-and-spinach pie in most parts of Hammerfell, made with flaky filo pastry. Spinach and a good amount of spiced goat cheese makes for a hearty yet relatively light filling. Some iterations also contain pulled fellrunner or mushrooms. The pies come in sizeable slices, piping hot from the oven, usually with a twist of lemon to serve.

[kagrenacs]

Explaining the Iceberg #6

*Some things aren’t covered, namely things i’ve already discussed or content that I don’t feel is appropriate. And not everything is covered in depth

Tatterdemalion Moon Colonies: A since deleted forum post from MK, discussing the moon colonies of Reman that would later appear in c0da

Tamriel is the Far Shores: Orgnum is the immortal King of the Maormer, also said to be the Serpent God of the Sakatal’ indicating some connection to the Yokudan God of everything, Sakatal. Orgnum’s goal is to conquer Tamriel, this theory states that he may have mantled the Yokudan God and is confusing Tamriel for the Far Shores.

Water is Memory: One of the more difficult concepts to really pin down in these kind of theories, so bear with me. This topic has been brought up a few times in older lore discussions, and once again in ESO quite recently. First there should be clarification that I mean water both metaphorically and literally, just like the towers, there is no distinction between real and fake because this is a video game world. Second thing to note: There’s a lot of conflicting theories and ideas on this, i’m only providing the way I can conceptualize this all. If I provided every theory i’d surely hit some sort of character limit. Do you remember the metaphor about every soul in existence being a singular drop in an ocean? This is looking at the ocean itself, it’s the collective consciousness and memories of everyone out there, past, present and future. But this isn’t a synonym for souls and energy, this is a whole separate process. Sometimes souls are shown to be able to live without their memories (the soul carin), sometimes reflections of people's memories get stuck to places like ghosts (memory stones) When someone dies, their soul/energy and their memories may stick together and go to an Aedra or Daedra, or they might get split apart (like a Vestige) and end up in the Dreamsleeve to get recycled and in the Drowned Lamp which is a name for where all knowledge lost to history goes. This concept can be seen with the Daedra too, when discussing the ‘waters of oblivion’ when they get banished their essence heads back to this beginning place to spring back up. Water is memory also gets brought up quite often talking about Sotha Sil, who Vivec says is the selfishness of the sea, and whose ‘daughter’ is Mnemoli/Memory.

Crassius Curio, Time traveller: Another variant on the Crassius Curio plagiarism theory, accounting for why the lusty argonian maid is in ESO.

The Republic of Hahd: Mentioned in the Pocket Guide to the Empire, a group of people who claimed they lived off the coast of summerset, in an underwater civilization called Hahd. The only point in history that they became relevant was when they received tariffs for the transport of ‘mnemolite’ from the people of Hahd to the people of Nahd, and nearly sparked war between the Empire and the Altmer as they tried to figure out what was going on. Hahd and Nahd were both made up, thought to be by a group of psjjic students, as the island of Artaeum disappeared in that same year again.

Leaper Demons: Another name for Mehrunes Dagon, before he was cursed to become Dagon. Named this because of his ability to jump from Kalpa to Kalpa

Zero Stone: This is related to the towers, it’s the ‘heart’ of the tower, the piece that keeps it stable and functioning, essentially like a cornerstone. For the Red Tower and Walk-Brass this was a literal heart (the Heart of Lorkhan), but sometimes it’s other things like a fruit, or a person.

Tiber Septim Awoke Dagoth Ur: In the same short time as the Tiber Wars, where Tiber Septim was attempting to conquer all of Tamriel, Dagoth Ur awoken in Morrowind, which eventually forced ALMSIVI’s hand in signing the Armistice that would make Morrowind a part of the empire, hand over the Numidium, but allow Morrowind to largely keep it’s sovereignty. This theory suggests that Tiber Septim purposefully awoke Dagoth Ur as a long-term strategy, rather than trying to defeat ALMSIVI in wars. If not done purposefully, Dagoth ur may have been awakened by the presence of Tiber Septim (whose thu’um seemed to have came from Wulfharth, a survivor of the battle of Red Mountain and associate of Dagoth Ur)

Akatosh’s Shadow: MK mentioned Peryite as Akatosh’s shadow. Akatosh/Auriel largely introduced stability into the chaos of the Dawn Era as the God of time. Peryite has a similar function, that being natural order, where he micromanages Oblivion and Nirn. There’s more to this theory that i haven’t included due to sake of brevity  https://www.reddit.com/r/teslore/comments/4zct3i/the_shadow_of_aka_peryite/

The people of Et’Ada: Mentioned in the books The Light and Dark and Sithis, the people of et’ada are the descendants of the clash between Anu and Padomay, the original spirits that would give up their forms to become mortal

The Dwemer became their creations: A thought that instead of the commonly accepted Numidium Skin Theory, the Dwemer souls are the ones powering their automatons. 

Lefthanded Maomer: An in-universe theory that the Lefthanded elves and the Maomer are related. Evidence for this may exist in Orgunm being ‘Sakatal’

Skyrim getting Colder: A theory that says Skyrim is entering the ice age because of the recent snowfalls and the presence of Sabertooth cats and mammoths.

Anti-Magik Zones: Probably taken from D&D, areas where magic doesn’t work for some reason or other.

The Greedy Man: Another name for Lorkhan due to him ‘stealing’ the divinity of his fellow Et’Ada

Vvardenfell Lesbian Anomaly: The prescence of a large amount of wlw npcs in ESO and the presence of Tel Mora, an island full of women and Mistress Dratha who says she hates men. While the ESO one i’d argue that there’s a fairly equal spread of same sex couples, and Tel Mora is certainly the original developers adding in something ‘strange’ by having an entirely female island, various Lgbt fans of the games have made their own theories on this. @boethiah has proposed that Tel Mora was established as a safe place for lesbians, and Telmoran is the in-universe equivalent to ‘lesbian’ 

Prism Textract: A reference to a book from the mod Legacy of the Dragonborn

Ruptga: The chief god of the Yokudan Pantheon, people debate on whether he’s equivalent to Akatosh or Magnus, if he’s even equivalent to any god. He was the first god to figure out the Walkabout, and taught the other gods how to survive Sakatal (God of everything) shedding its skin.

The Elder Council world control:  References a theory that the Elder Council is an incredibly powerful political entity that controls the entire world. (looking at how things were handled in Oblivion, doubtful.)

Tiber Septim Shapeshifting dragon: Ingame theories that Tiber Septim was a shapeshifting dragon based on the empire’s affiliation with them. (source seems to originate from GT Noonan, pre-Oblivion and Skyrim) Could be an early idea for Dragonborns, or perhaps just a wild conspiracy theory.

Insane Time-God: Another MK text, et’Ada Eight Aedra, Eat the Dreamer. States Aka has gone insane due to how many names he has

The Staff of Unity and Chaos: The object you need to assemble in tes Arena. Is able to open gateways to other realms, near instantly kill people. In some of the early drafts of the main quest of ESO, a similar relic was proposed called the Staff of Towers, and would have been similar to the main quest of Arena.

Dracocrysalis: Mentioned in the Nu-Mantia, it’s largely unknown what this means apart from ‘it keeps elder magic bound so it can’t change into something lesser’ based off wording it probably means something akin to changing into a dragon.

Telescopic Aurbis: Refers to a quote from MK A single Wheel? More like a Telescope that stretches all the way back to the Eye of the Anui-El, with Padomaics innumerable along its infinite walls. Essentially this refers to the cycle of Kalpas, all wheels lined up with one another would make a telescope-like shape. The focal point of the telescope would be Mundus, ascending upwards you hit oblivion, then Aetherius surrounding that, and then lesser, more chaotic realms beyond that. This is also mentioned in the Murkmire book ‘Lost tales of the Famed Explorer.’

Gaenor is Sai: Gaenor is said to be one of the hardest bosses of Morrowind, in the Tribunal expansion you can give him gold and allow him to become an incredibly strong warrior. He has incredibly high luck (770 points) making him difficult to hit. This theory states that he is either Sai, the god of luck himself, or a champion of his.

Haskill is the Actual Mad God: This might be a couple different theories. 1st: The events of the Shivering Isles is a trick played on the player character by Haskill/Sheogorath, and the Sheo you see and interact with is just a projection. 2nd: From a loremaster interview from ESO, Haskill states he’s the ‘vestige’ of Sheogorath, the mortal remnants of the person who mantled the mad god in the last greymarch.

Moraelyn=Nerevar: Moraelyn of the King Edward books was likely an early draft for Nerevar. Both have association with roses, both are from House Mora and are considered a champion of the Dunmer. He probably participated in the War with the Nords, being described in the 36 Lessons.

Tsaesci Vampire Language eaters: From MK’s And we ate it to become it and another interview. https://www.imperial-library.info/content/fireside-chats Tsaesci feed on language, he doesn’t state if this is metaphorical, or literal (if that even matters in these games)

Scarab’s transformation: Refers to Scarab that Transforms into the New Man, or Amaranth. The Scarab is a metaphor for godhood. (Scarabs are symbols of divinity in Ancient Egypt) and the New Man is a person achieving Amaranth and creating a new dream/universe.

Trinimalarky: A fun name for Malarky. 

King Dead Wolf-Deer: A Bosmer transformed by the Wild Hunt. Lived from the first era until the beginning of the third.

Multiple Underkings: Another statement by MK, general consensus seems to be this refers to the existence of the Underking as two people, Wulfharth a nordic general from the 1st era who held the title. Zurin Arctus, who may have taken up the title after the 2nd Era, when Tiber Septim turned him into an undead being. Or both of them sharing the same body known as the ‘Underking’

Thot-Box: https://www.c0da.es/thotbox/7b10359a40bba7d2e654bc10226f694a68009f15 the worlds worst choose your own adventure. From what I understand of KIMMUNE, a thot-box is some sort of AI

Baar Dau is Shit: Pretty well known at this point. One myth states that Malacath got into a disagreement with Vivec and pooped on Vivec City..

Nu-Hatta: In reference to the person, they’re an ancestor cult member. Otherwise this is used to refer to the Nu-Hatta Intercept written by MK. The text in question seems to be a list of the various ways mortals have achieved divinity. 

Talos brought back dragons: Not sure about this one, there’s too many results to filter through to find what this is specifically about

Lyg’s Numidium: The thought here is that if Lyg is the parallel to Tamriel, then it should also have a Numidium that reinforces time and makes events a reality.

Dawn Era Ideological warfare: From UESP, Quote: The Dawn Era was a period during which time followed an incomprehensible nonlinear path and the very laws of nature remained unset, making a timeline an artificial fabrication. A conflict was simultaneously a mere ideological difference of opinion and a manifest war. What this means in simple terms, all possible outcomes in the Dawn era were simultaneous. This might also refer to the Ehlnofey wars where the wandering ehlnofey (ancestor of men) and the old ehlnofey (ancestor of mer) differed in opinion about the existence of Mundus and went to war.

Vivec destroyed Yokuda: A reference to the 17th lesson of Vivec, where Vivec states For a year they studied under their sword saints and then for another Vivec taught them the virtue of the little reward. Vivec chose a king for a wife and made another race of monsters which ended up destroying the west completely. In a literal sense (not that this means much in context of the lessons), this seems to indicate that Vivec created the sword saints, who ultimately ended up sinking Yokuda with the Pankratosword technique. Vivec also said malewife rights.

Ayrenn KIMMUNE: Another MK text. This one states Queen Ayrenn is actually a 9th era cyborg from the future. This was written after MK read an early draft for the Dominion quests and wanted to make it cooler. The writers of ESO have stated they don’t consider this canon.

Tiger Guars: A bit of old morrowind lore, Imperials would mistakenly call Guars, ‘tigers’

Hermaeus Mora is a failed Elder Scroll: Two theories here: 1st: The Black Books are Mora’s failed attempts to create Elder Scrolls (The first pages reference concepts such as the Dreamer and CHIM, Elder scrolls are fragments of creation) 2nd: Hermaeus Mora himself is a failed Elder Scroll. The Census of Daedric Princes describes him as ‘born of thrown-away ideas used during the creation of Mundus’

SITHISIT: the Ehlnofex word for Sithis

Khajiit Tattoo theft: Rajhin the thief god was said to steal a tattoo off Empress Kintyra’s neck as she slept. 

Mythopoeia: irl, it’s essentially a term for ‘world-building’ In the context of the elder scrolls, it means the ability to affect reality using belief or the will to change (similar to CHIM) In morrowind Yagrum uses it to describe the enchantments Kagrenac placed upon the tools. 

Dragons Biological Time-Machines: In the early drafts for dragons, MK described them as Biological Time-Machines. While this isn’t entirely reflective of what they are now, some truth holds. Being shards of Aka, dragons inherently have some ability to alter time itself.

Argonian Tits: I can’t keep doing this.

The Elven Lie: From what I gather, it seems to relate to the idea that the gods are infallible, when in fact they have weaknesses and flaws.

[itssuppertim3]

OC Headcanons (Myuri):

(Ft. Teldryn)

Myuri is what us ~intellectuals~ would call an introvert. And I'm not putting it lightly, either. This poor mer is the epitome of socially awkward despite her popular reputation as leader of the Thieves Guild. But over the years and the people that she's met, she's much better than how she once was. "You expect me to just... walk up there and ask where the restroom is? Are you mental?" Well, she still needs a little work.

She has a very scrawny build and has heard thousands of times that she needs to grow some meat on her bones. Those people are incompetent fools, because this girl could eat an entire mammoth and still be hungry. Left and right, she devours her meals and calls for seconds, thirds, and fourths. ((Miraak supports this behavior)) Myuri did suffer from an intense case of food poisoning once, and was bedridden for days. Since then, she's learned to be a little more picky with what she eats.

To the average individual, she excels at pretty much everything. Sure, she's light on her feet, has a keen eye, and is handy with a bow, but don't depend on her magicka skills. Like ever. Magic and this thief go together like two opposite sides of tape. She's tried to learn it a few times, but to be honest she never took much interest in it. "Those who become too dependent on magic are weak and stupid," she says. Because of this, her healing magic is kinda shit. Every broken bone, cut, bruise, and internal injury she's ever faced has either scarred due to the lack of supplies or remedied with more basic and traditional medicines.

Unlike Remeir, she's actually great with kids. Myuri enjoys telling them stories of her adventures and even gives them little trinkets and mementos to remember her by. She might not seem like it, but she yearns for the domestic life and wishes to have children of her own someday. But there's one teeny tiny issue that gets in the way of that dream of hers. She hates men to the bottom of her core. This dunmer has trust issues like no other, and I mean it.

Out of all of my characters, Myuri would have to be the most timid. She's terrible at expressing her feelings and half the time, she doesn't even know what she's feeling. That's why it's better for her to be around people that have more outward personalities like Teldryn. If she's acting especially quiet, he'll give her a mini checkup to see if she's still alive in that shell of hers. "Have you eaten today? Did you get enough rest? Is there anything on your mind? Why don't you humor me with a joke?" He'll ask her these kinds of questions throughout the day, but hoping not to bombard her too much. Unbeknownst to him, she really appreciates it.

-----------------------------------------------------

Myuri is a sweet lil' charm and whoever hurts her will burn at the stake☺️

[shebeafancyflapjack]

Consequences

Follow-up to What She Needs, because who doesn’t love make-up fluff.

*

She wakes to the sound of eggs sizzling on a frying pan, the greasy smell of bacon wafting over her. Her stomach rumbles but she’s not ready to get up just yet, snuggled into the sofa beneath the shirt that’s been laid over her.

It’s not a bad position to wake up in but it leaves her a little disoriented.

What time is it? If she’s on the couch then it must be the afternoon but...they wouldn’t be having fried eggs and bacon this late - not that either of them gave a fork about eating routines, it just wasn’t usual. She doesn’t recall practicing walking or swimming earlier, her hair isn’t damp, her calf muscles aren’t cramping...

Ten seconds is all it takes for the time to rearrange itself properly in her head, for the barrage of memories to slot in place like a magical jigsaw and recall why she’s waking up alone, on the sofa, in the morning. And why she shouldn’t be calling the nearby chef over for a good morning kiss. He doesn’t deserve one...not yet. So she stays quiet, pretending to stir and mumble to show she’s awake, but keeping her eyes and mouth shut.

At least he left a nice, warm indent for her to lay in for as long as she wants to stay there and let him wait on her.

She barely remembers the nightmare that forced her to seek out Michael’s comfort, it’s been dissolved by the peaceful sleep and sanctuary she slept through until a minute ago. When her mind attempts to recall it, against her will, all she catches are the worst sensations of fear and loneliness, absence of all hope, her skin crawling as if covered in dung beetles. Again. Eleanor inhales, letting the scents and sounds of the beach house return her to the present.

Michael places her mug on the coffee table. Fork, she’s gonna have to give in and sit up now. She’s prepared to wait until she hears him move back to the kitchen. Then his fingers stroke some of her hair from her face, then brush against her cheek. Forking...

“Y’know I could bite your hand right now.” She murmurs, eyes still closed.

“It’d be worth it.” Michael tells her, softly; “Plus Janet would just grow it back.”

“Ugh, gross.” Eleanor wrinkles her nose; “You’re like a lizard.”

“Oh so it’s fine when you call me a...” She opens her eyes in time to see him bite his tongue as he kneels beside the couch; “Never mind.”

Indeed. She’s glad to see he’s smart enough not to dig his hole even deeper than it already is.

He gives her a humble smile; “How you feeling?”

“Still annoyed with you. I’ll update you when that changes, bud.” Eleanor pushes herself up and yawns.

“I figured that. I meant after...Last night...”

Oh.

“You can just say ‘nightmares’, man, it’s not a forbidden word.” She accepts the coffee when he passes it to her; “And I’m okay...Don’t even remember it. Just is what it is.” And it sucks; “It’s not like you can take them away or anything.”

“I could. I mean...” he takes a breath, “I could always...take the memories away...It’s crossed my mind more than once.”

She takes a sip of her drink, studying the conflict on his face.

“...Could you do it without erasing our time together?”

Michael shakes his head.

She shrugs; “Then it’s not an option, dummy.” Her eyes harden when he dares to look touched by that; “And don’t assume that means I like you again!”

They don’t say another word to each other until she’s nearly finished her breakfast, sat the kitchen island, stomach ravenous after eating nothing but Janet-delivered snacks with her drink instead of dinner the previous night. Michael sits opposite, slowly making his way through his hash browns, eyes cast downwards, almost unnaturally quiet.

He nudges a couple of baked beans with his knife, looking pensive. He takes a deep breath.

“I’m sorry.”

Eleanor glances up, still chewing her eggs. Wow, was that really so hard? To be fair, she’s hardly one to talk. It was hardly a word she was used to saying in life, unless it was something along the lines of ‘Oh I’m sorry you can’t handle how hot I am’ or ‘Sorry...not sorry, psyche!’. 

Michael puts down his knife; “I don’t think of you...Of any of you guys as cockroaches, not really. Humans have always astounded me with how...resilient you guys are. You’re like rubber, everything that hits you just bounces off...I’m sure there’s some kinda great intellectual saying with that analogy...” He waves his hands; “Anyway...Truth is, I’m never been good with handling anyone being better than me...It took me two hundred years of being an apprentice until I got my own neighbourhood. Do you know that’s the longest any demon was in training for? Most fly solo after the first fifty years or so! And even before that, no matter how good I thought I was at torturing, there was always another demon wo was better and getting more praise...I was never strong enough to compete so I would take it out on...” His jaw clenches with shame.

Eleanor swallows the last of her food. She keeps watching, not saying a word, letting him get out everything he’s been clearly rehearsing in his head as he cooked.

“Having someone be better at my old job was one thing...But when there’s someone better at being what I truly have always wanted to be...and never will. Someone who also gets to spend more time with the woman I love...Who knows how to be a better...person,” Michael reaches to sip his own coffee; “The truth is...I’m the one who feels like an insect between the two of you. I feel...scared...” he clears his throat; “Scared that I’ll always fall short of the rest of you...I don’t have anything that compares to your strength or Chidi’s wisdom. Fork, I don’t have Tahani’s confidence...even Jason seems to understand some lessons more than me, with those inane stories he tells which always seem to somehow be on point!”

It’s true, every nonsensical ramble about the DJ’s life seemed to neatly tie in to some ethical thought experiment. He had a talent for it. That and firing spit balls around the chalkboard. 

Michael manages a smile, his cheeks turning pink to match his shirt; “You’re not small and gross to me. You’re...magnificent. And gigantic. Like...mammoths.”

Eleanor snorts.

“That the best you can do?”

“Oh c’mon!” Michael scoffs; “Mammoths are awesome! They....Oh, I forgot, you haven’t seen one. Would you like to? I can get Janet to-.”

“No, no....Well, maybe later, I’m sure Jason would love to ride one, but...” She sighs and slides off her stall.

It’s impossible for her to resist those puppy dog eyes anymore. She moves around the island and shifts her butt onto his lap, throwing her arms around his neck. He blinks, stunned, as she moves in close. One of her hands unhooks to run her fingers across his soft, white hair, smiling as her nose touches his. Michael dares to put his hands on her middle, holding her tight and secure.

She presses her lips to his, lightly at first, before cupping his jaw and moving her tongue to massage her demon boyfriend’s, sharing the taste of bacon between them. It’s been over a week since they’ve had a chance to hold each other and kiss, properly, like this. Having to hold off on the good stuff out of keeping to her newfound principles and to teach him a lesson was not easy. 

But totally worth it.

Eleanor hums as she pulls back, holding onto his shoulders; “Apology accepted. And as for that whole, ‘having nothing that compares to us’ schtick...You know that’s bullshirt, right?” 

Michael looks puzzled. What a dingus. Eleanor touches his face, thumb stroking across his cheekbone. 

“You care, dude. That’s your virtue. It’s why I’m so in love with you, even when you drive me crazy. None of us taught you that...It was right there, locked away inside of you, but you brought it out and you cared for me when I needed to....And you kept on doing it, even when you could’ve stopped...You tried to sacrifice yourself to save me and my friends....You keep putting your neck on the line for us...Don’t ever think that’s worthless, okay? We’re all super grateful to have the most caring, if a little immature and arrogant, demon on our team.”

There’s a wetness growing on his blue eyes, making them shine behind his glasses. She should really add ‘sappy’ to that list. Eleanor kisses his cheek as one tear leaks.

“Maybe that’s why you sucked at torturing. You only went so far to prove your worth. Your heart was never really in it?” She wonders.

He shrugs; “Possibly...Mostly because I don’t have a heart.”

She slaps his chest, lightly; “Y’know what I mean. Do I have to make you one like you’re the forking Tin Man just so you get the point?”

“...Yeah, okay.” He seems excited to have another trinket for his collection.

“Well, I ain’t crafting shirt that’s more complex than another paperclip bracelet, so ask Janet for one.” Eleanor smiles, leaning in to hug him tight around the neck. He squeezes her back, no doubt feeling the same relief as she had, to be back in each others arms without a worry for the weekend.

He hesitates before asking the next question.

“Am I allowed back in the bed tonight?” He says, sheepishly.

“Well....I suppose it will save me the walk if I have another bad dream.” She slips off of his lap; “...Only on one condition of course. You apologise to Chidi.”

His face falls, like a little kid who just had his candy snatched away.

“What, today? He’s not even here! How am I gonna...Can’t I just repeat what I said to you to him?”

“No, that’s cheating.” Her voice turns stern, ‘tutor’ mode activated; “You gotta think of a way to say sorry to him in a way he’d appreciate.”

Michael sighs and taps his fingers on the surface.

“I...I suppose I could...write him an essay on Consequentialism, drawling parallels it to this whole situation?” He suggests, looking to her for the go ahead.

“That’s....actually brilliant. He’d love that! Go for it.” Why are the two men she’s closest to in this afterlife the biggest dorks?

And, worse, she’s pretty much one herself now.

Michael grins, perking up from her approval; “Oh, great! I’ll get right on it and...Then what, do you want me to go back and read it to him?”

“No, just say it to Janet and she can repeat it to him back at my house.” Eleanor waves off; “...But you gotta have her disguise herself as Chidi while you’re reading it, so it feels like you’re saying it to him.”

“That’s gonna be disturbing as well as awkward.” He shifts, frowning.

Eleanor kisses his head before whispering; “That’s consequences, baby. Now get to writing. I’mma gonna go ask speedboating with Janet on those waves until you’re done. Then we can have the couples getaway this is supposed to be.”

As he gets up to put the dishes in the sink, she makes sure to give his butt a good slap, just to add in that incentive. She adores the startled, giddy look on his face that it always leaves him with. Damn it’s tough to stay mad at someone so cute.

After changing out of her PJs and into her bathing suit, sunglasses resting on her head, she goes to head out the patio doors.

“Hey, babe...” Michael stops her, having finished washing up. She turns to see his smile; “...Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. Chidi’s gotta accept your apology so don’t half-ash it.”

“I wasn’t just saying thanks for that...” He stares at her, adoringly; “....I mean for everything, Eleanor. Thank you.”

She tilts her head to the side. Then a smile.

A quick skip towards him, leaning up on her toes, hands on his shoulders to reach that mouth of his again. Fork, it’s more effort to reach him when he’s upright. She gives him another kiss, a little motivation, something to remind him of what he misses out on when acting like a deck.

“You’re very welcome...Now make your hot girlfriend proud by doing your homework.” She smirks, one hand stroking down his chest; “Then come fork me into the sand, ‘cause I’m horny as Here - and if you don’t, I’m gonna get Janet to make me a clone of Jason Statham to spend this weekend with.”

If that doesn’t force the dumb demon to get his ash into gear then nothing will.

[flowerslut]

BREAKING DAWN Part 1 & Part 2

an updated, more modern take on the original soundtrack.

(TWILIGHT) (NEW MOON) (ECLIPSE)

spotify link — BD pt1 spotify link — BD pt2

[track list and commentary under the cut]

Part One

 Endtapes — The Joy Formidable  ➼ ➼ ➼ I Will Be Waiting — Let’s Eat Grandma

This soundtrack starts off so strongly that I had no choice but to pick one that can kick it off just as well. Let’s Eat Grandma might be my favorite band I’ve found this year. Their genre-bending is exquisite.

Love Will Take You — Angus & Julia Stone  ➼ ➼ ➼ Need Ur Luv (Japanese Wallpaper Remix) — Charli XCX

Talk to me a year ago and tell me I was going to be putting Charli on a Twilight soundtrack recreation and I would’ve stared blankly and asked “fucking how?” Well, with this incredible Japanese Wallpaper remix, that’s how.

It Will Rain — Bruno Mars ➼ ➼ ➼ In My Blood — Shawn Mendes 

And how do you replace baby Bruno? Well, only with today’s romantic power-balad singing baby, Shawn Mendes. It’s a perfect replacement, if you ask me.

Turning Page — Sleeping at Last  ➼ ➼ ➼ For Now - Reimagined — Kina Grannis

Any other 2009-era Kina Grannis stans? Message From Your Heart? All those YouTube covers? No, just me? Whatever. Kina belonged on those soundtracks back then, and this is setting things right.

From Now On — The Features  ➼ ➼ ➼ Cliffs Edge — Hayley Kiyoko

One of Hayley’s older songs, so it’s not too new, but I felt that is matched From Now On’s mood fantastically.

A Thousand Years — Christina Perri  ➼ ➼ ➼  human — Christina Perri

No, this isn’t cheating. But only Christina Perri can truly replace Christina Perri. It’s also a perfect pre-change Bella song. I’m sure you heard this song everywhere at the end of the saga when everyone took to YouTube to make their cathartic recap videos. 2012-13 was a great (but weird) year to be a Twilight stan.

Neighbors — Theophilus London ➼ ➼ ➼ FACE — BROCKHAMPTON

Whether you like BROCKHAMPTON or not means little to me. They were absolutely ending up on one of these soundtracks. And as replacement to Neighbors, it’s like they belong. “Tell me what you’re waiting for? I just want to love you.” Ouch. Harsh Jacob vibes.

I Didn’t Mean It — The Belle Brigade ➼ ➼ ➼ All out of Tears — Z Berg

Z Berg created a song that sounded like it was made for one of these soundtracks. It’s insane. And one of my fucking favorites.

Sister Rosetta — Noisettes  ➼ ➼ ➼ Digital Witness — St. Vincent

The Twilight soundtracks (and also Sufjan Stevens himself) are responsible for introducing me to St. Vincent. Now, years later, she’s consistently been one of my favorite artists. She has the range, y’all.

Northern Lights — Cider Sky  ➼ ➼ ➼ Pool — Paramore

Of course I was putting Paramore back on one of these lists, you crazies. (And this isn’t the last you’ll see of them, either.) 

Flightless Bird, American Mouth (Wedding Version) — Iron & Wine ➼ ➼ ➼ New America Classic — Vitamin String Quartet

There isn’t a wedding version of New American classic, but there is a Vitamin String Quartet version! (And no offense Iron & Wine, but it sounds so much more like an actual wedding song.) Any OG Twilight stans know that in this house, we love and cherish the Vitamin String Quartet. They were like our musical savior back in the day. Couldn’t find a decent quality soundtrack upload? No worries. Odds are, they’d already recorded an insane strings cover already.

Requiem on — Imperial Mammoth  ➼ ➼ ➼ Waste — Oh Wonder

I unashamedly adore this song by Oh Wonder. Their dual vocals always put me in a damn trance. It’s so beautiful to describe. Just listen.

Cold — Aqualung & Lucy Schwartz ➼ ➼ ➼ Willow (feat. Robert Pattinson) — Tindersticks

Told you I’d stick him back on the soundtracks eventually. This song is so hauntingly perfect. When I first heard it it reminded me why I was so in love with Robert back in the day. That voice, man. Talent leapt!

Lloverá — Mía Maestro  ➼ ➼ ➼ Silence II — Son Lux

It’s not as beautiful as the Carmen actress’ ballad, but it’s just as haunting.

Love Death Birth — Carter Burwell  ➼ ➼ ➼ Sæglópur — Sigur Rós

When I went through my Sigur Rós phase way back when (pre-Twilight) Sæglópur was my favorite song for ages. It takes you through the whole spectrum of emotion, just as Carter Burwell’s music does. I thought it was an ideal way to end this first half.

You still get bonus tracks! Here’s two for the first movie:

Otherside — Perfume Genius

Simple. Powerful. Emotional. All you need at this point in the saga.

Everything In Its Right Place — Radiohead 

A song that feels like waking up from a dream. Perfect for Bella’s dramatic change. (And of course I had to actually add Radiohead to one of these.)

Part Two

Where I Come From — Passion Pit  ➼ ➼ ➼ Manchester — Kishi Bashi

Bella deserves to see the world for the first time with vampire eyes while Kishi Bashi magically transforms the scene in the background. It’s *chef’s kiss* literal perfection. 

Bittersweet — Ellie Goulding  ➼ ➼ ➼ Warrior — AURORA

Can I go off topic for half a second and tell you guys that I cried when I saw AURORA featured on the new Frozen song? No one deserves that wide recognition as much as she does. And no one does mystical pop better than AURORA (not even Ellie Goulding).

The Forgotten — Green Day ➼ ➼ ➼ Warm Winds (feat. Isaiah Rashad) — SZA

SZA deserves this spot and don’t even question why. SZA’s first album was so iconically emo. She’s another artist I’m convinced would’ve been reached out to for a track if she’d been making music just a little bit earlier.

Fire In The Water — Feist ➼ ➼ ➼ Carry Me Out — Mitski

Even though I’ve been a Feist fan since I got my first vocal comparison to her pre-Twilight (so I was ecstatic when she was featured here) I think Mitski really encapsulates everything a Twilight soundtrack needs.

Everything and Nothing — The Boom Circuits ➼ ➼ ➼ Highspeeds — Elliot Moss

I can’t not give Elliot Moss a spot. And that's it.

The Antidote — St. Vincent  ➼ ➼ ➼ Unholy Trinity — Von Grey

I needed a harder song for this replacement and Von Grey’s music does the trick. This is the band of an old Tumblr friend that goes fucking hard, y’all. She and her sisters know how to bang out the tunes.

Speak Up — POP ETC  ➼ ➼ ➼ Reasons Not To Die (Demo) — Ryn Weaver

This girl just knows how to fucking get me. Her second and final appearance on the soundtrack, here to just make you want to laugh and cry all at once. And as a replacement to another top favorite, it works well.

Heart of Stone — Iko  ➼ ➼ ➼ Smother — Daughter

Heart of Stone actually made my end of year top tracks playlist for 2018. I knew I needed a solid replacement. And you can never go wrong with a Daughter track.

Cover Your Tracks — A Boy and His Kite  ➼ ➼ ➼ In The Mourning — Paramore

We bid farewell to Paramore with their final appearance here. In The Mourning is another long-time favorite. It’s beautiful. And sad! We love it.

Ghosts — James Vincent McMorrow  ➼ ➼ ➼ Weight — Crywolf

You need that late Breaking Dawn depressing shit? I got you that late Breaking Dawn depressing shit. “Bless me with just one kiss before you leave me here with my heart.”

All I've Ever Needed — Paul McDonald & Nikki Reed ➼ ➼ ➼ Beetroot (What If I Was 1?) — Blue Americans

I can’t describe how double-sad I get when I remember that Paul McDonald & Nikki Reed divorced not long after the saga wrapped. (Not that I ever had an attachment to him, but this song is so nice!) So that’s why Beetroot is a little sadder than All I’ve Ever Needed. Still a great song though.

New for You — Reeve Carney ➼ ➼ ➼ Black Hole — HANA 

Black Hole is a little more pop than New For You. But it’s beautiful and nice and lovely and I am also In Love with HANA. So you get her here.

A Thousand Years (Part 2) — Christina Perri (feat. Steve Kazee) ➼ ➼ ➼ I Get To Love You — Ruelle 

Had had had to put this incredible, romantic, hopeful song at the end of this soundtrack specifically. Just listen and tell me you don’t get emotional over their future with this.

Plus Que Ma Propre Vie (More Than My Own Life) — Carter Burwell ➼ ➼ ➼ Half Life - Instrumental Version — Imogen Heap

How are you supposed to pick a song to end the soundtracks? Thankfully, Imogen Heap had the foresight to release instrumental versions of each song on her Ellipse album. Such a thoughtful queen. We thank her by giving her the final word. 

What’s this? No more? It’s okay. You do get bonus tracks, but not here.

I’ll be posting one more soundtrack, full of all the extras and little gems that I couldn’t quite place in any specific spot on the soundtracks. A whole other playlist full of Twilight-vibey songs for your listening enjoyment! Look out for that next week. Happy New Year!

[writteninsunshine]

Step Into The Dark - Adam-Centric - NSFW

Title: Step Into The Dark Author: Donnie Fandom: Saw/Insidious Setting: The Bathroom Pairing: None Characters: Adam Faulkner, Lawrence Gordon, Zep Hindle, John Kramer, Specs (Insidious), Tucker (Insidious), David (Saw .5), OC: Matthew Faulkner, OC: Lukas Radford-Faulkner Genre: Angst/Horror Rating: M Chapters: 1/1 Word Count: 2006 Type of Work: One-Shot Status: Complete Warnings: Canon Character Death, Hallucinations, Sensory Deprivation, Adam Dying, AU - Canon Divergent, Adam just starves to death here, Vent Disclaimer: I don’t own anything except Matt and Lukas. Summary: Adam would have accepted anything to dull the pain, even death. AN: Lol just have to say this before I get into the meat of it, I checked, and 2006 was the original word count for this. 2006 was the release year for Saw III. I just thought that was funny. xD So… On to the real thing here. I’ve been doing not very good and really needed to torture Adam, I guess. I don’t usually write his death, or him being dead or whatever, but I guess I needed to vent pretty badly. I hope you guys enjoy! Edited by my friend, Griff, because I couldn’t do it myself.

Bye Bye Man/Insidious/Saw Fic Masterlist Step Into The Dark ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ While Adam was used to the clawing beast in his stomach, this was a new low for him. Dying in the dark, waiting for something that wasn’t coming. Lawrence had lied to him, and all he could hear was I wouldn’t lie to you. over and over again in his head. An endless loop, sometimes in slow-motion as if he could pull every syllable from Lawrence’s filthy, lying lips if he tried hard enough, and it was growing so old. The last thing he remembered seeing were those grotesquely bright blue eyes. They had been so handsome before the blood loss; it had made the incandescent fire in them scorch him, before leaving him to rot.

It took too much effort to be angry anymore. It took too much effort to even open his eyes, and he’d given up on trying to move his right shoulder at all. There was no escape this time, no way to duck under the responsibility and run. His own cowardice had landed him in the one place he couldn’t seem to leave. Even the acrid scent of his dead cellmate and the stench of shit didn’t register anymore. He had heard of the term ‘nose-blind’, but this was probably to a rather crazy degree. Old-Lady-With-Twenty-Cats crazy. Sunlight was a vague memory, something he couldn’t quite grasp anymore, and he yearned for one more sunrise. In his restless dreams he saw his family, his father’s crooked grin - passed to all of his sons, Lukas’ inability to stick to one person, David’s sardonic attitude, Specs’ nerd culture. They welcomed him back, Matt constantly babying him, much to his siblings’ chagrin, and even Lukas was being kind. That was probably the biggest tell that it was a desperate fantasy. Another bout of stomach acid shredded his throat as it leaked out of his mouth, and he didn’t have it in him to even move. Barfing on his shirt was something that, last month, would have been alcohol-induced. Here, he was so used to tasting acid and feeling sick that he couldn’t imagine ever drinking booze again. With his head pounding and his eyes, adjusted to the dark enough to see the vague shapes of the fixtures, pulsing, he closed them carefully, watching the spinning dots behind his eyes like an in-flight movie. When had his life become so bad that he wished for his shithole apartment, that he missed the days that he couldn’t eat because he didn’t have the money? Having the option sounded like it would be better than this. How long had he been down here? It could have been three hours or three days. That time was spent either pleading with God or hating him because that had always worked for other people. It wasn’t like he had access to anything else, either. The tap didn’t run, not anymore. Even the ticking of the clock had stopped at some point, leaving him in the dark in deafening silence. It figured that he wouldn’t be allowed to count the seconds by to try haphazardly to keep time. Worse than that, though, was when he could hear things. Little scampering feet in the darkness. They had to belong to rats, mice, things of that ilk, and if Adam knew these New York sewer lines, he’d be feeding mammoth rats before the day was out. It did enough to terrify him into stiffening until his shoulder quaked, but nothing ever ventured close enough to touch him. Maybe in his sleep, emboldened by his steady breathing, but never when he heard them when he was awake. Beady eyes in the darkness watched him, mocked him with their ability to come and go as they pleased. Rustling the chain did well enough to scare them off, and it was usually both a gift and a curse when he finally decided to move his leg. Restriction made comfort a far cry in any position, but even less so now that it felt like his ass had been melded with the broken tile beneath himself. Sometimes, he humored himself; which of them was really worse off, after all? At least Adam had both of his feet, the evidence was on the other side of the room. It was a poor claim to happiness when seconds later his traitorous brain replied with, But he has his freedom. That was, if Lawrence had managed to crawl to safety. For all Adam knew, Zep wasn’t the only corpse he shared a catacomb with. Anything beyond the bathroom was a mystery, and he’d go so far as to say that anything in the bathroom out of reach was a best guess, at this point. It was almost impossible to even tell which of Zep’s feet he had had to kick away from himself at first. Once the door was closed and he was, rather suddenly, left with the inability to take anything for granted, he took everything in his general vicinity for some semblance of safety. For a while, he had thought it was a better use of his time to try and find the key, to lay in the bathtub instead of on the floor. The less strength he had in his arms and legs to lift himself, however, meant he had wanted to get up and down less. Eventually, he parked back against the floor, and he wasn’t sure he’d moved much in the last millennia. He was a fixture of this bathroom, like the tub, the clock, Zep’s lifeless corpse. Sometimes he wondered if he’d been dead this whole time, if he wasn’t already gone and his soul hadn’t left, hadn’t been given the chance or the option to leave. Was this Hell? The question had crossed his mind on a few occasions, but he never truly entertained it. If nothing else, leaving the thought open-ended meant that there was a chance that this mind-numbing loneliness would leave, that the impending doom he felt looming all around him could end. Even if he didn’t live, which was looking like the only option, death would be a welcome reprieve. What had he ever done to deserve this? He supposed starving to death in a shithole you could leave wasn’t much better than starving to death in one you couldn’t, but at least he’d been able to try and change his situation before. That was his mistake, he mused absently, giving a breathless, mirthless chuckle. His only sin had been living, trying to survive. Had he gone back to his dad’s two-bit trailer and scraped up his pride off the floor for dinner instead, maybe this wouldn’t have happened to him. Hell, Lukas was better off than he was, and the man was a walking medicine cabinet if you were paying high enough. Why wasn’t Lukas tested? Or, maybe he had been. That Jigsaw guy was intent on cleaning up the under crust, and Lukas was as slimy as they came. Unbeknownst to him, David had been a player in his own game, just the same as he was, except for the thorny issue of him being the triplet that lived. David’s survival was the only thing holding Matt together, who pleaded and threatened God in equal measure to have his son returned to him. Much like an unimpressed Customer Service employee, God had deigned to do nothing but let him rant, so far. It almost hurt more that his dad might be holding out hope that he’d come out of this, but he would say it was a close second. This hurt like Hell. Whatever his stomach was saying, he’d almost forgotten the translation. Pain, sure, it hurt, but it always hurt. No matter how much writhing and pitching it did, it melted in with everything else that wore on him. Sleep was nonexistent for him, but there was occasionally a lull in the constant pounding of his head. Were his eyes ever even open, anymore? He could make out vague shapes but it didn’t really seem much different from when he closed his eyes again. A sudden rush of light plagued his tired eyes, and he blinked awake, lower jaw quivering slightly. “Adam, come on.” Lukas cried, and the eye roll could be heard in his voice as he slammed his elbow into the table, “Dad says we can’t eat if you don’t get your ass in gear, he’s gonna starve all of us because of you, lazy assh--” “Shut it, Lukas, don’t you have a ballet thing to be at for daughter number twelve?” Matt’s voice cut in, playful and sharp as a tack, and Adam felt a smile working onto his face. It turned to a full-on grin when his father could be heard smacking Lukas’ shoulder, “You watch your mouth. I’m your father.” “Pretty sure Adam’s the only one that matters to you. Davey and I’ll just have to go hungry.” “David’s a good kid, he can have as much KFC as he wants, too.” “KFC?” Adam heard himself before he could register that he’d spoken. His voice didn’t sound broken, it didn’t sound fractured or even quiet, it was just how it used to be. “The grilled shit?” “Yeah!” Lukas piped up again, peeking around the wall a little to give Adam a disapproving frown, “With mashed potatoes, macaroni, coleslaw, and biscuits. Get in here or I’m going to eat everything but the fucking slaw.” “You will not.” Matt snapped, before his voice turned soft and coaxing, “Adam, come on, baby boy. Got all your favorites.” “You did not,” Adam found himself giggling, elated at the idea that anyone would actually like coleslaw, “You got coleslaw, and not extra Mac.” “I know, kiddo, that’s the thing I got me that I know you brats won’t eat. Except maybe Tucker.” “Tucker eats coleslaw.” Specs supplied, already dishing out his plate of mashed potatoes, gravy and a single drumstick. “But he eats almost anything.” The mammoth of a man sat with his family around the coffee table in the dingy trailer he grew up in, on the floor because all of the chairs were too tall for him to still reach the table. Everyone was staring, expectant, as Adam shuffled in place in the hallway that lead to the bedrooms, biting his lip and feeling out of place. Was this even his family anymore? “Adam,” Matt’s tone took on a sugary sweet tone that had him wary, knowing he had probably done something wrong, “Come on, come eat. I know you’ve been struggling. You’re not in trouble, I’m your dad, I can do stuff like this for you guys now and again, even if you’re grown. Especially because you’re grown.” Acceptance seemed to wash over him in waves. Each step he took onto the thin carpet didn’t feel like anything, but he was moving forward, taking a spot between David and Specs on the couch. David offered a one-armed half-hug, and Specs barely tilted his head before demolishing his drumstick. Lukas shot him an expectant look but dug into the breast he’d pilfered from the bucket, eating enough that when Matt noticed, he didn’t do anything more than glare. “You know that’s--” “Adam’s, I know, I get it. We all know he’s your favorite.” Lukas groaned, “It’s weird to pick a favorite identical triplet but whatever.” “I don’t play fav--” “Dad,” Specs paused in his eating to look up, “You do, and it’s okay.” There was something in Adam’s hands. It didn’t feel like the greasy, delicious grilled chicken wing he’d picked up, it was soft, firm and bony. Cold, maybe, or just cool. It didn’t seem quite right, but he couldn’t exactly see anything wrong with it. Warmth blanketed his face as he took a bite, and something seemed to give. With a final sigh, everything melted away into nothingness, and he finally felt at peace. Matt never would get to see his son again without looking into the faces of the remaining triplets. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ AN: I forget why I started this, but this happened even more because of some shit happening in my life right now and I’m just…. Trying to keep going. This sort of helped but I’m also more anxious, now.

[lesbian-ed]

My girlfriend broke up with me two nights ago. She said she still loves me but she rushed into a relationship and needs time to “figure herself out”. She still wants to be friends and I don’t want to lose her in my life. She said she doesn’t want me to wait for her but once she figures everything out and we both still want it we could get back together. I don’t want to wait for her to want me again but it’s really hard to not feel that hope. There’s not a question here I just want some advice

Let me tell you right off that I’ve been in a painfully similarsituation, Anon, so that perhaps it soothes you to know that I speakfrom experience.

First off, this is a recent event. A two nights’difference is still very fresh and I imagine you’re still reelingfrom this development, so although I know you’re going to overlookit I’m going to say it anyway: try to stay calm. There’s no userunning up to her and grovelling and throwing yourself down beforeher in desperation; if she’s called for a time-off, if she said sheneeds some space and some time to think, you need to allow her asmuch. It’s already more positive than negative that both of youseem interested in continuing in one another’s lives regardless ofthe outcome (keep that in mind!) and it’s even better that she hashad the tact and the care to not expect you to wait on her. This far,despite the confusion and the emotions, you’re both actually doingvery well from the little info you’ve given.

On the other hand, the possibility left in the air iscertain to cause anguish. Even when that sort of hope it’s notgiven, break-ups that happen like this, seemingly out of the blue,tend to leave this aftertaste of ‘well, maybe not now, but someday!’ that can be more of a hindrance than a help precisely becausethere’s no telling when (or if) this day will come. Whichisn’t to say you should just abandon all hope and fall into thearms of the first woman that crosses your path – although, truth betold, this isn’t the sort of hope that will do you much good in thelong run either. Obviously, eachcase is its own case but, all in all, if a partner feels she needs tostep back for a bit, then she must, she will, and there is noguarantee whatsoever that she will step forth again despite whateversigns might spring up in this little unpredictable intermezzo.It’s good to not want towait on her, to decide that, if someone else shows up, if sparks fly,then you’re not obliged to pass up on the opportunity. You don’towe her your time in this aspect and neither should you – neitherof you, in honesty. Which is probably a weird thought, but also themost fair.

My personal advicewould be to focus on maintaining a line of contact, on keeping upwith the friendship and companionship you have since that is whatboth of you have in common in regards to this relationship right now;the affection is there, whichever nature it might have oneither side, and that’susually worth hanging on to. It might be painful some days (and if itgets overwhelming – and it might – you, too, have every right toask for some time and space for yourself) and it might seempointless, but that depends on point of view: it seems pointless ifyou’re looking at it as a hopeful partner, as a lovestruck womanwaiting for signs of reciprocation when in fact you should be lookingat it as a caring friend, an intimate acquaintance (considering howyou would like to keep her in your life, I’m guessing this is anangle that shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you). You’llboth have to work on remodelling barriers between yourselves, testingthe waters more or less constantly to figure out what’s morecomfortable for both of you in this moment as well as those to follow andyou’ll both need to do quite a strenuous effort to be mindful ofwhere you are at the moment, trying to recall what each of you feels – which, of course, becomes an easier task ifyou, as I said, maintain contact and keep communication open.

Now, since she’sgoing to ‘figure herself out’, it might be that she won’t knowvery well what to tell you about her feelings oreven what to say at all, soit’s best not to push too much. When I say there’s effortinvolved, it doesn’t mean spending the twenty-four hours of everyday worrying about this! The less you can worry,the better, really. Take the time she’s allotting to herself andgive yourself some of it, too. Take care of yourself, do things youenjoy, don’t let this situation eat at you or you willgo mad. I know it’s hard to avoid sleepless nights in the earlydays, but things will settle eventually and you have to allowyourself to seek that settlement. Thesilence and the distance don’t last forever if the intention toremain close is true, so seek comfort beingkind to your heart and feelings, but doing what you can to be moreof a realist than an optimist.

Sometimes even ourmost realistic approach will reveal some sort of overlyoptimistic view of a possibleoutcome and that’s fine, but the moment you anchor yourself to hopeand aching instead ofwhat you actually have in front of you, in the palm of your hand(which is to say the connection you two have), you’re feedingyourself to the lions and there will be more suffering in store foryou than what you can bear because you would be holding out for adream, for a desire, an ideainstead of what’s concrete, what’s real.Your mutual fondness exists, whereas the relationship you had in thestatus that it held does not – not for the moment, perhaps, but itis the moment that concerns us the most, not the past nor the future.Right now, this iswhat is going on, this is where you are.

And there’s noshame in that, there is noshame in experiencing thepain that comes along withthese things. You’reallowed to feel it, all the feelings that come along,as long as you don’t let them skewer what is – I repeat – real.If you have another friend who has your back, a confidante, I suggestyou open up to them. Not in search of suggestions or guidelines ofwhat to do now because, truly, nobody can tell you what to do or howto act (I myself cannot and if I am speaking in the imperative it isperhaps because I more or less imagine my youngerself in your shoes ratherthan wanting to impart my ‘wisdom’ for you to follow blindly),but just to be able to get things off your chest. Talking cansometimes be very helpful in organising our thoughts and feelings.If, however, you don’t have anyone you trust with yourvulnerabilities, I would suggest writing – which is perhaps an evenbetter medium to externalise what is going on inside you and makesense of it all. You don’t need to write beautifully, you don’tneed to keep it or show it to anyone, you don’t even need to followthrough with whatever decisions you might come up with in the act ofsetting down your mind to paper (I’m old school, pen and paper arepart of my craft; if typing is your thing, make sure to lock thefile, although I will always defend the greater cathartic power ofink on paper… But that’s up to you, and even so only if you tryyour hand at this!) you justneed to get it out.Even if you don’t know what ‘it’ is, you’ll probably needsome sort of escape valve, a means to give you relief through thesecircumstances.

Because it isn’teasy and I’ll tell you that however much we might cut off ouremotions and let our brains lead us forth in the aftermath of thissort of event, that hope rarely ever dies altogether. Since there isno actual closure, no definitive good-byes, hope lurks behind theeyes, it rests under the ribs, gets caught up in our throats, justready to pounce when the slightest hint of romantic love (orsomething we interpret that way) appears. And that’s not an easycurse to live with –

But it’s notimpossible or unbearable either. What you think of what happens,what you feel about it all will depend on your priorities, your wayof looking at life and your heart. I think that as long as you staytrue to yours and respect hers (and as long as she respects yours aswell!), things can find their way. Not their way back,mind, for there’snever a going back –but forwards, whether you do end up together in ten years’ time ornot.

As always, Ioverextend myselfand I apologise for yet another mammoth of an answer wherein youmight find nothing to help you. I hope some portion of it is useful,though; if you take anything out of it, let it be this: breathe. Livein the present as much as you can, ground yourself in the now andfocus onand celebrate what you have. You, individually, as well as what bothof you have together.Be mindful, be kind, be patient (with yourself!) and don’t try toswim against the current when it’s clearly going to overpower you –sometimes we need to let our weight follow the stream a bithaphazardly, to get detoured for a while in order to eventuallyget to the other side of the river.

It’s not the endof the world, Anon, even ifit seems that way at times.You’ll be fine whateverhappens. If nothing else, at the very least you’ll both have awonderful friendship in sometime and that is notsomething to throw away. Focuson the good you have (but likewise don’t be afraid to discardthings if they are no longer good).

All my love andsympathy to you.

/Mod T

[haydenandtrish]

Welcome to Paris, the grandest city in the world.

Remember everything that you have ever heard, now forget it all. Because the city we are about to tell you about is far greater than you will ever expect and more incredible than what anyone can ever describe. It has history. It has monument after monument. It has beauty and detail. It is the city of love. It is the city of lights. It is Paris.

Yes, it can be dirty, but it’s not from neglect. Yes, it’s a city proud to be French and yes, some may hate this, but a Parisians arrogance comes from a place of deep love and pride for their heritage. However, If you try, they will too.

All I can recommend for you to do is to allow yourself to get lost with an open mind and an appreciation for all things. We did. And what we discovered was incredible. Here, let us show you.

Montmartre

For accommodation, we stayed at the Le Mont Clair, a hostel in the 18th Arrondissement of Paris. This area is also known as the village of Montmartre, made famous by artists such and Vincent Van Gogh and Picasso, who both called it home at one point in time. Originally it was farmland for the peasants who were kicked out of the newly renovated Paris in the 1870’s - after a 17-year facelift. The redesign was commissioned by the then Emporer Napoleon III who declared Paris to be too small, too dirty, too overcrowded and too smelly. An already accomplished man of his time by the name of Barron Haussman was who the emperor tasked with the mammoth job. I will not get into the controversy that still surrounds the decision to completely change the city, but in my opinion, it was a necessary decision that helped stop the spread of diseases and added a new level of elegance that we now get to admire. An addition that set this renovation apart was the sewer system that was put in place then and is still used to this day. For a more in-depth description read here, it’s incredibly interesting how it all works.

The (not so) funny thing is, the people who were banished were the bodies who did the physical labour that transformed the city. Unfortunately, with over 20,000 buildings torn down, roads widened and a completely new sewage system put in place, there was no room left for them. So the rich stayed put and the poor were exiled to the lands just outside the main area. However, the city continued to grow and the space became a necessary area for more housing during an era where exponential growth was experienced. Now it is a beautiful addition on the outer skirts of Paris with much to see and do.

We explored Montmartre during our second day. what captivates us about this area - and all of Paris really - is that every single street is so innately beautiful with their detailed stone buildings and wrought iron balconies. Look up, you will not be disappointed.

I was also surprised at how up and down the cobblestone terrain was – so be prepared for that. From our hostel we walked directly up to a cafe called La Maison Rose - a walk filled with fantastic views along the way. We continued down some of the prettiest streets we had ever seen, all pink, green and white with vines covering the houses.

It seemed only fitting to stop into one of the many cafes and try the local cuisine in this eclectic part of town. We were seated and served and all we ordered was 6 garlic snails, a plate of fries, a beer and champagne. Like I’ve said before, we’re backpacking… so money mindfulness is necessary, but we still want to experience things. The verdict? To me they tasted like a garlicky oyster, Hayden agreed and says “I would only eat an oyster Kilpatrick and I would only eat a snail with garlic butter”. Fair enough.

We walked past many art galleries, and one artist we want to mention is Andre Martins De Barros. If we were not travelling for so long, I am positive we would have bought something. Being unable to take pictures of the artwork directly, we elected to take one of the artist’s website. So please feel free to check it out if you have the time, or better yet, if you are in the area visit the gallery. Here are two websites to check out his art: https://www.artmajeur.com/amartinsdebarros

http://amdbartiste.free.fr/  

Our walk led us to the Sacre – Coeur Basilica, a beautiful sanctuary sitting atop the hillock of Montmartre. We walked the 222 steps to the bottom and unfortunately, we didn’t escape unscathed. Hayden was haggled into spending 3 Euro on some cotton bracelet. Admittedly, it was pretty cool because the man used three pieces of string and made the bracelet right then and there. But the hagglers are a little full on and it was a waste of money – he’s still wearing it though.

The bottom of the steps led to a number of little side streets full of restaurants, shops and chocolate stores. We got a bargain on a Lindt chocolate bunny as it was just after Easter. We would highly recommend exploring this area, it’s simply a nice little touristy part of town.

Later that night we ventured out of the Montmartre area and visited the Eiffel Tower. The experience was so special to me, I want to leave that story for another time. All I will say here is every part of it was incredible and so worth my lifetime wait.

The Moulin Rouge is also located in this area. We will not give any spoilers away, instead, here’s the website, splurge on an activity and get prepared for the most tasteful, artistic, dreamy burlesque show you will ever see. I mean, you can’t really be surprised, it is the birthplace of burlesque after all. There are cheaper options around and although I haven’t seen them for myself, I cannot imagine them living up to the extravagance that is Moulin Rouge. We cannot recommend it enough.

There are so many things to see on this side of town so if you are up for it then most definitely make the hike to the 18th ARR, either on your own or with a tour guide. The tour company we went with during our last day also does one of the Montmartre area and if it’s anything like the one we experienced, I’m sure it will be worth the Euros. I will leave their details further down. For now, we’ll continue on to another area.

Champs Elysees

We were told by a lovely fellow traveller that on the 1stSunday of every month theChamps Elysees avenue is open only to pedestrians. Luckily enough, it happened to fall on the Sunday we were in town. Just like that, our plans were sorted. We headed off in the general direction of that avenue, with stops along the way of course.

The avenue its self is beautiful. Wide sidewalks path the way for a window shoppers dream. Glass lines the buildings, gold adorns the entrances and bellmen are ready to greet you at the front.

If you can ball then Avenue Montaigne may be the place for you. Every designer shop is somewhere down there. But just walking down it and appreciating the wealth was enough for us.

A few monuments we came across included: Palais Garnier (Le’Opera House) Just go see it, it is such an incredible building. And if you get to see a show there, I’m already jealous.

Arc de Triumph An arc that was commissioned at the beginning of the 1800’s and completed in 1836 is dedicated to the celebrations of Napoleon I great army. After each victory they would march into the city and straight under the arc, all the way to the kings palace (which is now the Louvre).

Luxor Obelisk An ancient Egyptian obelisk that is placed in the centre of Place de la Concorde - one of the most famous traffic circles in the world. The triangular shaped needle is said to date back 3,300 years and is one of the oldest monuments within Paris. 

We will note that on this day the main destination we had in the back of our minds was the Pantheon. Unfortunately, we never did make it there during our stay, we just kept getting sidetracked. The furthest we got was the Louvre, but I’ll address that further down because we visited it again during our tour. I cannot stress enough how huge Paris is and how much there is to see and learn about. There is so much much I know we still need to see, and I am positive Paris is a city we will always come and visit, so we have time to explore more in the future. For now, we will leave you with our last day. 

Sandeman’s New Europe: Free walking tour (tip based).

Here we are, our last day in Paris. We woke up, packed our bags and checked out. We left the big backpacks in storage at the hostel and set off for one last exploration. We were finally able to do our free walking tour and before we go any further please do this on the first day. You learn so much about the city - the best spots to see, the cheapest places to eat, you glimpse some of the best monuments to visit and if you are lucky, you’ll have a guide as incredible as ours.

His name was Dawie and I could sing his praises all day. He was the funniest, most informative tour guide I have ever come across and because of him, we have so much new knowledge about the history of Paris, from its small tribe beginnings to the grand city it is now, from the different monarchs to the different monuments. For three hours he kept us engaged and wanting more. He held little back while speaking about gruesome topics and painted an incredible picture in our minds of what Paris and it’s people have been through. A few things I cannot go without mentioning, please, do your research before proposing to your beloved at the Eiffel tower, if you know the history of its surrounding land then it isn’t the most romantic spot in the city. The lock bridge is no longer there, and it was only ever made famous from sex and the city. Just trust that you and your love will be together forever – a lock isn’t a necessity. It’s still the city of pickpockets so never let your guard down.

Now, where were we?

Ahhh the tour. We were able to see monuments such as the Notre Dame, the first pedestrian bridge ever built in the city, the original jail and courthouse plus so much more - all with a vivid description from our amazing guide. Finally, we finished at the Louvre.

Let me just say, it is not just a glass pyramid if that's what you are thinking. No, the Louvre is an art museum that has lived many different lives. It was first created to be a fortress for war in 1190. It was then reconstructed in the 16th century and became the Royal Palace. This explains its grand beauty. Each monarch believed that they were far greater than the last and could do everything better, so they would add their own touch. If you don’t know anything yourself, do a tour and have someone point out the distinguishing differences of each monarch, it’s awesome to see that every single detail has a back story. It was only made into an art museum in 1793 (18th century) with only 537 pieces of art. Now, centuries on, there are over 330, 000 pieces. If you want to see them all, all you have to do is visit the museum every single day for 100 days and view each piece for 30 seconds. Too easy.

Outside is just as beautiful. Of course, you are instantly drawn to the huge glass pyramid in the middle of the square. It’s one over the top front door that’s for sure. But like our tour guide told us, just get that damn tourist picture! Don’t snidely look at others who look ridiculous in person trying to get that famous tourist shot and not get amongst it yourself. You will look back in your Paris photo album and notice that photo of you pinching the top of the pyramid in the Louvre is missing. And you’ll be sorry for it. I am so glad we did ours, I laugh every time I look at it because it’s a classic, and it could be one of my personal favs in our collection.

So, my advice to you (in the Louvre and in life) is this, don’t stand on the outside feeling too cool to do it but secretly wishing you were. Maybe Nike’s on to something because…JUST DO IT. Get in there, get that photo, talk to that stranger, dance in that circle, smile at that person making eye contact with you. Stop shouldering life away because you’ll find yourself watching others living theirs instead of being immersed in your own. You hear it all the time but until you lower your ego and let yourself be free, are you truly experiencing everything that comes your way? I was once that person who stood on the sidelines and judged, now this is my mantra every day and I’m so happy because of it. I have that photo, I danced in that circle, I made friends with that stranger and I’m living my best damn life every single day.

Anyway, inspirational rant over.

Here’s our tip for taking the perfect illusion shot: Hold your arm straight and at an angle. Move the camera, not your arm! Life will be a whole lot easier. You’re welcome.

After you get your picture, wander through the incredible Tuileries Gardens (located in between the Louvre and Place de la Concorde). It seems like the perfect park to enjoy a bottle of seasonal wine, cheese and a baguette. Walk through the hedge mazes, admire the countless statues, see the artists painting their own vision. It is all so breathtaking.

So go visit and fall in love, with the city, with its monuments, with its history and with its art. If it’s a once in a lifetime trip then give yourself a week. Otherwise, be sure to revisit it. We will, maybe we’ll even see you there one day.

The rest of our day will be in our next blog, where we tell you about our first ever overnight journey… or should we say first two? So, for now, this is goodbye.

Always with love,  Trish.

[purple-xxo-stuff-blog]

Teenage Drama-chapter1

The teenage years blossom when we are thirteen to be exact. The suffix 'teen' that had been there with the number 13 now finally finds a purpose in it's life-the purpose to destroy ours.  That one suffix welcomes you to a world of misery and hormones, feelings that you never knew existed before, the extra inches in your body, the mammoth voice you discover one morning that comes out of your vocal cords, the clothes that aren't fitting anymore and everything else that makes us wanna tug in under a blanket and go back to childhood. If only that was possible.Notice one thing that remains constant in all these sudden occurences in our lives- CHANGE. Yes,changes of all kinds, sudden and unfiltered. And believe me changes are never good, especially when you're bidding adieu to literally the best part of your lives. Do you know why changes suck? Because it drags us out of our comfort zones, and makes us accustom ourselves to new ways and patterns.But why are these things necessary? Just imagine,you are sleeping in your most comfortable pj's in your own bed, and watching a fascinating dream , and just when it's about to reach it's climax,someone drags you out of your bed, wakes you up and offers you breakfast. How would you feel,especially when the dream was damn intriguing, and the breakfast,though it looks scrumptious,is horrible to taste? You'd feel deceived and angry, and ask your waker was it worth waking you up for a meal this tasty?What was the point? There's no point.So childhood,is exactly like the third stage of sleep and watching a vivid ,beautiful dream. Adolescence is waking you up to have breakfast, which might delight you in the beginning, but tastes like burnt gravel in your mouth. You've always wanted to grow up, but you realize growing up is one of the worst things ever,only after you've grown up. During the teenage years,you're mostly preoccupied with so much confusion, by the time you shut your jaw that was opened by looking at what was becoming of you and your life,teenage is over. And in your twentieth year,you've finally completed your exile and you feel like the most knowledgable person in the world. Me being one of them, have come to bestow my blessings through this platform. You're welcome!

Now, the changes that happen to you, are not so subtle.Especially the ones occuring in your body. The skinny,fit teenager now suddenly gains weight. For girls the chest grows bigger and lumpier, also known as breasts. Most girl's don't get accustomed to such a change in the begining,and invite a new change in their lives-being ashamed of your own body. I went through that when I was thirteen. I was a really skinny girl,underweight, but I kind of liked how I looked. From age eleven, I started experiencing a bit of soreness in my then chestal area. That soreness didn't disappear overnight,but remained for another four years. When I was thirteen, I already had well-formed breasts and I was disgusted of them. This forced sexuality was unwelcomed. Everyday, before school, I made sure I had several layers of cloth under my shirt to even the platform. It was hot and sultry, yet I had to survive with eight thin inner tank tops under my shirt. You can't believe how weird I looked. I was ashamed of my body, but those were the beginning years of my teenage, and I went out of my comfort zone to appease the soceity in my head, and today I still watch girls my age going out of their comfort zones to appease the soceity for real. Weird, huh?There are internal changes in our bodies too. Now whatever you eat, adds up a layer of fat in your body. Metabolism decides a pace it wants to continue moving in, and oh! your period begins.Our mentrual cycles are always celebrated with an array of god-damning painful cramps , and the stains that occur on your lower clothes no matter what you do.    

At this age, girls don't really get why she needs to bleed every month, and neither do guys. The guys I am talking about ,are a bunch of kids, who find it extremely hilarious to see a stain behind a skirt. They whisper into each other's ears and laugh, yet they don't know why they are whispering. "Hey,did you see Arya's skirt?She messed up""Yeah dude, I did. What a clumsy girl . Didn't she realise we can see her clothes?'"Lol dude,yeah. I mean who sits on a pile of mud during school hours?""Dude,I think she fell, lol"This is an actual conversation I once witnessed. You can laugh, if you want, but find something better than laughing at your own imagination for god's sakes.

To be honest,guys don't have it easy either. I am not a guy, and this information is mostly abridged from science books. Imagine waking up one morning and as you call your mom to get you something, you don't recognize your own voice. There's this crude , deep cracked voice that's coming out of you. You go to school and you see a guy you are not really friends with,because he is a bit annoying. Today, you can't believe how annoying he feels to you,all of a sudden. Why is he so stupid, and his stupidity is bothering you way more than it is bothering him. He doesn't have the right to be so stupid, and as you think of these words, you feel blood rushing through your veins. You feel a sudden rage, and also a sudden power,that you,once and for all can demolish his stupidity from the core, and the means to do that is a punch right across the guy's face for no apparent reason. You feel powerful,a skinny boy with a voice of god and the strength of superman. You go,guy!The world is but a dust at your feet.

Now I am not saying girl's don't gossip either. Actually this is the age girls learn how to gossip,and the sweet ecstacy of bitching about someone at their back. This revelation changes their whole world. They are going through changes which are massive in regards to their bodies and minds, and they need,need to talk about how Lyra looks like a dork in her round glasses. In this ocean of utter confusion, gossiping becomes a girl's true power, that makes them feel powerful and better than the others. You're not, you're in the same pile of crap that nerd Lyra is, and trimming her nails or styling her hair won't make her any better either. You have better hair, it hasn't worked for you too.Surpise!

There's so much change in our lives during this time. The changes hit us hard because we aren't prepared for it. What looks like a cool,windy evening,turns out to be a tornado. And when a tornado hits, nothing is discriminated on basis of their condition. The seven years of our lives,roughly,are difficult, and in this quagmire,nothing is under bounds. You have to accept everything that is happening,and everything you are becoming. Prepare ,accept, and enjoy. Even if it is a mortifying roller coaster,doesn't mean you can't let go and scream,yet also enjoy the ride. After all,you paid for it! -Purple

[tastesoftamriel]

do you have a list of salty snacks of tamriel, this one rather enjoys a generous amount of salt in his munches

I love my salty snacks too, so compiling this list was surprisingly difficult...after all, how can there just be one favourite when there's all of Tamriel to cover?

Altmer

If you've not tried puffed rice crackers before, you're in for a treat! Light but crisp, dusted with sea salt, and sometimes flavoured with herbs and spices like dill or thyme, these thin crackers are delightful to snack on. Best of all, they're baked rather than fried, so they're not particularly bad for your health either!

Argonians

Corn and saltrice chips are the quintessential Argonian snack, which are either fried in hot oil or baked on hot stones. While they're traditionally used for dipping in curries and soups, nothing's stopping you from eating a whole handful! I really enjoy mine seasoned with a mix of lime, coriander, chili flakes, and lots of sea salt.

Bosmer

Aside from jerky, the Bosmer are known for producing amazing little bites of air-puffed timber mammoth cheese, which are perfect for nibbling on! These surprisingly light and crunchy snacks are delightfully savoury, and made entirely from small chunks of real timber mammoth cheese. Great with a cup of jagga, or just for some good old mindless munching. If you're not a Green Pact adherent, they're also delicious when dipped in maple syrup!

Bretons

Nothing hits the spot quite like the classic crunchy salted pretzels of High Rock for me. These bite-sized snacks are a lot less unwieldy than the enormous bread-like pretzels they're inspired by, and are perfect for munching on. I especially like dipping mine in melted cheese sauce, just to up the naughty factor a bit...

Dunmer

Baked scrib snacks are a Dark Elf favourite, and these little balls of bug meat are rolled in seasoned saltrice powder. Popular flavours include smoked saltrice, scuttle, ash yam, and curry, but plain salted scrib snacks are always a classic hit.

Imperials

Growing up, my mother was the queen of Cyrodiilic dough balls: fluffy on the inside and crisp on the outside, fresh and hot from the cauldron. While these balls are generally served plain and are naturally salted, some Imperials like theirs stuffed or rolled with parmesan, herbs, and even truffle oil if you're feeling particularly fancy.

Khajiit

Not a day goes by without me wistfully dreaming about the crispy mushroom chips of Reaper's March. Small slices of mushroom are rolled in a tasty salty batter flavoured with lard and beef liver, and deep fried until crispy. Other variants include sweet-and-salty, made with a blend of moon sugar and rock salt, or spicy paprika and cumin.

Nords

Puffed wheat and smoked nut clusters held together with a mix of powdered goat cheese, salt, and herbs are a Nord snacking staple. These simple but tasty treats are great for any time of day, and pair well with mead (the hallmark of any great savoury snack).

Orcs

Crunchy root vegetable chips served by the cauldron are everyone's favourite, whether they're seasoned with cheese and onion or salt and pepper! Thinly sliced root vegetables, like potatoes, carrots, parsnips, and beets are deep fried until crisp, then tossed in a savoury seasoning. You can't go wrong with plain rock salt, but I like mine with a good amount of målt vinegar for extra kick.

Redguards

Tiny samosas filled with curried potato are a must-try for anyone travelling to Hammerfell. These snacks are basically scaled-down versions of regular samosas, and are favoured as party snacks for platters. Usually served with a mild or savoury yoghurt dip, they're a delight for anyone who loves their salty snacks with a bit of a spicy punch.

[livinginlandmarketing]

In late January, Mammoth Mountain was hit with more than 100 inches of snow just as Gov. Gavin Newsom lifted the latest stay-at-home order.

And, while the fresh powder beckoned cooped-up eager skiers and riders, it also was a pivotal lesson in how resort officials would navigate this year’s season amid tight COVID-19 restrictions while still providing a fun place to enjoy the outdoor winter wonderland in the High Sierra. The resort opened on Nov. 13, after the longest off-season in its history.

“It was quite a weekend,” said Stacey Cook, who heads up the mountain’s newly created COVID-19 Enforcement Team. “The storm kept building in the forecast and at the same time, we saw the stay-at-home order being lifted. It was the perfect storm.”

Crowds began forming at the few open lifts across the vast mountain and wait times stretched to as long as 55 minutes. Access to the mountain was limited to IKON pass holders and advance paid ticket sales. By that weekend, resort officials announced the mountain was “sold out.”

“Everyone showed up all at once,” Cook said. “We wanted to make sure we had safe operations and waited until ski patrol finished their avalanche blasts. I don’t know if any communication would have suppressed the guests’ stoke.”

Then, two weeks later, the mountain got some more fresh powder with about 18 more inches. Skiing conditions were much better and the mountain opened a lot sooner. The next fresh snowfall is expected Wednesday, March 10 and the mountain is expected to provide skiing and riding until at least Memorial Day. The summit now has 224 inches and Main Lodge has 184 inches.

To keep its guests safe, Mammoth Mountain has invested $1 million in COVID-19-related resort enhancements. This includes new technologies and sanitization procedures to help with physical distancing and public health and to reduce contact points throughout the resort.

Skiers and boarders wait in lift lines near Canyon Lodge, where COVID-19 restrictions are in place. (Photo by Erika Ritchie, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Skiing in the COVID era

That late January weekend was eye-opening as crowds began forming at the lift lines. Masks are required indoors, in lift lines and on lifts, in gondolas, shuttles, and when social distancing with others outside who are not part of your travel group.

Cook’s team members — dressed in orange vests — were on hand to make sure guests had their noses and mouths covered and that kept a 6-foot distance. Bandanas and gaiters are already part of many skiers or riders’ gear, so that part wasn’t that difficult, officials said.

But, some who tried to grab a sip of a beverage or maybe cool down after an exhilarating run and pulled down their face coverings were quickly and politely addressed.

“A lot of it is observation and talking to guests,” Cook said. “How do we make them believe what we’re doing is necessary? We’re constantly battling the misconception of being outside without a mask is OK.”

Chris Dahl, a lift operator who is on Cook’s team, brought an unusual amount of enthusiasm to the waiting lines at Chair 5. He’s found a way to make COVID-compliance fun by bringing a sort of entertainment to the crowd.

“It’s almost a whole year into the pandemic and I can see a lot of people are pretty tired of it,” said Dahl, of Fullerton, who is working his first season on the mountain. “I take that attitude because it helps make my experience more fun. I think people gravitate towards it because they’re also excited about being on the mountain and they want someone to share the energy with.”

Since the first storm, Dahl said he gets a good level of compliance but sees better cooperation from California residents than those who come to Mammoth from out-of-state.

The lift lines are distanced. For skiers, that isn’t too hard; it means lining up tail-to-tail and, for some, including just about one more foot of separation.

“We do get some people who squeeze up tight,” Cook said.

The late January storm showed Cook and her team how to get ahead of the game. In some cases, that meant opening lifts earlier and getting ahead of any crowds forming by the beginning of the day.

“That weekend, we were never able to get people spaced out.”

The COVID team works with mountain hosts — part-time workers and local volunteers dressed in yellow vests — to advise skiers and riders where to go on the mountain.

Three-step enforcement

While the majority of guests comply with the COVID protocols, Cook said some balk. But, the mountain has a three-step plan for non-compliance. Many times the mistakes are innocent and people have either forgotten or aren’t aware.

“We correct the mistake and we’re nice about it,” Cook said. The second time it happens, we educate them on why it’s important and how we’d like to keep the mountain open. The third time, corrective action is taken; it’s noted in their profile.”

Each guest has a profile whether they are an IKON Pass holder or not. A first warning is noted in the profile. The second time non-compliance happens, their ski pass is turned off for a week. If it happens a third time, the pass is revoked for the season.

Cook said a lot of notes have been made in profiles and more than a dozen passes have been revoked so far this season.

COVID protocols have also affected the Panorama gondola that travels to the summit. It no longer picks passengers up at McCoy Station at mid-mountain. Those who ride must board at Main Lodge where capacity is limited to single households. The Village Gondola — which runs from Canyon Lodge to the Village at Mammoth — limits capacity to 25% with open windows, even in inclement weather. Seating is arranged to ensure a six-foot distance between people from different households.

If you want to get more proficient at taking turns, ski and board lessons are private to ensure only people within a household are placed together.

Mammoth Mountain basking in sunlight after a recent storm. (Photo by Christian Pondella, Mammoth Mountain)

Lodges and après-ski

And, with the restrictions on the mountain, there are similar safety measures being taken at all of the resorts’ lodges.

Hand washing and sanitizing stations are placed throughout lodges at the resort. Places like railings, bathrooms, door handles, tables and chairs are being disinfected regularly.

Guests will miss some of the traditional ski getaway fun like eating hearty breakfasts and lunches inside lodges, having a place to warm up a shivering child with hot cocoa and the ever-popular and expected après-ski at some of the mountains’ bars and restaurants.

While the lodges aren’t open to gather, there is plenty of outdoor seating where visitors can enjoy takeout food and drinks. The mountain also has opportunities for advanced ordering and pickup options through the Mammoth Mobile App. There are also pop-ups on the mountain where guests can pick up drinks and snacks.

At Canyon Lodge, for example, the ever-popular Canyon Beach has been a place to hang out socially distanced while relishing the pure joy of a bluebird ski day. At Main Lodge, there’s plenty of space on the sun decks outside with views to the mountain’s famed Unbound Terrain Parks.

“It’s not the same experience, but it’s still a good experience,” Cook said. “Have a plan to grocery shop or eat lunch in your car. Call and ask questions, look on our website and don’t come unprepared. Our employees don’t want to be the police. This is a place to be kind and enjoy life. Show up with an attitude of fun and patience.”

In Mammoth Lakes, all restaurants are open for outdoor dining, takeout and delivery.

The best place for a fun après-ski is likely your lodging. If you need to stock up for groceries and want to avoid large groups and long lines, avoid times between 3 and 10 p.m., especially on Friday and Saturday.

While COVID may have changed some of the experience, Mammoth’s terrain remains amazing. The wide-open bowls, steep canyons and long groomers are there to welcome eager skiers and boarders back. Here are some of the best ski runs that just may make you feel “normal” again.

A skier is covered in powder on Mammoth Mountain. (Photo by Peter Morning, Mammoth Mountain Ski Area)

EXPERT

Hangman’s Hollow: Perched near the summit of Mammoth and accessed by the gondola, Hangman’s Hollow is an adrenaline junkie’s dream. Large rock faces and drops take you through the “hollow” and into a powdery landing. This run requires skill and bravery.

Climax: Towering just below the gondola, Climax is a steep, daunting run that provides some of the best turns on the mountain. Drop over the edge and get buttery turns. Funnel through a few chutes; then it’s back to wide, fun slashes to the bottom. Don’t fall because you’ll have an audience watching from the gondolas above.

Dropout Chutes: The Dropout Chutes, which take skiers right under Chair 23, are filled with some of the best snow on the mountain because they capture the Mammoth “wind buff.” Skiers and riders pass by large rock formations in a tight chute and then hit wide, long, grin-inducing turns that are hard to beat.

West Bowl: Some of the best “first tracks” on the mountain on a powder day. On an average day, it can be a technical mogul field. Accessed from Face Lift Express, West Bowl requires a slightly technical traverse to drop in; then it’s a wide-open bowl, usually all to yourself.

Paranoid Flats: The “Noids,” as locals call them, may not feature the rocky chutes of some other double black trails, but they are steep, fast and require a little finesse to access. Whether you choose 1, 2, 3 or 4, Paranoids give a run of a lifetime when they’re hit right.

Avalanche Chutes: Off Lincoln Mountain and Chair 22, the “Avy Chutes” are a ton of fun for advanced skiers or riders — especially after a storm. Chair 22 is an option when the top of the mountain is closed. You can get fresh, steep tracks while snow falls. The chutes collect a lot of snow, and a short hike takes you over to a choice of three.

Boarders cruise groomed runs above Canyon Lodge. (Photo by Erika Ritchie, Orange County Register/SCNG)

INTERMEDIATE

Road Runner: Road Runner takes skiers and riders on a scenic 3-mile tour of the backside, all the way back to Main Lodge. The views of the Minaret Range will take your breath away, but don’t get too distracted — there’s a steep dropoff on your side.

Stump Alley: It’s a misleading name. Stump Alley is actually a wide treeless run with tons of space to work on turns. With just enough pitch to pick up some acceleration, you can carve down at full speed and treat yourself to some pulled pork nachos at The Mill at the bottom. This tame blue run has varying conditions and can be confidence-inspiring.

Solitude: Taking you from the top to the bottom of High Five Express, Solitude is fun and wide. If you’re feeling adventurous, the left of the run is lined with trees you can cut between and find hidden pockets of powder. Just make sure you don’t cut through the trees completely, or you’ll find yourself going down the more advanced Face of Five trail. Solitude is the perfect practice for making turns down steeper terrain or to get comfortable picking up downhill speed.

Gold Hill: Starts off at the top of Cloud Nine Express, which is known for having some of the best snow after a storm. Gold Hill definitely provides that for the intermediate skier or rider. It’s a long run with tons of fun side hits, tree runs and powder stashes.

White Bark Ridge: If you’re looking for a relaxed run off the backside of Mammoth, head over to Chair 12 or 13 and take some laps on White Bark Ridge. Shorter than Road Runner, White Bark Ridge provides amazing views and is less of a thigh burner.

A view of The Minarets — a series of jagged peaks — visible from Chair 16 on Mammoth Mountain. (Photo by Erika Ritchie, Orange County Register/SCNG)

BEGINNER

Sesame Street: If you’re at Main Lodge, Sesame Street can be a good place to build confidence on the slopes. It’s an easy run with access to beginner freestyle terrain. Sesame Street has some of the best views of the top of the mountain to give you something to work toward.

School Yard: Out of Canyon Lodge, head to School Yard to learn your heel from your toe turns. School Yard is a long, easy beginner run that is a perfect place for all age levels.

Pumpkin: Out of Eagle Lodge, Pumpkin is a long, mellow run perfect for beginners to get comfortable on the snow. Often with fewer crowds than other beginner runs, Pumpkin has space to learn how to nail your turns.

Wonderland Playground: This is the perfect space to learn and get comfortable in the park, whether you’re new to freestyle terrain or just looking to have some fun. With small jumps, ride-on boxes and rails and an 11-foot halfpipe, this is the place to start your park progression to the big leagues.

St. Moritz: If you’re feeling comfortable on the beginner slopes but aren’t quite ready to make the jump to an intermediate run, check out St. Moritz. Take the Panorama Gondola to McCoy Station and make your way down the wide, mellow beginning of Stump Alley toward the top of Forest Trail. St. Moritz is an advanced beginner run that takes you back to Main Lodge and allows you to gain more confidence on the mountain before hitting intermediate runs.

  -on March 05, 2021 at 01:36AM by Erika I. Ritchie

[the-forest-library]

2017 BEST HAPPENINGS TAG

Every year on tumblr I see loads of posts about how sucky the year was - and you know sometimes they’re not wrong but I’m not going to forget the good things either.  

I was tagged by @lizziethereader, @bvkspine, @onceuponabookblr, @lilymaidofgallifrey. Thank you! 

Here are some highlights of my year:

March: Birthday! Celebrated with dinner out with friends at a lovely restaurant, and made a nice dinner at home on the day of. Received some wonderful books. @bookcub promise I’m going to read The Name of the Wind before my next birthday!

May: Trip to Texas for a friend’s wedding. I had never been to Texas before and did so many things! We went to Waco Mammoth National Monument, toured cool literary bars in Austin, visited so many history sites, and tried Whataburger for the first time. And completely by coincidence, got to see Elizabeth Wein speak on The Pearl Thief tour. 

June: Read Black Beauty and fell in love. Saw Wonder Woman and fell in love. 

July: Saw The Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare in the Park!

August: I got to pet a horse, and it was the coolest thing ever! Still obsessed with horses after reading Black Beauty, I took advantage of a nice day and visited a local farm, which had the sweetest horse with the kindest eyes and softest nose. 

September: Met some furry friends on my walks after work. I love taking walks in the fall because the woodland creatures seem to be out and active more. 

October: I made my first cross stitch project ever - a bookmark! Saw Maggie Stiefvater on the All the Crooked Saints tour, and visited the gorgeous Detroit Public Library for the first time. 

Other happenings: 

Discovered my love for chick peas which I eat all of the time now!

Found a new favorite Thai restaurant!

Placed second in a salsa competition at work!

Thanks to @all-these-paperback-dreams discovered the Books of Pellinor and read them all this year. So many pages. So many wonderful descriptions of food! 

Read so many other great books!

I’m not going to tag anyone because honestly, this was a lot to put together, but if you’re inspired to do it, please tag me!

[whitechrysanthemumsandlilies]

Taking Bomb Ass Notes on a Budget

Yes I am a Capricorn 

Not all of us can afford the top of the range stationary of our dreams and with Enrolment day for colleges in the UK fast approaching, I thought Id share a comprehensive guide on everything I’ve learnt on how to make and take successful notes and how to get the grades you want on a low income budget.

Be warned: This post is mammoth.  

A plan of 3 phases. 

Phase 1- Pre School year

1.1- Gather supplies 

For this to work, you need only the bare necessities- coloured pens/pencils, a ballpoint/gel pen, a 5 pack of highlighters (in place of midliners), and 2 notebooks (In Class and At Home)

In Class notebooks- Your In Class notebook is for scruffy notes taken on the fly. All these notebooks need is a lot of pages and a flexible margin. I recommend the metallic, geometric, spiral bound notebooks from Poundland for this. They’re simple but surprisingly good quality for a £1 product, the pages dont even bleed!

At Home notebooks- This is where the actual fun lies. At Home notebooks are the notebooks you use for your studyblr posts when you slip up and procrastinate an hour into your studies (we’re all human). Anything that gets you excited to rewrite your notes is good for this (re-writing your notes not only means you’ll be allowed bragging rights because you’re technically revising every night, you can sneak in the formatting and extra info you need without compromising on your note taking time in class)

Coloured pens/pencils/highlighters and a pen- These are pretty obvious supplies, used for the AH notebook’s colour coding and general decoration. The type of pens you use depends on how much your notebook pages bleed. Some recommendations I have are- 0.3mm assorted colour fine liners from The Works (The colours are great and they don’t bleed as much as other budget brands), the 20 pack of ballpoint pens from ASDA, and the 5 pack of highlighters from EITHER The Works or WHSmith if there’s a Back to School sale on.

1.2- Learn how you learn

This is possibly the most important step of all, you need to figure out how you can best take notes for your brain, i.e- what type of learner are you? This will greatly dictate how you format your AH notebook since different learners access different content to help them memorise, for example- a visual learner should fill their pages with arrows, diagrams and colour but a auditory learner would be better off writing summaries of their notes in the form of a speech to speak aloud later on. 

(See x for a free quiz to determine your learning type :) )

1.3- Format your notebooks 

Hannah Witton has a philosophy that if you’re spending more time on the organisation than actually executing your plan, you’re being inefficient. This step is to ensue you don’t fall into that habit. Formatting your notebooks before you start school means you have a pre-prepared resource that you can work straight onto, cutting the time you need to spend on your school work. Also its super fun! There are a few basic pages you need in both notebooks before you seize total creative freedom. 

In Class- Really the only thing you need here is a Key page (see bottom of the section for an example) and a footnote at the bottom of your note pages to put the textbook reference in (this’ll save you so much time when you revise for tests and wanna expand on your notes honestly just so it, its worth it in the end)

At Home- Since this is a more traditional BuJo, you need a few more pages- A Key, a Index/Contents page and more heavily formatted pages (Ideally: A header (for the chapter name), a title (page contents/subject) and a footnote (revision guide reference))

For my Key, I like to include the colour code system (e.g- red for key vocab) and symbols for stuff like ‘needs more info’ and ‘info found’, relevant context ext. In my Index I like to break by chapter and then mini units (like how this is set out) but that’s a personal decision, that may or may not be how you choose to do it! I also like to include a Grade Tracker as a motivational tool but, again, you may decide against that. 

P.S- For my note pages, I like to include a 2cm margin in which I can jot down symbols and colours without interrupting the flow of the page. Do with that what you will

1.4- Create a study space

The problem a lot of us have is procrastination and a catalyst for that is distraction. You’re never going to be able to focus sat on your bed near your phone and laptop with WiFi as well as you will in an environment where those distractions are removed (That’s why coffee shops and libraries are so popular!) Creating an environment that you associate productivity with can help to focus you on your task. 

Study spaces dont have to be extravagant. Even if its just a chair and a desk in the corner of your room with a plug, a nice cushion, and a pencil pot. As long as it separates work and play, it will be more than enough for your studies. 

Personal preferences will change the layout and atmosphere of your study space (e.g- background music or no background music, relaxed or stimulating, personal or detached) but I do recommend looking at the psychology of colour and doing some introspection to decide what will and will not work for you.   

Phase 2- Study schedule

Once you’re back studying, you need to implement a schedule that’ll guarantee you stick to all the planning you did in phase 1 as opposed to having it sit there looking idyllic while you procrastinate by binge watching Stranger Things for the 9th time this month. 

Obviously from 08:30am to around 15:30pm you’re out of your house and away from your study space, even longer if you travel via public transport, and unless you’re the worlds biggest morning person I wouldn't recommend studying from 06:00am unless its desperate cramming before a big exam SO that leaves the evenings. 

A big mistake a lot of people make is taking a break before starting to study. This is the worst thing you can do, you know how the brain resets when you enter a new environment? Think of it like that. Once you sit on that sofa and watch some TV or start to scroll through Instagram, you’re not gonna want to move. 

As soon as you get in, grab a big drink of water and a small snack and head up to your study space (it sounds painful and will be at first but as soon as it becomes a habit you’re gonna be much better off) I recommend devoting from 16:00pm to 18:00pm to studying, allowing time for you to make a dent on the piles of homework you’re definitely going to get without creating an antisocial and impractical eating schedule. Two hours is more than enough time to rewrite up to 4 subjects worth of notes (consolidating your knowledge and adding in any extra info “class you” wanted you to find) and to start on up to 4 subjects of homework, even if its 20 minutes for each task with a 5 minute break in between. 

Those of you who work, like me, will have to negotiate this weekly to make sure you can slot the time in around your shifts, not forgetting weekends can be optimised as well. On weekends, operate on the basis of Hannah Witton’s schedule (my organisational mom)- The day is split into three segments, Morning, Afternoon, and Evening, work at a 2:1 ratio of Work:Play (unless you work weekends, also like me, in which case just aim to optimise the time you have left wisely while also not overworking yourself)

Additionally, make use of study periods!! If you know you have a study period that day, take one of your AH notebooks with you (I recommend the one you have the most notes for) and get ahead of time OR do your homework in the period so you only have to do your notes at home. Snatch up every bit of free home time you can! Its important to be allowing with yourself during this time, you’ll be doing heavy studying and while it is important to complete your tasks and not make excuses for not doing something, its equally important to relax and wind down and see friends because not doing so impacts greatly on your mental health and you come first!

It can be helpful to make study groups (as long as they’re used for actually studying) or meeting up with friends and studying together in order to get that interaction and escape from the stresses of student life. Having other students there means they can offer insight on any questions you have as well as being there as moral support, even if its just to compare notes with or to be talked to&at while revising. This is especially true near finals week and end of year tests, which leads me on to...

Phase 3- Revision 

So you’ve got your selection of notes that you spent hours slaving over and you’ve got a perfect track record because of how efficient you were with your homework, what now?

Revising, much like this post, works in a rule of 3 trials- Reading, Creating, Applying (Id like to take a moment to thank my GCSE Geography teacher for this golden method of planning that I did not use but ShOUD HAvE) 

Reading- 1 month (per subject). From start to finish, cover to cover, read your notes. Since they already include the relevant bits from the workbooks and revision guides, they are a vault of everything you need to know. Reading them in their entirety will refresh your memory of the stuff you forgot and allow you to see the subject as a whole, a perspective you might not have had previously since you were still learning it.

Creating- 2 months. Using what you’d forgotten, create resources (mind maps, flashcards, presentations, speeches) for you to revise from. This can be in the notebook or separate (I like to have them separate but that’s just me) just as long as they make sense for the learning style we talked about earlier.  Use the resources and memorise them.

Applying- 4 months. Once you think you’ve done memorising, find past exam questions and papers  and do them. Mark yourself (on the harsher side, just to be safe) and then check your grade. If you’re dissatisfied, go to the questions you didn't do well on, figure out what concept it was based on, re-revise it and find another question to try (repeat until happy) If satisfied, find harder and harder questions until you run out of material then get friends to make some for you OR think of the worst possible question you could get and then create it, answer it and mark it. Do this until exams happen or you feel like you’ve done enough. 

Once you’ve finished the Applying phase, create a A4 page of max. 10 bullet points (for each exam) to peruse up until you enter the exam hall (bin it before you enter) then go in and kick ass!

A really good tool for this is GetRevising, a free site which helps you make study timetables and gives you thousands of pre-prepared resources (made by teachers and students) specified to your exam boards and subjects. Not spon i just fcking love GetRevising

If you do all this, you should find the work and stress load of studying greatly reduced and it’ll give you more than a fighting chance against the generation of harder exams that they’ve sprung on us.

Go fourth and get good grades babes. 

All graphics were made with Canva

[bluethepaladin]

so im like super excited to meet the aliens in ur next chap of when i dream it happens in blue. ur like so smart in science and stuff. what about the science of aliens? is that a thing? how do u make urs? do u know anything about it?

Thank you, dear anon, for this ask about life. Also thank you for reading when I dream it happens in blue. I’ve gotten overwhelming support on this fic and I am just blown away by how much you all love it.  I was honestly waiting for an ask like this because I love aliens and creating alien societies. Also, thank you for being patient with me as I get around to answering these asks.

Basics of Life

So first of all, when considering life in any discussion, I am going to make the fundamental assumption that advanced life-forms must either evolve from more primitive life forms, or they must be created by other advanced organisms that already did so. Therefore you can’t have humans or alien counterparts on some other planet without a whole web of interdependent plants and animals that surround them, and a whole chain of ancestors that led from a raw plant to an ecosystem. There might be a hypothetical exception to this rule, maybe on a planet where one life-form has wiped out all other natural life forms, but how that happens is up to your creative exploits.

When we think about life and how it develops, we have to draw from the only example we know of where it happened, aka. Earth. And as we have no eyewitness accounts for how this happened we are again forced to heavily rely on inferences and experiments that have been widely regarded as accurate within the scientific community.

But what’s even worse for us writers is that we have no actual scientific evidence of how typical what happened on Earth actually is! But since it’s all we have we just gotta work with it. But keep this in mind! (It’s actually pretty cool to think about, too) At first glance, it seems like our little planet offers an enormous range of life-forms all so obviously different that one might suspect them of representing a large sample of independent instances. Earthly life-forms include protius bacteria, komodo dragons, octopus, cacti, antelope, hummingbirds, coral reefs, orcas, redwood trees, and us–just to name a very, very few. Seems pretty diverse, right? Especially when you consider there are lichens that grow in the frigid wastelands of Antarctica, and fish living in hot springs that would cook a regular fish. If we take into account all flora and fauna that have ever existed, well that includes things like the stegosaurus, ammonoidea, mammoths, and giant dragonflies, the sample gets even bigger. Surely, surely this is a diverse lot, but if we look at them at a fundamental level, they are all so similar they are in all likelihood products of a single biogenesis. What scientists mean when they say this, is that all terrestrial life is, in a real and important sense, just one example with many variations on a basic theme. 

While that may seem like an extreme statement, there’s a great deal of scientific evidence to support it, a lot of which has just been discovered in the last few decades. It’s not easy to define life, especially with only our terrestrial examples to work with. But as far as we can tell, all life, no matter what form it takes, has these things in common:

they are highly organized structures

take in energy from their surroundings and use it to maintain their structure and organization

have the ability to reproduce, i.e. to make exact working copies of themselves (more or less).

Each of these statements is subject to some qualifications and clarification, of course (not every individual actually uses the ability to reproduce, and the offspring of sexually reproducing species are almost never identical to their parents) but even taking this into consideration, these are all characteristics that we expect of any life form on Earth.

Terrestrial organisms acquire energy they need to maintain themselves in a variety of different ways. Until recently, we assumed that all living beings got their energy from the sun, whether directly or indirectly. Green plants use sunlight directly, combining it with water, minerals, and carbon dioxide as raw materials which in turn makes carbohydrates and fives off oxygen. They then store that energy in their own tissues. Fungi or animals get their energy from eating those tissues and metabolizing the carbohydrates and giving off carbon dioxide that can then be reused by plants. But then we have another level, the carnivores, who eat the animals that eat the plants. There’s also smaller organisms who eventually recycle the bodies of other dead organisms into the soil as nutrients for the plants. This is the most elementary summary of the science of ecology, and I highly recommend reading more about it to make your aliens more accurate! From this we know that no organism exists in isolation, but all organisms interact to maintain cycles of chemical reactions repeating, with chemicals being reused repeatedly and energy being the only substance added from outside sources.

The essential input, as we now know, is energy, not necessarily solar energy. As we discovered, we can no longer say, even on Earth, that the sun is at the center of all energy cycles. Recent deep ocean explorations have discovered whole ecosystems based on chemical synthesis on the ocean floor, much too deep for the sun’s reach. The food chain in this ecosystem starts with microorganisms that metabolize directly hydrogen sulfide and minerals in the warm water that seeps up through vents from Earth’s interior.

The CHON System

All terrestrial life, from the tiniest bacteria to human beings is based on the same fundamental biochemical architecture. It uses the same DNA to make the same protein building blocks: the diversity comes in on how they’re arranged. The building blocks of life on earth is largely based in four fundamental elements: carbon ©, hydrogen (H), oxygen (O), and nitrogen (N), where the acronym CHON comes from. A few other elements are also vital in specific applications. Phosphorus is fundamental to the basic energy transfer reactions used in living cells. Sulfur is also crucial to some aspects of terrestrial life.

Carbon is the backbone of the CHON system. It is the only element that makes arbitrarily complex linkages to itself and because of this it can build up extremely complex molecules. Another major component to life on Earth is liquid water. Life in general would probably require some solvent that all its magnitude of chemical reactions can take place in. Water works well because it’s made of common elements–hydrogen and oxygen. Hydrogen actually makes up most of the universe. Of the heavier elements, oxygen is more common but in the grand scale of the universe is much more rare than hydrogen, due to the fact that it’s most common isotope is exceptionally stable. Overall, this means that water is actually one of the most abundant substances in the entire universe!

But water has some unusual properties too. It has a high boiling point and it’s temperature range means that it has a very large range in which it stays liquid. This is convenient when world building because planets vary in temperature form place to place. Water is also a near-universal solvent. It can dissolve virtually anything to at least some degree. A solvent is necessary for biochemical reactions, and this makes water a great contender by making it easy to move things around–like food and oxygen and waste products–but it also provides a medium in which the basic building blocks of life can move around.

Probably one of the more interesting things about water is that it expands when it freezes. This is extremely unusual: most liquids are less dense than the solids they melt from. (There are also different forms of ice. Ice I occurs on Earth, the normal stuff you find in your freezer and in glaciers and is the only kind less dense than water. But Ice II and Ice III can form under immense pressure and most likely exist in icy worlds in other parts of the universe). This property of Ice I is very important for Earth’s climate regulation. 

Other Possibilities

We are now venturing into the world of hypotheticals. All of the examples of planets I give are mostly derived from science fiction I’ve read or watched, and are all plausible, even if we can’t identify any specific examples in our small solar system.

Hydrogen Fluoride WorldIf we base a planet on the halogens, or the elements that range from fluorine to astatine (group 17), then there are some comparisons to be made between a potential oxygen/water world. Free fluorine could act as a sort of oxygen element and hydrogen fluoride (HF) would make a substitute for water. By this I meant that it would form lakes and oceans and be the solvent in which the biochemical reactions took place. In a system such as this, plant life would release free fluorine during photosynthesis, while animals would breathe in fluoride instead of oxygen. 

There would be some technicalities in using such a world–factors come into play such as the fact that fluoride is comparatively a much rarer element, and the fact that fluoride is a much more reactive element which would make it hard to accumulate in the atmosphere, but it’s up to you how you’d like to solve these problems, if you acknowledge them at all. 

Ammonia WorldSince water is such a good solvent for biochemical reactions, it’s been an object of science fiction writers’ obsession to try and find an alternative. One possible is liquid ammonia. Ammonia is also made from common elements–nitrogen and hydrogen–so it’s common in the universe. Ammonia is a great solvent and it also has a large temperature range where it remains liquid and has a high boiling point. One major difference is that ammonia ice sinks, so ice would sink to the bottom of the ocean. Although, that could still technically work as a climate regulator: the ice at the bottom of the ocean would be extremely hard to melt and help cool the atmosphere. 

Because of scientific factors like the greenhouse effect causing a thin atmosphere, and the fact that such a world would have to be frozen to be sustainable that it would be near impossible to extract ore from the rocks to make metal, would likely mean this type of planet would never get past a Stone Age without outside influences. 

Sulfur Dioxide SeaAn additional candidate as an alternative to water and has the fun bonus of containing sulfur is the idea of the sulfur dioxide sea. In our solar system, there’s actually a planet in our system that has a sulfur dioxide sea. Jupiter’s moon Io, however is covered in ice and is therefore unlikely to contain life (but there’s speculation about beneath the surface, but I digress).

Like water and ammonia, sulfur dioxide has a long liquid range and a relatively high boiling point, although it is important to note that the atmospheric pressure would have to be at least 3x that of Earth’s in order to maintain it in liquid form without boiling at a reasonable temperature. Sulfur dioxide ice also sinks. 

An interesting factor of such a planet is that there would be no oxygen in the atmosphere, otherwise sulfur trioxide would form, which is solid at room temperature. This means that the sulfur dioxide sea would likely lap against shores of pure sulfur and the atmosphere would be largely made up of nitrogen and interestingly enough–sulfur dioxide! Yeah, the compound that makes up the oceans would also make up a large part of the atmosphere! Higher life forms would have an interesting development because fire would be impossible on such a world.

Notes:

Thanks for the ask! I love thinking about aliens and creating them from the ground up. When you do it that way, you start to think how the environment and the physical aspects of the occupying planet actually can affect the aliens and their culture. I hoped this helped you! Don’t forget, you are free to tag me in or send links to me of your stories and fics so I can check out the cool sci fi aspects! Also, my askbox is always open. You can find more science answers under the tag #blue answers.

love, Blue