#just TRY quoting wikipedia at me again.

[thewertsearch]

TG: but each time i would be watching myself from the vantage point of a different crow

Imagine being in Dave’s head, during that last fight with Jack.

Imagine watching yourself die violently, again and again, from the vantage point of a different Dave.

By the time it’s your turn, you already know exactly where each bullet is going to collide with your chest. You're already intimately familiar with the particular tones of your helpless screams - so familiar, in fact, that you're screaming before the bullet has even hit.

You already know how this goes. The only new part is the pain.

TT: Well, if I've learned anything from my extensive skimming over the Wikipedia articles on dream analysis, TT: It's that this dream is very unlikely to have any literal significance whatsoever. TT: It's probably not about dying at all.

If Rose hasn't yet diverged from the bubble's seed memory, then this quote is fairly ironic, in retrospect.

...but if Rose has broken out of the original memory, then she's the funniest motherfucker in the comic.

TG: i think im getting this weird deja vu thing where i was sure we talked about this […] TT: Why don't you tell me more about your dream?

I am so glad we’re going with option two. Never change, Lalonde.

TG: so i kept dying and kept being crows and stuff TG: and then i started to notice something coming from the sky TG: it was this faint eerie singing and i look up and theres nothing there just darkness

This was another peek at Derse, then.

Dave, the Horrorterrors have been trying to reach you since long before the session started. Will you finally heed their call?

TT: Certain texts say singing from the unknowable void carries a message. TT: That its recipient has been selected for a mission of supreme cosmic importance, that will result in your death and that of billions more.

It sounds like Rose is saying that the Green Sun’s destruction will kill many, many more than just the Tumor's pilot.

Now, we already knew that, more or less. The Sun is the keystone of the First Guardian system, and destroying it is sure to cause massive problems with every session in the multiverse. I can't even imagine how dire the long-term consequences will be. We know that - I’m just surprised that Rose is admitting it.

I guess I assumed Scratch had convinced her that destroying the Sun would be strictly beneficial - but no. She knows exactly how much destruction she’s about to dole out.

If you know this, Rose, then what the hell are you playing at?

TT: But one that is essential to the perpetuation of existence itself.

And here’s our answer. Scratch hasn’t hidden the fallout of the Green Sun’s destruction from Rose. He didn't need to, because he's opting for a much more subtle manipulation strategy, framing her mission as some nebulous 'greater good', which 'justifies' any side-effects.

Protect the multiverse from Jack, Rose - and don't worry about English. He's, uh, 'sanctioned by Paradox Space', whatever that means, so don't waste your thoughts on him. Look away from him, Rose.

Look at me, Rose. The real threat is Jack Noir.

That is what you need to fix, you silly girl. He’s your fault, Rose.

Fix it, and damn the consequences.

Don’t even think about the consequences, Rose.

[captainzigo]

so unfortunately very few entries here are going to properly be vintage. also what i consider vintage might not line up with what you do. i am not old.

also i am not wealthy. and my family isn’t wealthy. this is an expensive hobby to have. i get most of my stuff from loving it and refusing to throw it away… and digging through the trash at university. you would be surprised with the stuff people throw away. planned obsolescence has nothing on the fact that people can’t be bothered to fix a sour harddrive.

i actually fix computers as a sort of second job. it’s nice to work on computers i can’t afford and that aren’t from the trash. but i love old tech. i love breathing life in to things long dead. i’m a technonecromancer. i am not including pictures of things i haven’t finished yet for the most part. and i simply am not including most things. this is but a fraction of my power

ok so these are all my computers that work. i didn’t include ones that im still working on. they all worked but needed repairs variously. mostly they just needed new hard drives.

my game consoles. again not including ones that don’t work. i actually bought that 3ds, but the rest my parents gave me after they got them used. that gameboy has needed a screen replacement that required soldering. the ds is my little trooper and has needed nothing ever. the wii needed a new disc drive. and the 3ds came in japanese and i hacked it to english.

there’s a back view of my stickers

these are some of my various devices. again not including ones that don’t work. that nano needed a new battery which was actual hell and i’m surprised it survived. that ipad is the first ipad and she works beautifully and one time i fastened it to my tummy for a tellytubby costume. i was slutty lala and i played the old spiderman movie trilogy in glorious VHS quality. i couldn’t find my iphone 3gs for this picture :( but it will turn up. i’ll include an old picture instead of cleaning my room to find it lol

here are some novelties i just like. thats an old radio i swiped from my great grandfather. i got it working but it broke again. i dont know whats wrong with it and its so old that the parts are impossible to find. on the right is the browser for DS which is just so quaint. i love it. it barely works at all but i loaded a wikipedia page one time so xP

this is my terrible stupid tiny phone i got from aliexpress that barely works BUT IT DOES WORK and is technically loaded with all modern smartphone features. i attached a video of it barely playing roblox

this is my og imac. with the og keyboard. i didn’t include it with the working computers because it doesn’t. the harddrive died and im trying to fix it but its really hard. i’ve already sought out two different adapters that haven’t worked

and this is a commodore 64 that i also got out of the trash. it does not work but im hoping to make it work. someone clearly loved it. enough to paint it crazy colors and enough to

write some weird scifi quote on the inside of the case under the RF shield. but maybe they died, or it just became too much of an undertaking.

not included here is:

• several more apple products that i just don’t think look good. all the iphones between 6 and 11 are just so ugly. and i don’t actually like the way apple watches look

• the phone, tablet, and smart watch i actively use

• various bits and bobs like the official speakers for a imac 4, an electronic pocket dictionary, various wii peripherals and so on

• all of my audio equipment

• my iphone 3gs. i just never found it or any pictures of it. i love it tho. it was my first phone (hand me down. i’m not that old) and i have had to repair it so many times and i love taking bad photos with it

• all of my monitors

• my many videogames

• my old fridge that i love and cherish and use

• anything i have fixed and then given to someone else

• a bunch of other stuff

so if you are a beautiful trans woman, are you in love with me yet? or do i need to make a part two

[sophieinwonderland]

Now, why would you dare me to embarrass you and your pals like that?

I appreciate how you wanted my attention so bad you posted me to not one, but two subreddits.

Makes a girl feel special! 🤣

I have actually never seen Wikipedia cited as a source about endogenic plurality. Though I do see anti-endos all the time, when asked for sources, telling people to just Google things.

Anyway, here's @guardianssystem's document filled with academic papers about endogenic plurality:

I've compiled my own, but honestly, theirs is better organized than mine.

And in the interest of fairness, here are all the anti-endo papers debunking endogenic plurality:

Sorry, I forgot. Those don't exist. Oops. 🤷‍♀️

Echo chamber? LOL!

Weren't you the one spouting a bunch of lies on Tumblr, got totally debunked, posted the people who debunked you to r/systemscringe to have a hugbox where fakeclaimers could assure you how the people who contradicted you are all fakers, and then blocked everyone who disagreed with you?

Weren't you also the one who, when shown a quote from an expert in dissociative disorders who worked on the DSM-5 saying that a disorder isn't a disorder if it doesn't cause distress, argued that the people who defined what disorder are must be wrong about that definition?

You're a misinformation machine who can only find support when huddled in cringe subreddits. Don't try to talk about people in echo chambers.

Also, you know most of psychology is just... listening to people? That's how it's been as long as the field existed. DID (or MPD at the time) was a recognized disorder since long before the first brain scans were conducted on DID patients. It's saying something though when basically every single scientist who has ever researched endogenic plurality has said they believe it's a real thing, or that it could be. While absolutely zero academic papers have expressed that it's fake.

There is also an fMRI study into tulpa systems that's been in the works, but results have yet to be published.

Sure, if that's what you'd like me to call you, Crazy. 😊

Anyway, Crazy, you should know that just because you personally find something scary doesn't mean everyone will or that the thing is bad. Personal preferences are a thing.

In a study of tulpamancers though, most generally reported their lives becoming better after the practice.

78% reported improvements in their mental health, and 91% on overall life.

There are many out there who would jump at the chance to have someone there with them that knows them intimately, and to never have to be alone again.

If it's not for you, then so be it.

But it's certainly not something to be afraid of.

And maybe, for those who are willing to commit to the practice while America struggles with an epidemic of loneliness, it's something worth being open to.

This is actually pretty fair.

But that's now, and I'm looking at course of history and trends of plural acceptance.

300 years ago, any plural would be viewed as demon possessed and end up tortured or killed for their plurality.

70 years ago, all plurality was seen as a mental illness, and it was common to force plurals, as well as anyone else associated with mental illnesses, into asylums.

30 years ago, the first real plural communities were able to connect on the internet and form in small numbers.

8 years ago, the first studies into endogenic plurality started being conducted. 4 years ago, the ICD-11 acknowledged that you could have multiple distinct personality states without a disorder. 2023 marked the first, but certainly not the last, time a system used their system name as an author of an academic paper.

Recently, new plural resources have been designed and put into use. More servers than ever are using Pluralkit. And Simply Plural went from 100k users at the end of 2021 to 210k at the end of 2022.

Progress is happening far more rapidly than you realize. And you had best be ready for it.

BOO! 👻

Oh, hey, I just realized... this is literal pluralphobia!

Liberté!

Egalité!

Fraternité!

And yes, The Future is Plural! 😜

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 9/10/2024

someone adopt this little orange man from me in Houston TX! more details here!

listening

the 1991 Ella Mae Morse compilation Capitol Collectors Series is the official driving-cats-to-the-vet album bc it is so mellow but still fun. this album has previously been featured several times in tuesdayposts but i think you should all listen to it again.

seven thousand three hundred days IS a long long time to sleep ur so right ella

-

reading

two different works that annoyed me: Emily Hamilton's The Stars Too Fondly. my first clue should have been that this is my least favorite poem, bc ppl would quote it to me smugly after my mom died. im sure they thought they were being so super comforting to a budding astronomer, but, much like how i can no longer eat lasagna bc ppl gave us Twenty! Party! Size! Platters! Of! Lasagna! after my mom died (they would just Appear on our front porch, frozen), too much of this poem really soured me.

i had this book on hold Forever and then delayed delivery twice bc i have not felt like reading lately. here's the publisher's description:

In her breathtaking debut—part space odyssey, part sapphic rom-com—Emily Hamilton weaves a suspenseful, charming, and irresistibly joyous tale of fierce friendship, improbable love, and wonder as vast as the universe itself. So, here’s the thing: Cleo and her friends really, truly didn’t mean to steal this spaceship. They just wanted to know why, twenty years ago, the entire Providence crew vanished without a trace. But then the stupid dark matter engine started all on its own, and now these four twenty-somethings are en route to Proxima Centauri, unable to turn around, and being harangued by a snarky hologram that has the face and attitude of the ship’s missing captain, Billie. Cleo has dreamt of being an astronaut all her life, and Earth is kind of a lost cause at this point, so this should be one of those blessings in disguise that people talk about. But as the ship gets deeper into space, the laws of physics start twisting, old mysteries come crawling back to life, and Cleo’s initially combative relationship with Billie turns into something deeper and more desperate than either woman was prepared for. Lying somewhere in the subspace between science fantasy and sapphic rom-com, The Stars Too Fondly is a soaring near-future adventure about dark matter and alternate dimensions, leaving home and finding family, and the galaxy-saving power of letting yourself love and be loved.

should be catnip for me, right? wrong. starts out as a chat fic, which i hate.

i had a lot of trouble finishing the first chapter, which also has an extended third-person omniscient narrator flashback in italics, a thing i also hate. i KNOW you can figure out how to integrate this information into the book in a better way instead of dumping it in my lap.

i think part of why this is not hitting like i wanted is the tone, because i think this veers more new adult than i was really hoping for. i think introducing a big group all at once is very hard to do effectively. i do not like a series of character introductions that feel like they are trying to sell me action figures. or perhaps blind-bag figures. i do not like a six-deep list of cheesy puns about someone's name. i do not have the patience to see if this debut novel finds its footing a little later on, though i am glad a sapphic ghost in the machine romance exists in this world.

i also read dean motter's mister x (both the original late eighties through early nineties run and the 2008 follow-on).

let's yoink the description from wikipedia:

Set in Radiant City, a dystopian municipality influenced by Bauhaus and Fritz Lang's Metropolis, the series concerns a mysterious figure who purports to be its architect. His radical theories of "psychetecture" cause the citizenry to go mad, just as he did, and he takes on the mission to repair his creation. To accomplish this he remains awake twenty-four hours a day by means of the drug "insomnalin", all the while coping with a Dick Tracy–like rogues gallery and supporting cast including his long-suffering ex-girlfriend Mercedes. (ed note: the redhead in the santa beard below)

the art in this comic book is really and truly stunning. everyone was firing on all cylinders. beautiful retrofuturistic advertisement vibes, very fun play with panels and word balloons while still being readable, there are airships, you know how it is. looooooooove a hardboiled noir.

the Concept of mister x, this horrible awful futuristic city that grinds its citizenry up and spits them out? both figuratively and sometimes literally? love it!!! love a great wounded beast of a city as a character!!!

unforch the "who is mister x" subplot does not resolve in a satisfying way, imo. there's a lot of flip-flopping, there's a lot of options, he ends up being (maybe?) someone he was very definitively proven NOT to be in an earlier issue, and it really soured me on the whole experience. and also i don't believe it! that specific person makes no fucking sense! who mister x is, is by far the least interesting part of the series. tell me more about how he's fixing the city. show me more of the city. shut up and dance, robot artists

-

watching

X-Men: Apocalypse (2016, dir. Singer). this movie did not need to be two and a half hours long. appreciated the EXTREMELY divorced energy from charles & erik though, quicksilver rescuing the school scene was also very fun. my bestie's husband has informed me we are NOT watching Dark Phoenix, i'm not sure if we're going to loop back and watch the ??? number of wolverine films or if we're going to see how i feel about deadpool. bc i find this character insufferable through clips only.

-

playing

there is a feature in the video game genshin impact to turn your World Level (TM) down in order to make overworld enemies a little easier. i am at seven out of nine bc i genuinely can't finish the boss to unlock world level 9, and i am finding some of the overworld enemies too hard at 8 and want to finish the achievements in a more relaxed fashion.

-

making

this is going to be a lot of previously posted pics so bear with me.

saturday morning/saturday evening. plants? repotted. porch and stairs? swept. old wasp nests? knocked down. different mirror on the porch to go out to the curb when i have the energy? yes. also a giant slab of engineered stone from the top of a dresser but that's out of frame.

speaking of the giant broken dresser that was in my apartment when i moved in just over a year ago, i ripped it apart with a crowbar and threw it in the dumpster. put my pretty zebrawood desk in the empty space and started thinking about what to hang on that wall. the wall across from it is maps, bc i think a cozy office should have lots of maps and it makes a good video conference background. maybe this will be the dedicated cowboy nonsense wall. i did so much dusting and vacuuming and mopping and the girls can't even hang out in here bc the orange boy is in the office bathroom. big sigh.

also a lot of driving around and emailing and calling thirty shelters and rescues figuring out how to get this orange man a home. please take this orange man off my hands.

[derangedfujoshi]

hi I have a question which might not be super clear?? Essentially I was in a server on discord that had sh0tas banned and when I asked for an explanation of what exactly that meant (bc it was explicitly under their no under 16 or under in explicit positions to “abide by discord TOS” which was silly bc Discord TOS is under 18s) and I pointed out not all sh0tas are explicit they got mad and said I was mixing up sh0tas and sh0tac0n and said that anime kids are not sh0tas and that sh0ta and sh0tac0n are different things. They also told me that any image of someone under 16 in an explicit or sexual position is a sh0ta or a l0li and that sh0tac0n was the Japanese’s term for ped0phia according to Wikipedia. Which doesn’t make any sense as far as my knowledge of what a sh0ta is is concerned. Can you help me??? Am I wrong or are they wrong or is it something in between?? Sorry to ask you about this you’re the most knowledgeable on this type of stuff and best at explaining it.

essentially I’m planning to draw some DC comics characters in the style that you define as a sh0ta (ie big eyes, short arms, etc.) bc I know that more Western franchises get less sh0ta-style art and I thought that the younger characters would look really cool in that design. They’re saying that that would be “just anime” and not a sh0ta and that anime is not sh0tac0n. What are your thoughts on that? If it wasn’t mean to be explicit or inherently sexual just kinda cutsie but with those elements would it still be a sh0ta. It also wouldn’t be anime style because that’s not my style, but it would still have those proportions and elements. I’m just trying to understand because I’m curious.

(Sorry if putting the 0 in there in the ask isn’t the right way to do it I don’t know how tumblr reacts with these things and I’ve been shadowbanned a LOT)

Ok wow that's a long ask! I hope I'll be able to help somehow!

First thing first I'd like to suggest dropping the server cause it's clearly made by antis and you're never going to win them over. Especially because they apparently can't even read a Wikipedia article fully since it clearly states, and I quote: "Shotacon (ショタコン, shotakon), abbreviated from Shōtarō complex (正太郎コンプレックス, shōtarō konpurekkusu), is, in Japanese contexts, the attraction to young (or young-looking) boy characters, or media centered around this attraction. The term refers to a genre of manga and anime." The article clearly states this is a fictional thing but, as we all know, that means nothing to antis so it's kind of a lsot cause, really...

"and said that anime kids are not sh0tas and that sh0ta and sh0tac0n are different things" This is true in the way that 1) not every young anime boy is drawn as a shota, they could be a shounen or a weird hybrid of different genres and 2) shota is the character, shotacon is the one who likes said characters

"They also told me that any image of someone under 16 in an explicit or sexual position is a sh0ta or a l0li" untrue. Once again, shota is a very specific category of character and young boy =/= shota, they could be a shounen, a femboy, just a dude and the way they're depicted wouldn't suddenly turn them into shotas, they would still be their own category but, well, drawn in a sexy way lol what even-

"Am I wrong or are they wrong or is it something in between??" They are, don't sweat it dear, you are correct into being confused because once again, to quote the Wikipedia article they didn't care to read: "The usage of the term in both Western and Japanese fan cultures includes works ranging from explicitly pornographic to mildly suggestive, romantic, or in rare cases, entirely nonsexual, in which case it is not usually classified as "true" shotacon. As with lolicon, shotacon is related to the concepts of kawaii (cuteness) and moe (in which characters are presented as young, cute or helpless in order to increase reader identification and inspire protective feelings). As such, shotacon themes and characters are used in a variety of children's media." There are a lot of shotacons who are completely sfw about shotas and are there solely for the kawaii and moe factors although the majority of shatocon works are nsfw in nature, but the two things can coexist, but I guess the nuance is too difficult for antis to grasp.

"If it wasn’t mean to be explicit or inherently sexual just kinda cutsie but with those elements would it still be a sh0ta." yeah, again, erotic factors have nothing to do with a character being a shota or not. If you follow a certain guideline (short + very young looking + tiny torso + long possibly a bit radish legs + big head + huge eyes + soft features) chances are you'll end up drawing a shota. Dipper Pines technically qualifies as one, for example and he's from a western show, do you think his design is erotic in any way? Of course not, because that has nothing to do with shotas!

I hope I answered to all of your questions clearly enough and, once again, I'd like to suggest you dropping that server for your own good and to not engage in any discussion if the interlocutor doesn't seem like someone open to a real dialogue. As for your artistic endeavour I hope you'll have fun! I think that visually speaking shotas are the cutest category ever eheh and the western world needs more of them smh Oh and no need to censor your words in the bodytext, what's important is censoring the tags :3

Thank you for trusting me with this and keeping me in such high regards, I truly hope I helped somehow and that you'll have a wonderful day (ෆ˙ᵕ˙ෆ)♡

[anti-lies]

Tips on sourcing:

Endos have a knack for demanding sources and take a lack of sources on our parts as a victory for them. So, let's talk about how to deal with that.

First, it's important when providing sources to have a good idea of what your goal is, and to find sources to help accomplish that.

As fellow anti-endos, your goal with your sources is going to be to shutdown arguments and make people who know The Truth feel better about themselves with the least amount of effort possible.

With that in mind, here's how to do it:

Google a question.

Find an article that seems like it might support your opinion. (Not Wikipedia though. You don't want to be too obvious.)

Copy the link without reading or trying to understand the article. Remember, looking for sources that support you takes too much time, and wasting your time is the only reason endos want you to provide evidence to prove your point. Don't fall for their dastardly trap.

Paste the link with no further context or quotes from the article.

Try repeating steps 2-4 many times over so you can get so many sources that the endos won't want to even click on one.

What if I use a source that doesn't support my argument? (For example, citing something that says DID usually comes from trauma in order to prove all plurality come from DID.)

Don't worry about it.

Your job is to be a magician! You're giving the illusion of having sources by overwhelming people with the quantity of links.

If you do everything right, nobody will even notice! Trust me!

What if an endo does notice and calls me out on it?

If an endo does click on your sources and notices, we have one special tool we can use against them.

It's called the block button.

Remember, this is our stage and by noticing out sleight of hand, the endos are heckling us. And you wouldn't let someone heckle your magic show, would you?

No.

You kick them out!

Liberally block anyone who tries to correct you on anything. That way you can preserve the illusion of your show.

What if another anti-endo notices?

They won't. Trust me.

But what if they do?

Seriously, this won't be a problem.

Okay, but, just humor me...

Fine... God, you're so needy and demanding.

Look, no anti-endos will challenge you because they don't want to look like they're pro-endo. They're too attached to their friends and the relationships they've formed. Even if they think wrong thoughts, they're not going to say those wrong thought aloud. That would be crazy.

On the off chance they do speak their wrong thoughts aloud and question your sources, then you can use your social leverage against them. First, block them to limit their influence. Then publicly paint them as a pro-endo and no longer safe to interact with.

Wrong thoughts are like an infection. Once they start spreading, they can infect the whole body. Your goal is going to be to cut off the infected limb, leaving them separated from our community so they can't infect anyone else.

Remind people that you have sources, that those sources are Correct, that anyone questioning those sources will be treated the same way as the Infected, and trust that nobody else will dare question your sources again.

I hope this guide has proven helpful and can aid you in spreading your Right Thoughts.

[seriously-mike]

Don't Fear Your Tears, Binge on Your Cringe

So, there's shitstorm brewing lately that Tears for Fears' new album uses AI-generated imagery for the cover and related promotional purposes, and rightly so because on that level of money and fame not hiring an actual artist to make those for you feels insultingly cheap. Also, just look at this:

This is some ridiculously basic bitch shit cooked with zero effort in Bing Image Creator. Look, if I'm disgusted, you know it sucks shit big time. It's as bad as Saxon's video for "Madame Guillotine".

So, I thought "fight AI with AI" and came up with a chorus that skewered the idea, asked for 80s synthpop with male vocals, got the right vibe in the first batch. Then, it kinda went downhill from there.

"You want Tears for Fears' new single? But we have Tears for Fears' new single at home!"

This is the cheapest kind of Temu knockoff that I could accept, and since it's in English and relevant to current events, I'm expecting a shitton of hits in no time. Hell, if the short teaser clip featuring the chorus exploded right out of the gate, I'm expecting the full version to be a smash on par with the original Chinchilla song.

But, the lyrics:

There was a day I ruled the world, When I made people shout, Girls fell head over heels for me, Then we had a falling out, I laid so low, and tears rolled down, I broke it down again, Then by some kind of God’s mistake Dined with the Kings of Spain I want a spaceman, Standing in the field, Made by an AI, People will be thrilled! I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! (See!) I rode the wave and I forgot About how much he sucks, And then he just called me one day To help him pay some tax, This happy ending, a fresh start, The crowd will love this crap, We’re going past the tipping point, And numbers spin back up I want a spaceman, Standing in the field, Made by an AI, People will be thrilled I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! (Say!) The getting’s good, we’re on the road, Touring with some old hacks, We rule the world with our old hits, But we still need new tracks, We’re nervous and we’re getting old, So let’s run a new scheme, The cover of our record will Be designed by machines! I want a spaceman, Standing in the field, Made by an AI, People will be thrilled I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! I want the limelight, I want to get laid, And I don’t give a shit If the artist gets paid! (SUCKERS!)

If you look up the history of Tears for Fears on Wikipedia, you'll see an absolute shitton of references to their songs and albums, particularly in the first verse. There are also references to the acrimonious split between Orzabal and Smith and the unusual reason they reunited (basically, Smith moved to the US and after several years asked Orzabal to sort out some bureaucratic issue regarding his UK property).

It wasn't that difficult to write, considering that once I spent almost two months on trying to put together a song based on Minsc's quotes from Baldur's Gate 2. The total creation time for this one was a couple of hours, including the video for Youtube. And please do remember that the lyrics are all-natural, free-range, fair-trade, hand-crafted and GPT free.

[drowninnoodles]

Back to UT/DR phase, baby

I spent way too much time looking for this information so if anyone is curious...

Its mostly some pseudo physics things :p

Well, I think everyone here knows this quote:

I haven't seen anyone actually break down Undertale and make references to quantum physics, but if someone did, I'd be grateful for the links because I find it very interesting. Well, I thought I'd try to do it myself, even though I don't know anything about mathematics or physics. I will rely entirely on internet sources, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes.

I will also speak rather briefly because no one will want to read long descriptions about something neither of us will understand.

We can start with an obvious introduction about the fact that, of course, this science is about photons and protons. I don't know if there's a point in explaining what I'm referring to, because of course it's the whole thing with Negative Photons in UT, but I'd like to remind you again of my old theory about the black hole. But that's in a moment.

However, this physics is deeply connected with philosophical issues and this is what I am initially going to talk about. So let's start with the, so appropriately named, view of Determinism. In short, it says that all decisions and events are inevitable. Of course, this is the opposite of free will, the ability of individuals to make decisions, because everything is already written down in advance. There are different visions of this view, but I want to specifically address the fact that, according to some, the universe is a determined system. Of course, what I'm pointing to here is that every game has a script that assumes what will happen after making some decision and what ending we will have at, well, end of the game.

Determinism leads us to the next theory, the multiverse or many words theory. This is, by the way, my favorite theory of the world and I'm not talking about Undertale, but about our real one. However, I will explain it as simply as I can, and also remind you that Toby himself said that there are “AUs” in the UT and DR universe. Multi worlds theory is basically that DR may be a world existing in parallel with Undertale, but some event or decision made them go in two different directions. Quite hypothetically, let's take into account that the point in history that divided the universe into two, into Undertale and Deltarune, was the war between Humans and Monsters. During this war, humans and monsters had two possible outcomes, humans winning or monsters winning. We know what happened when the humans won, because this story is basically what we know from Undertale. But what if the monsters won? For now, we can only guess that this is a story from Deltarune, but nothing has been confirmed.

Another example would be that when you play Undertale you have a lot of options to choose from, right? So let's follow this lead and choose the most significant one, i.e. killing or not. Of course, the ending of True Pacifist is generally considered to be the true ending, but in Genocide we also get one. Here we started one story in the same way, but our choice created two different worlds existing in parallel. One world is the one where everyone is happy and the other is the one where everyone is dead. Of course, the fact that we have a choice does not give us complete free will, here the theory is combined with the already mentioned determinism. Because although we make decisions, their consequences are already determined, they exist because there is a game script. By the way, maybe why there are so many cats in Deltarune is simply a reference to the so-called Schördinger's Cat, but this is just a guess.

In any case, quantum physics nicely explains the existence of what we call the timeline.

While searching Wikipedia, I also came across something called String Theory, but I can't understand it, so you'll have to forgive me.

Now I will talk about what I consider to be the most logical explanation of the history of what "Dark Darker Yet Darker" refers to. Black Hole, of course.

The Black Hole has such a strong force of gravity that nothing, not even light, can escape from it. When an object falls into such a hole, all information about it is lost for observators. There is a black hole information paradox, but once again, my brain is too small to understand. We can also keep in mind that "darkness keeps growing” didn't mean it was getting darker. That meant there was literally MORE of it. Black Holes grow by eating matter, and I dare to propose a theory that opening the Fountains in Deltarune creates small micro black holes that, if not sealed, can devour the world.

Now let me remind you of the well-known fact that passing through this Hole is called Spaghettification or the Pasta Effect. In this process, the object or, in our case, a person, is torn to pieces and their matter is added to the black hole. Poor Gaster, I guess.

As for Sans, Quantum jumping isn't just thing, it's an actual thing in science. Yes, it's something that gives you access to alternate universes. This goes completely back to what I said earlier, that every decision opens up another new world to us, and somewhere we probably exist in another world at the same time. These jumps involve visualizing yourself in a given place and... that's it. You will then attract events that will help you achieve this, which will make you appear in the timeline you wanted to jump to. So personally, I don't think Sans teleports per se. For example, imagine that you meet Sans near his house, and then you go on and meet him again, but this Sans is not 100% the same because he came here from a different timeline. Does this make sense? It depends on whether I explained it well XD.

Also remember that moment when Sans is in several places at the same time? Yes, this also applies to jumping.

I think a good explanation for this might be "It's raining somewhere else". It's raining somewhere else because there was a possibility that it might or might not rain. It is not raining in this world you are in now, but in a parallel space-time it is raining because factors have occurred that allow it to happen.

By the way, according to Google, it is impossible to create a black hole in a laboratory. Oh well.

However, if someone hypothetically created one, intentionally or not, being close to it would have no chance of escaping.

Whoops?

I think it's also worth noting that it's damn cold inside such a hole, -237,15°C is, yeah, a little bit of not sunny.

Maybe that's why Black Holes are so Cool…

So summary at the end:

-Determinism means that everything is written down in advance, i.e. basically the game script.

-Many worlds and Multiverse theory explains why Sans is everywhere, and also that all timelines are happening at once

-Black holes tear people to pieces and it's called Spaghettification. (we all know it)

I don't know anything about physics, so these are just my thoughts.

[lewisinho]

felipe massa and the championship that got away: an analysis

prompted mostly by massa pissing me off so bad with his campaign of misinformation (like bro sue the weather while you’re at it); this involved rewatching absolute disasterclasses and a few snoozefests during my free wednesday (the weather was terrible as well so took the time to refresh my memory on some of the less memorable 2008 races and compile this mess) and my eyes were bleeding so please show some love

ok, so on a more serious note, he wasn’t absolutely dreadful (apart from in the wet); my biggest issue is that we probably don’t know just how good that 2008 ferrari really was; in the hands of someone with much better quali/race pace it could probably have dominated much more strongly; i think his performance was quite average considering the potential the car had; he had some brilliant weekends as well, but i think they are quite significantly overshadowed by the dreadful ones; then again, 2008 wasn’t lewis’ best season either, and this analysis isn’t really to compare the two, it’s mostly to showcase that massa’s assertion of it being a ‘perfect’ championship isn’t quite true…is all this necessary? ofc not, but i’m going to have some fun with it anyhow; 

i also made this because the concept of ‘deserving’ something is one i deeply deeply despise in sport; the only thing you can bring to the table with such discourse is your own subjective opinion; you win or you don’t, end of; you can, of course, be robbed of something when a rule is indeed broken, but the concept of ‘deserving a championship due to how you performed over the course of a season’ is frankly stupid; and do i think massa was robbed? no. he can’t prove that crashgate was the very thing that cost him the championship because it conveniently ignores everything else that happens afterwards. there’s a clear break in the chain of causation. he neither ‘deserves’ it in my opinion, nor was he robbed of it and i also don’t like the historical revisionism he’s campaigning for either so here’s a full rundown of felipe massa’s season (i tried to be as impartial as i could in this):

top 2 in the driver’s standings (included only for the sake of completeness, please don’t cite toto’s 'wikipedia statistics' quote at me):

some background information:

the 2008 championship comes right after the spygate shitshow of the previous season; fernando alonso leaves mclaren for renault after one year; heikki kovalainen replaces him to drive alongside lewis hamilton at mclaren; felipe massa and kimi raikkonen (the reigning world champion) are teammates at ferrari (kimi’s 2008 season is also interesting to revisit considering the internal ferrari politics at play but i’ll save it for a different time); it's an eighteen race season, and for this season traction control has been banned! (it's important to mention considering the ban had been brought up several times over the season as a reason to explain some of felipe's performances considering he had never driven a formula one car without traction control before);

moreover, the fia’s decision-making this season was questionable to say the least; this is obviously not felipe's fault ofc, but there were a few decisions which he had certainly benefited from at lewis’ expense (spa comes to mind…);

2008 scoring system quick refresher: p1: 10 points, p2: 8 pts, p3: 6 pts; scoring only up to eighth place;

for the race results i will only include the top 3 as well as lewis if he finishes off the podium; for the championship standings i will include the top 3 in the championship as they were after every race (+ HAM/MAS/RAI if they were outside) and on how many points they were after every race;

australian gp (0 points, dnf)

bit of an embarrassing start tbh…massa qualifies p4 but spins in the first corner of the first lap all on his own and hits the barrier; he manages to get back into the pits though and get a front wing change; however, on lap 26 he collides with DC when trying to overtake him; DC retires, but massa continues only to retire from an engine failure a few laps later; pretty shit start to the season

race result: lewis hamilton p1, nick heidfeld p2, nico rosberg p3 (the infamous brocedes podium btw)

malaysian gp (0 points, dnf)

much better qualifying, ferrari clearly has pace as massa qualifies on pole, with raikkonen in p2; however on lap 31 felipe spins off and gets trapped in the gravel; this race was a masterclass from kimi btw, he won by nearly twenty seconds from kubica in p2; also before massa crashed, kimi also managed to get ahead of felipe in the first round of pit stops after pitting a lap after felipe by producing a brilliant in-lap

race result: kimi raikkonen p1, robert kubica p2, heikki kovalainen p3 (lewis p5- qualifying penalty for impeding drivers in quali and had started p8 + slow pitstop by mclaren in the race)

championship standings: HAM (14 points), RAI (11), HEI (11) + MAS (0)

bahrain gp (10 points, p1)

it’s kubica on pole (who i also need to mention because he arguably was the best driver of the 2008 season) and massa starts p2; felipe overtakes kubica in the first corner and then maintains the lead for the rest of the race; very good performance for him and good bounce-back from the first two races

race result: felipe massa p1, kimi raikkonen p2, robert kubica p3 (lewis p13- bit of a disaterclass from him this time around, as he went into anti-stall at the start due to going into a wrong engine mode and dropped positions; he then drives right into the back of fernando’s renault and had to get a nose change, dropping him to p18)

championship: RAI (19), HEI (16), HAM (14) + MAS (10)

spanish gp (8 points, p2)

ferrari are dominating the past few races and the same happens in spain; kimi pole, felipe p3; massa overtakes alonso at the start and it's a ferrari 1-2 procession to the end basically; the race was basically sorted with the overtakes made at the start; also a literal snoozefest;

race result: kimi raikkonen p1, felipe massa p2, lewis hamilton p3

championship: RAI (19), HAM (20), KUB (19) + MAS p4 (18)

turkish gp (10 points, p1)

actually a pretty good race from massa; starts on pole and wins the race; lewis comes in second, executing a three-stopper (arguably this strategy cost mclaren the chance of fighting for the win but they were worried about tyres…still i think, a bit on the conservative side from mclaren in terms of strategy and considering lewis’ amazing pace relative to massa bit of a missed opportunity)

race result: felipe massa p1, lewis hamilton p2, kimi raikkonen p3

championship: RAI (35), MAS (28), HAM (28)

monaco gp (6 points, p3)

wet monaco and absolute chaos! (great race to rewatch btw); massa qualified on pole, but then lost the lead because of a mistake in the wet; lewis wins, and also brilliant race by kubica;

race result: lewis hamilton p1, robert kubica p2, felipe massa p3

championship: HAM (38), RAI (35), MAS (34)

canadian gp (4 points, p5)

massa qualifies p6, ferrari fuel rig problem in the pit lane meant he dropped down to p17; he fights back to p5; and because hamilton crashed into raikkonen in the pit lane, he managed to outscore the both of them that weekend; also robert wins! relative to the others, a pretty good weekend for massa;

race result: robert kubica p1, nick heidfeld p2, david coulthard p3 (every time i remember DC raced in 2008 it’s like a shock to my system)

championship: KUB (42), MAS (38), HAM (38) + RAI, p4 (35)

french gp (10 points, p1)

again, ferrari are pretty much dominating in quali; kimi takes pole, felipe p2; it was kimi’s race to win and he was comfortably leading however he then had to slow down due to his car suffering from an exhaust pipe breaking and hence, loss of engine power; felipe therefore, inherits the lead and wins the race;

race result: felipe massa p1, kimi raikkonen p2, jarno trulli p3 (lewis- p10, he had to take a grid drop for the incident in the pitlane in canada when he ran into the back of kimi; in the race he has to serve a drive-through penalty for cutting a corner and gaining an advantage)

championship: MAS (48), KUB (46), RAI (43) + HAM, p4 (38)

british gp (0 points, p13)

eyeee think this race is best summarised with pictures? allow me:

an all-timer of a race, lewis hamilton masterclass;

race result: lewis hamilton p1, nick heidfeld p2, rubens barichello p3

championship: HAM (48), MAS (48), RAI (48)

german gp (6 points, p3)

massa qualified p2 alongside lewis; this is one of lewis’ best drives of the season i think; he was leading the race comfortably in the beginning stages, pulling away from felipe like crazy (he gained 1.8 sec in the first lap, had a 3.7 sec lead by lap 4, 11 sec by lap 18, clearly on a mission); mclaren don’t pit him under safety car when everyone else around him does, so he has eight laps to build a large gap before having to eventually pit himself; he does on lap 50 and overtakes massa and piquet jr for the win (some really nice overtakes btw); massa really just didn’t have the pace to compete;

race result: lewis hamilton p1, nelson piquet jr p2, felipe massa p3

championship: HAM (58), MAS (54), RAI (51)

hungarian gp (0 points, p17/dnf)

this one was bad luck because massa suffered an engine failure when leading the race; it would have probably been his best win of his career had he not dnf'ed- good overtake on lewis at the start

race result: heikki kovalainen p1, timo glock p2, kimi raikkonen p3 (lewis- p5, suffered a tyre puncture on lap 40; tbf the early seasons also show lewis is still learning about tyre management and that he’s still prone to overcooking his tyres making them vulnerable to punctures)

championship: HAM (62), RAI (57), MAS (54)

european gp (10 points, p1)

qualifies on pole and wins the race; he nearly manages to crash into sutil when released into the pit lane after his pit stop; the team is charged with 10,000 euros after the race but felipe keeps his win (it would be dealt with so differently these days lmao but can’t really blame him)

race result: felipe massa p1, lewis hamilton p2, robert kubica p3

championship: HAM (70), MAS (64), RAI (57)

belgian gp (10 points, p1)

this race still makes my blood boil; funnily enough felipe wins after not leading a single lap in this race! lewis gets handed a 25-second penalty by the stewards and gets demoted to p3; quick recap: lewis tried to pass kimi at the bus stop chicane, but he cut the corner and got into the lead; he allowed kimi to re-pass him because he gained an advantage by going off track; but smartly, he passes kimi again at la source; post-race he’s handed a penalty; mclaren then appeal and say that charlie whiting himself said that lewis had given the place back to kimi completely legally; thing is, charlie isn’t the stewards, who say that lewis didn’t give kimi enough of an advantage; it causes a bit of a storm in the media, niki lauda goes off and calls it the ‘worst judgment in the history of f1’; thing is, it's a really grey area, to some extent i can understand the stewards’ reasoning, but the severity of the punishment is absolutely ridiculous and also points to how inconsistent the fia is...handing him 25 seconds just doesn’t fit the crime at all; (also the last four laps are just pure drama in general! worth a watch);

(if i had a nickel for every time felipe massa got handed a lucky win in 2008, i’d have two nickels. which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird it happened twice)

race result: felipe massa p1, nick heidfeld p2, lewis hamilton p3

championship: HAM (76), MAS (74), KUB (58) + RAI, p4 (57)

italian gp (3 points, p6)

bit of a disasterclass, qualifies p6, finishes p6; but funnily enough, he still finished ahead of both kimi and lewis as the both of them were sent out on the wrong tyres in qualifying and only managed to qualify p14 and p15; btw beautiful overtakes by lewis (he finished p7- just one place behind felipe); also seb wins!

race result: sebastian vettel p1, keikki kovalainen p2, robert kubica p3

championship: HAM (78), MAS (77), KUB (64) + RAI, p4 (57)

singapore gp (0 points, p13)

crashgate! he gets pole (quite an impressive pole lap i must admit) and leads the race until piquet jr crashes, and felipe pits, ferrari release him too early and he drives off with the fuel hose still attached to his car…to that i say, maybe sue your pit crew as well 

race result: fernando alonso p1, nico rosberg p2, lewis hamilton p3

championship: HAM (84), MAS (77), KUB (64) + RAI, p4 (57)

japanese gp (2 points, p7)

now this one is a disasterclass on all fronts, but if you want drama i recommend watching it; felipe qualified p5; he managed to crash into hamilton and got himself a drive-through penalty; he also tangled with bourdais when attempting to overtake him on lap 50; bourdais was blamed for it and got a 25-second penalty after the race; thing is, i don’t see how it’s only bourdais’ fault tbh? massa squeezed bourdais as he attempted to pass him going into the first corner and bourdais couldn’t just disappear…anyway the decision to penalise bourdais was criticised a lot, also considering that penalising him went against charlie whiting’s pre-race direction that the car exiting the pit-lane has the right of way (which bourdais was); 

race result: fernando alonso p1, robert kubica p2, kimi raikkonen p3 (lewis hamilton- p12, bit of a disasterclass from him as well)

championship: HAM (84), MAS (79), KUB (72) + RAI, p4 (63)

chinese gp (8 points, p2)

qualifies p3, behind lewis and kimi; lewis comfortably leads the race and wins it fifteen seconds ahead of p2; massa finished second after raikkonen is instructed to let him through (ferrari team orders, bit of a deja vu)

race result: lewis hamilton p1, felipe massa p2, kimi raikkonen p3

championship: HAM (94), MAS (87), KUB (75) + RAI, p4 (69)

brazilian gp (10 points, p1)

ahead of the last race of the season, massa could still win the title if he wins the race and lewis finishes p6 or lower; massa did all he could: he got pole and won the race; mclaren opted for an incredibly conservative strategy in the race (they only needed to secure p5, and considering how they lost the title only the year before, it’s explicable): for e.g. waiting for a relatively long time to get lewis off the inters when it began to dry during the first part of the race; 

race result: felipe massa p1, fernando alonso p2, kimi raikkonen p3 (lewis- p5 and world champion!)

championship: HAM (98), MAS (97), RAI (75); shoutout to robert kubica who had an absolutely amazing season and who also finished on 75 points, but ended up p4 on countback.

hope this was somewhat informative :)

[derangedanomaly]

SpongeBob rant lmao (Tw- stupid ass Star fish rage-bait?)

I hate that stupid pink starfish, patrick start from spongebob.honestly, im not good with writing long sentences, essay etc (not good with phrasing words as well, and horrible with using words that dont fit it) but i can write a list on why Patrick is a horrible friend to spongebob.now, im not going to list EVERY episode with him being a jerk, but i'll name a few with the episodes i rewatched recently what made me want to have a breakdown.

S2 E2: Something Smells/Bossy Boots

In this episode, spongebob eats some food what makes his breath smell like garbage, whenever he talks to someone, they run away or just perish. Patrick tells spongebob that hes just UGLY- i understand, according to the wiki, patrick doesn't have a nose. But he forces spongebob to accept the fact hes ugly witch is straight up just sad tbh, i mean- in my opinion i would be upset if my friend who i knew for a long time just told me to accept the fact im ugly. Later on patrick eats whatever spongebob ate what made his breath smell, the same thing basically happens to patrick, now hes "ugly" and hes crying and blaming spongebob until spongebob, our hero, tells patrick it was the food they both ate and it made their breathe smell.though before SpongeBob says its their breathe, patrick says he caught the uglys. and quote on quote HE SAYS "i was one of the beautiful people, now look at me. im almost as ugly as YOU" WTH? HOW IS HE KNOWN AS A FRIEND---

S2 E9: Dumped

Okay, so idk if i got the episode number correct but im looking on google and the wikipedia and the episode is called "dumped".

On the wiki (synopsis) it says:

As the episode begins with SpongeBob and Gary playing tag, Patrick joins in and begins to get better acquainted with Gary. At the end of the day, Gary seems to want to spend time with Patrick a while longer, so SpongeBob agrees to let Gary have a sleepover at Patrick's house. The next morning, Gary is still reluctant to leave Patrick, who concludes that Gary wants to be with him permanently, and so claims him as his own pet. SpongeBob refuses to believe this, but when Gary is given the choice of who shall be his owner, Gary heads for Patrick. SpongeBob is heartbroken, and out of jealousy, he attempts to find a new pet to show Gary that he does not need a two-timing snail.

It turns out gary only "liked" patrick is because he had a treat in his shorts, and gary actually liked spongebob ( i think )what i hate about patrick in this episode is that he steals gary and acts like a twat to spongebob about this. Not much to say really, other than patrick being a jerk like always.

S4 : Driven to Tears

Okay so idk yet again, the episode but its in season 4. here's what google says about it:

"Driven to Tears" is a SpongeBob SquarePants episode from season 4. In this episode, Patrick gets his driver's license, and rubs it in SpongeBob's face.and heres the wiki synopsis:The narrator opens the episode by stating "It is a very special day in Bikini Bottom." The camera then shows SpongeBob and Patrick heading down to Mrs. Puff's Boating School. Once they arrive at the entrance, Patrick says he brought SpongeBob's special learning cards that has everything he needs to pass the boating school test. However, Patrick then eats the cards and claims learning tastes good. Even though SpongeBob needed those learning cards, Patrick convinces SpongeBob that he is a winner and does not need them. SpongeBob then claims he is a winner and takes his boating school driving test.Unfortunately, after one minute and thirty-seven seconds, SpongeBob fails the driving test for the 58th time. Patrick, thinking the test is rigged, decides to take the test himself and passes with a perfect score on the first try, much to SpongeBob's surprise and jealousy. They go to receive Patrick's license, but while his picture is being taken, an announcer comes out to reveal that since he is the one millionth person to pass the test, he has won a brand new hot red boatmobile, the new Bass Blaster 3000.

Okay so basically some ragebait i guess? idk. But tbh i wouldnt say its jealousy, more like envy. ((Jealousy is basically three people, lets say your in second place of a race and your friend is third. Your enemy is first and you cant help but feel jealous about it.envy is two people. you got nothing lets say and your friend gotten lots of gifts.))

but yeah, i guess it can be both. The episode is where patrick rubs it into spongeBobs face and hes just SOOO ANNOYING ABOUT IT- patrick is just a jerk. no explanation needed. He also forgets that spongebobs parents aren't his, he calls them his parents. Dumb bitch cant believe a cartoon pink starfish is getting me mad. btw spongebob gets arrested for littering, a wiki commenter (idk what to call it lmao-) says this:

Technically, Patrick should have also been arrested for reckless driving. As he was driving slightly above the limit, ran three red lights, and made an illegal U-turn through an orphanage offscreen. He also drove recklessly after SpongeBob ripped up his license and the police told him to simply pull over and nearly hit several people as well. Basically, Patrick gets off scot-free for his actions while SpongeBob goes to jail simply for littering

(by snide2012)

S3 E24 - 25: New Student Starfish/Clams

OKAY- this episode made me grit my teeth. (just want to say, yet again the episode number could be incorrect!) Wiki synopsis:

SpongeBob is about to leave for boating school when Patrick asks him to go jellyfishing. SpongeBob says that he has go to school, but suggests that Patrick come with him, to which Patrick agrees. Upon arriving at school, SpongeBob shows Patrick around and explains their classroom's "Good Noodle" system, where Good Noodle stars are awarded to well-behaved students. SpongeBob has by far the most stars of anyone in the class. He also introduces Patrick to Roger, an egg in a case with only a lightbulb for warmth.

(my thoughts - later on in the episode, patrick RUINS his good noodle streak which made me nearly cry because it just triggers me for some reason to see a streak get ruined?)

When class starts, Mrs. Puff sees Patrick and asks him his name. Patrick gets nervous and replies with "twenty-four," which he and SpongeBob find incredibly funny. Mrs. Puff hears their jokes and catches them, letting Patrick off the hook with a warning since he is new, but gives SpongeBob a stronger warning that she expects more from him. Patrick then draws an insulting picture of Mrs. Puff and puts it on SpongeBob's desk. Mrs. Puff, thinking the picture is SpongeBob's doing, removes one of his stars from the Good Noodle Board as punishment for two classroom disruptions, much to SpongeBob's horror. Mrs. Puff then tells SpongeBob to move to the back of the room, where Patrick continues to annoy him. When SpongeBob snaps upon being annoyed that Patrick pestered him only to say a less-than-significant "Hi," an angry Mrs. Puff appears, sarcastically stating that SpongeBob can have his recess.

(my thoughts - im just glad the wiki agrees that patrick is a annoying cunt face)He has constantly made SpongeBobs life miserable with his aggressive hypocrisy and soulless jerky-ness tbh.

(I accidentally deleted the episode and season name :( but it's the episode about Patrick and SpongeBob being parents)

Wiki synopsis:

One day, after chatting with each other, SpongeBob and Patrick hear a noise that they suspect is one another, but realize that it's coming from a baby scallop in the middle of a coral plant who is alone and helpless with no parental guardian and has yet to develop the ability to fly. SpongeBob and Patrick take him in the former's house, name him "Junior," and raise him as their baby, with SpongeBob as the mother and Patrick as the father. After feeding Junior and changing his diaper, SpongeBob, Patrick, and Junior go out in Bikini Bottom through a montage. Returning home at night, they put Junior to sleep in a cradle in SpongeBob's bedroom then go to sleep themselves.The next morning, Patrick eats breakfast then explains that he has to go to work since he is the father, leaving SpongeBob to do housework. He promises to give SpongeBob a break when he gets home. Eventually, he returns home only to be exhausted from work, and then tiredly decides to sit on the chair and watch TV for the rest of the night. This goes on for several days until SpongeBob realizes that Patrick was a lazy father figure who broke his promises to assist him with Junior. Seeing his patience is completely terminated and fed up with Patrick's laziness, SpongeBob furiously lashes out at Patrick, showing him all the diapers that Junior used; including on Squidward's house from the outside. Patrick, feeling remorse, then realizes the error of his ways and promises to come home at 6:00 PM and give SpongeBob the whole night off.

The episode is basically about how hard it is to be a mother i guess, housewife with work-husband? like in the "oLdEn DaYs". Patrick in this episode, his "work" was actually him going to his rock (house) watching tv and eating junk food. Hes a lazy idiot. no, hes a SLOTHFUL idiot. (sloth as the deadly sin) Sloth is about a person not wanting to work, because of their lack of motivation. Patricks "work" is him just doing sloth. The work hes suppose to be doing is taking care of junior. Something i like about the wiki is this part:

After SpongeBob and Patrick say goodbye to Junior, they are proud to have looked after him. Patrick, learning his lesson, reconciles with SpongeBob by teasingly suggesting they would have another baby, shocking SpongeBob (knowing that he will probably do the same thing when they were taking care of him)

anyways, i could go on and on with more reasons i hate him and why hes NOT a better friend than anyone, but it been years since i watched the full show, thats why im rewatching it lol, made it up to season 4 or 5 so far so yeh.thanks for reading!!!! :)also sorry if i got any mistakes / typos !!

(1718 words??)

HELP- HOW LONG DID YOU SPEND ON THIS?! MY GOODNESS-

[dionysus-complex]

hello! I read you're "predominantly a Romanist" so I'm not really sure if you can help me but I have this question bugging me for weeks and I thought some clarity from people more expert than me could probably be insightful, so here's the tea: many generations of Italian high schoolers have been taught that Sappho was the headmaster of some sort of college (the term used in lit history books is "thiasus", but I'm 99% sure this is some wild anachronism, and that if such institution even existed it was certainly not called that); according to Ye Olde Books, this thiasus was some sort of bon ton academy to prep young girls for womanhood and marriage, and Sappho's homoerotic poetry must be therefore viewed through this "socratic" lens. Herein lies the issue, that while there seems to be no ancient evidence to prove or disprove this fact, every Italian schoolbook I've stumbled upon either in high school or university never provided a source for this (they all mention the Souda which is problematic in itself, but even there it's only said that her pupils were so and so and so, not that she was actually the head of any formal institution). Plus, looking over on wikipedia, the Italian one takes the thiasus claim at face value without even giving a source (again), while the English wikipedia goes at a length to explain that this idea has no historical grounds and it's just a xix century suggestion. I've even stumbled upon this Maximus Tyrius rhetorician from the second century and he quotes Sappho's views on love and the women she loved, without explicitly saying they were her pupils or part of an academic circle.

So, here's my question: is this concept actually still taught in the Anglo world, and is there any substantial evidence for it? Is it just a weird little straightwashing lie that is still taught in my home country to try and justify any homoerotic reading of the Lesbian, or is there possibly any truth in it?

Sorry for the long ask but I'm going kinda insane here, and i thought one thing i could do is hear from some non Italians cause it's clear to me that all Italian texts are more or less a copypaste of each other on this subject; if you could please tell me anything about this I'd be so thankful, thanks a lot xoxo

Hello! It's been a minute since I've been seriously engaged with Sappho scholarship, but this is something I am familiar with.

The short answer is, no, as far as I know there is no real ancient evidence for it and the concept has generally been regarded as debunked in English-language scholarship since the 90s. The oldest source we have for the concept is the 10th c. CE Souda, which (as you mention) is deeply problematic for a variety of reasons, and it seems probable that the idea of Sappho's thiasos originates with one of the many Greek comedies about Sappho (Sappho was something of a stock character in Greek comedy, with the joke typically being her excessive (hetero-)sexuality rather than homosexuality). The idea seems to have been picked up by 19th century German scholars, and the argument for it relies on the testimony in the Souda along with apparent parallels between Sappho's expression of homoerotic desire and the homoerotic language between women and girls in Alcman's parthenaia, which do have a context of chorus trainer/trainee relationships. However, there is probably no good reason to assume that Alcman/Sappho parallels make for a strong argument considering that the texts come from entirely different city-states and social contexts. I do know that Renate Schlesier has argued for a much less heteronormative and IMO more plausible version of the thiasos idea, which is essentially that the circle of women mentioned in Sappho's poetry is not any kind of "academy to prepare (aristocratic) young women for marriage" but a circle of enslaved sex workers/courtesans (hetairai). Schlesier cites the fact that the female personal names mentioned in Sappho's poetry are all names that would typically be associated with enslaved women and hetairai, at least prior to the Hellenistic period, and considering that the symposium was probably the main venue for the performance of erotic lyric in antiquity this seems to make a good deal of sense.

I won't recommend the article that essentially debunked the thiasos idea on account of its author being a truly awful person for unrelated reasons, but I would recommend this excellent Eidolon piece on "Re-Queering Sappho" as well as Melissa Mueller's 2021 chapter "Sappho and Sexuality" in The Cambridge Companion to Sappho (link here, but probably requires a library subscription) which covers the history of the idea very well and presents a compelling reworking of the idea of Sappho's circle in a way that embraces rather than resists the queerness of Sappho's poetry.

[treadmilltreats]

Is it okay for a world leader's buttons to be pressed?

I would have written about this yesterday but I thought it was more important to write about 9/11 as we should never forget the terrorism that took place on the United States soil and let us not forget what took place on our own government steps that was pushed by this man who is trying to run for office and bring us back there once again.

So if you watched the debate the other night, you saw a shit show. You saw Trump unravel as Harris pushed all of his buttons.

And all she had to do was talk about what would bruise his ego to get there. She spoke about his crowd size, his ex employees talking about him, past bankruptcies, and his inherited wealth. That was enough to unhinge Trump. He lost it, repeating again and again how great he was, how his crowds were the biggest, and how he did the best job. Typical narcissistic behavior. And in case you don't know about narcissists, let me fill you in since I am an expert, being married to one for 24 years.

“A narcissist, by definition, is someone with a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy,”

Her pokes at him spun him out of control, causing him to tell more than 30 lies during this debate, according to fact checkers. But that's not anything new. According to the Washington Post, during his four years in office, the former president told more than 30,500 lies, or an average of about 21 false claims daily. Even Wikipedia has this number on their site. That's pretty bad when you're in Wikipedia.

Seriously, is this the man you want to run our country? A man who, when poked, will unravel? A man who can't ever admit he is wrong? A man who lies time and time again to inflate his own ego. Maybe you “Christians” forgot what ego is. Ego is edging God out. You believe that you're bigger than God.

Hell, this man believes he is God. He tweeted that he is "the greatest President for Jews and for Israel in the history of the world," that "the Jewish people in Israel love him like he's the King of Israel" and even that "They love him like he is the second coming of God."

Who would say this? Only a narcissist.

So today, my friends, we all watched this live, we all saw this man lose it in just one debate. Is this the man who should deal with world leaders? Deal with other narcissist dictators? A man who, when poked about himself, will spin out of control and tell 30 lies in that of a short period of time? The button to the world lies at his fingertips, and he's self-centered enough to push it to show everyone that “he is the man”

We don't need this in the White House. We already read this story, and the sequel is never, ever better.

“Be the change you want to see”

@TreadmillTreats

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[imminent-danger-came]

Hi there! I don't really see the appeal of tragedy because to me it means everyone dies, the end is just defeat, and there are no resolutions whatsoever to the conflict, but that might just be a me thing.

And! If you're into tragedy and badass woman in action, you should give the webseries RWBY a try! You like tragedy, heavy thematic shows, gray morality, and consequences? Also badass women. This show is also hopepunk, if you don't mind that.

Do you mind elaborating on SWK's self-isolating, self-sacrificing, and terrible communication issues? Those puzzle me but it may be because I'm denser than a black hole.

Have a great month! Sleep early regularly.

Let me just quote the Wikipedia definition of tragedy:

"Tragedy is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy is to invoke an accompanying catharsis, or a "pain [that] awakens pleasure", for the audience."

For me, tragedy isn't just about the inevitable end—it's about the love and effort that was there despite it. I find real catharsis in that I think. But I also don't think a tragedy has to be full of death to be a tragedy! To me, MK's s4 arc of feeling that no matter what he does, he's just going to cause more pain and suffering is tragic. I think Wukong hurting the people he cares about while trying to protect them is tragic. But then there's also Azure, who died barely fixing the world he himself broke, ultimately failing to bring about the change he dreamed of. That's tragic!

So, I wouldn't say tragedies are only about death and defeat and that there are no resolutions. I often think of Orpheus and Eurydice, where every time you hope Orpheus won't turn around, but he does, and he does it out of love. And Eurydice can't blame him, because what can she blame him for except that he loved her. Both you and I and everyone we love are going to meet that same inevitable end, but our love and hope and passions still matters. A tragedy only hurts because someone cared.

Okay, completely switching gears here lol.

I watched the first...maybe 6 volumes of RWBY forever ago in high school, and I remember liking it! I got a really full list of things I need to get through at the moment, but maybe one day I pick it up again.

And, here's a meta where I talk about SWK's flaws (written post-s4 and pre-special)! I only go into his terrible communication and his self-sacrificial nature there, but when it comes to Wukong isolating himself I think that goes hand in hand with his tendency to run off ("I'm going to do what I should have done initially: stop the Lady Bone Demon—alone."). It's also what he did after sealing DBK—he disappeared and isolated himself on flower fruit mountain. It's just kinda what he does.

[winterpinetrees]

Nerd Behavior (The Gap Years Part 19) 

July 1st 2019

Coconino National Forest, AZ

Everyone is a nerd here. The road trip group gets a beach episode and talks about movies, the Mercurali play board games, and Amedi discovers what a Wikipedia rabbit hole is.

..............

“You know what I just realized about the Project Excalibur site?” 

Sierra Bracken is trying to distract the rest of the party from her current predicament. They’re back at high altitude, over seven thousand feet, and by the shores of a reservoir that looks more like a winding canyon. To be more specific, the so-called shores are rugged rock faces fifteen feet high, and Sierra is stuck at the bottom. It turns out that two elves, a man who climbs abandoned buildings for fun, and a tall varsity recruit are all outliers when it comes to scrambling up wet rocks. Sierra is five foot three on a good day and a little cursed at the moment. Also the sun is starting to set. 

“What did you realize?” Brian shouts down. He’s smiling, but it’s not exactly an encouraging smile.

“Excalibur is like, the reverse Area 51,” she says and clambers up, again, onto one of the huge brown stones. “They’re both in the Nevada Test Range, but one is where humans study aliens and one is where aliens study humans!” 

Clay has one arm inside of Marin’s fashionable messenger bag. He turns to him, “are you aliens? Also that’s not funny”. 

“Marin and I decided that elves count as aliens only when it’s funny. And it is”.

“We did do that,” Marin replies solemnly. He’s down on one knee drying out his long dreadlocks with a towel. Like Brian, he isn’t very concerned. 

Some time passes, not long, maybe two minutes, but they’re all eighteen and don’t really expect to reach September alive. Sierra does not succeed in getting any further up the rock face. 

Brian fakes a theatrical accent and crouches down. “I don’t suppose you could speed things up?”

“Don’t you dare quote The Princess Bride at me”. She pauses for a moment, half-way up a large rock. Sierra has a heavier build, but a lot of her upper body is muscle. It’s just the curse making her left shoulder sluggish causing this whole situation. Sierra rolls her eyes and gives Brian his response in the same fake voice. 

“If you’re so anxious to hurry things, you could lower a rope or a tree branch or find something useful to do!” Then she says something in Spanish that she knows Brian won’t understand. 

“Already on it!” Clay says quickly. He looks over the edge of the cliff, winks at Sierra, and tosses her the end of a rope he’s taken from the bag. Then he shoves Brian as hard as he can. 

“Not while I’m down here, idiot!” she yells back. Fortunately, or maybe not, the champion wrestler does not fall. She remembers too late that Brian has two older brothers (and they’re both not great guys) as he clamps a hand around Clay’s wrist and threatens to drag them both over the edge. They hang there in the golden sunset light before Clay throws himself backward. He slams into the dirt and Brian comes with him. Everyone is shouting now and Sierra is still at the bottom of the cliff.

Eventually they do make it back to their campsite. Zerada left the reservoir before them, and she sits alone, slowly feeding wood into a small fire. Her amber eyes reflect the flames, but Sierra doesn’t think they’re actually glowing with magic. She matches the scene well. In fact, Zerada doesn’t seem to own much that isn’t her family’s burnt orange. Marin only really wears emerald green when he has to be formal. Most of his outfits have been olive and tan. 

The humans pull folding chairs from the car and Marin sits down on a log. They’re in the dead center of Arizona, so far from city lights that there’s a state-of-the-art telescope twenty miles away. Despite that, they’ve chosen a real campsite instead of the side of a back road. That means they have the best of both worlds. Running water, and a location so deep in the woods that there’s no way they will be found tonight.

So they talk. Marin was confused by their reference to The Princess Bride and by some oversight they didn’t bring a CD of it (but they do have every Star Wars movie, so that’s something), so the humans try their best to act out the story themselves. It turns out that Clay is a shockingly good pirate. Brian takes every character that is either blond or seven feet tall, leaving Sierra to pick up the role of a swordsman chasing revenge. However, revenge stories get a bit more complicated with elves around. It’s been exactly three (human) weeks since a coup killed both of their own fathers. The list of casualties made that very clear. Zerada’s father was killed by Arjuna Kotija Mercuralis, an assassin and illusionist who is also the husband of the new apex. Marin’s father was killed by an upstart noblewoman named Hebe from a less powerful genus. They talk like all of it’s normal. Their parents died fighting like all nobles should, and the humans shouldn’t worry, but even Sierra can tell that they aren’t being honest. Marin may be happy enough to follow Brian's instructions and pretend to be a Rodent Of Unusual Size for one of the scenes, but he’s an orphan now, and that’s got to leave something behind. 

Or at least how Sierra would feel. He hardly ever talks about his parents. His mother was the old apex, and she lived in the human world for decades. She doesn't know anything about his father at all. Maybe he's glad they're gone. When a person is so used to power, children can feel like just another thing to own. She's lucky to be close with both of her parents, but Brian and Clay aren't. Still, Sierra’s starting to wonder what they’ll do if this adventure lasts longer than the summer. They’re all taking a gap year, but they did have plans, and it’s not like they can be on the road forever. It’ll be a national scandal if they don’t come back for the big Christmas party. More than that, she doesn’t want to be off at college if the world ends. She’s thrilled to be going to MIT (meeting people with her interests who aren’t like 30!) but, well, her weird little family is close.  She’ll wreck the Audacity, the crazy passion project that she built with her mom, if she has to, but losing her family to a doomsday plague is just not an option. Not her parents, not her siblings, not even the two idiot boys beside her. 

By the time they finish the “movie”, the sunset is over and the light of one of the darkest skies in America glows through the ponderosa pines. After a week in Vegas, the silver arc of the galaxy stuns Sierra as though she’s never seen it before. Jupiter floats near the horizon with bright-red Antares, but most of the stars Sierra knows are lost in the clouds of light. She's used to the Summer Triangle being the only thing in the sky, not it being the three brightest dots in a sea of stars. Sierra rubs her hands together. It’s not cold, but they’ve started to shake again. Hopefully from the climb and the rope, and not the curse. She nearly jumps when she realizes that Zerada is standing beside her. Elves are too quiet for their own good. The noblewoman lifts a hand to point to the center of the stellar triangle. 

“Can you see those two stars?” she asks. Sierra’s a little confused. They haven’t talked much before.

“No". Well, that was rude! She tries again. “I mean, you’re pointing at the band of the Milky Way. There’s a lot of stars”.

Zerada scoffs. “First, that’s a stupid name. Your society should stop listening to the Ancient Greeks. Second, there is a constellation. Humans call it Vulpecula, "little fox’”. 

“So we should only listen to the ancient Greeks when they make you look good? Tiny little constellation anyways". Zerada gives her a very fox-like grin. Sierra sighs and sits back down. She’s had quite the evening, and has this headache, and would rather just be quiet.

………

“Ryn! Ishtar! I have an urgent question about wild human society!” Amedi Kebero bursts into the Apex's living quarters while the family play dice games that even a master tactician like Ryn can’t always win. The sky outside the wide windows is deep indigo between the clouds. They’re a good deal west of the pine forests, and the sun has only just set. 

“You should probably ask your seneschal unless it is about science fiction,” Arjuna explains. He’s a very serene man, despite his legendary kill count. 

“She’s busy wrangling the computers to track license plates,” Amedi replies breathlessly. They sit cross legged beside the low table.  Fen is stealing his sister's dice to make an even taller stack. “I know the general location of the humans- deep in a pine forest beside a lake, there’s only a few options- and I’ve already sent an update, but I have a question”.

“Then ask it, Councillor. We’re rather busy”. Even sitting down playing a board game, Ishtar Mercuralis is larger than life. She's physically strong in a way that high nobility never are, and there's a depth to her dark eyes. She smiles down at Amedi, but well, she’s still smiling down. 

“What in the worlds is The Princess Bride?”

Everyone looks at Ryn. He’s spent the most time in the human world by far. “A film, I believe?” 

Amedi’s shoulders sink. “The humans have been talking about it all evening. It is a film, but also some sort of European folktale? They’re obsessed”.

“You should ask the reference clerks to find out, if you are still curious,” Arjuna says.

“Or… you could go to the human world and search for it there!” Suen replies. She’s lived her entire life in the age of advanced human technology. When Amedi was born, humans hadn’t even discovered radiation. Now “human computer” means a thinking metal box instead of a human that computes. It’s kind of infuriating because magic makes it all glitch and break down.

“Thank you! Good night!” They untangle their limbs and dash for the door. The table shakes and Fen’s tower of dice scatters. Suen shouts goodbye back. The adults are laughing behind them. 

Not long after, Amedi all but kicks down the heavy door leading to one of the computing rooms. There are around thirty uniformed humans sitting at desks, even this late at night. All of them are working to manage the data that wild humans could handle with a few lines of code. They all look up and stare. There’s a separation between humans and elves. No one with a vambrace ever intrudes in an office like this, not when they have seneschals instead. Amedi calls out for Esther and one of the clerks points towards the supervisor's office. They tear that door open too. 

Amedi stands in the doorway like an outlaw back for revenge. Scars and a bioluminescent tattoo stand out on their dark brown skin, and they look built for a battlefield, not an office.  The two humans had been arguing, but they both fall utterly silent. 

“Esther?”

She turns, eyes wide. “Is something wrong?”

“No, no, nothing to worry about. I need your help in the human world. Tech stuff”.

“Oh! Of course. I’m very skilled with technology”. She is! Esther can hack. It’s really impressive.

“All I need are a pair of hands that won’t corrupt the stuff”. That’s an exaggeration. Nobles can use human technology, it's just unreliable and breaks down over time. The vambraces that all graduates of the Conservatory wear are at the limit of processing power before the magic of a high noble starts messing with the hardware. Fifty years ago, that limit could run programs that seemed like magic to wilders. Now it’s about as powerful as a fancy calculator. 

Amedi is already turning to leave. “Grab some clothes that look wild. We’re switching worlds”.

There’s no arguing with that. Esther ends her conversation and follows behind them as they walk back to their living quarters. She starts to say something, but hesitates. The girl doesn’t do that often. If anything, Esther is typically too honest. 

“What is it?” Amedi says. 

“There are ways to access the internet from the palace, but I assume you want to visit San Francisco anyway”.

“Unrestricted internet? That works?” 

“Well enough for us seneschals to stream workplace comedies, Dee”.

Amedi scoffs and moves to ruffle Esther’s hair, but they’re really just petting the top of her head like a dog. “So that’s where you disappear to! I’d been wondering if a raptor picked you up and flew away”.  

“I promise that none of Genus Tiercel are trying to abduct me, especially not with my family history”. She moves their hand away, “and I’m not that short”.

Esther leads Amedi through servant’s passages deep into the palace. The walls are solid concrete and they can recognize the lead lining around the door. 

“Isn’t this a bit far from seneschal quarters?” they ask.

Esther smiles and opens the door, “Callum would kill me if I shared our secrets. This is for the maintenance staff. What are you looking for anyway?” 

The room is… a lounge? It’s windowless and loud from fans, but the room is full of chairs and tables from a dozen different styles. Maybe two dozen humans watch television and play cards. They look at Amedi with clear reverence, but most glare at Esther. Amedi glares back. Their seneschal deserves respect.

“Marin’s companions keep talking about this movie called The Princess Bride?”

Esther starts typing into one of the unused computers. “I’ve heard of it”. She opens a search engine and finds her way to the Wikipedia page before leaving Amedi the chair. The elf sits and begins to read. Wild humans are so, so, strange…

And someone is shaking them by the shoulders. They turn and raise a jagged dagger of red magical light, and Esther flinches away with terror in her eyes. They’ve missed her neck by only an inch. 

“Councillor, I-” 

“Life and death, Esther! You know you can’t sneak up on me like that!”

She takes a breath only after Amedi lowers the knife. “Yes. I know better… but you’ve got to get some rest. It’s nearly midnight”. 

The room has no natural light, but the people have changed and the television is playing a different film. Oh not again. The computer screen glows with the wikipedia page for fixed-term elections in the United States Senate. How did they get here? Maybe it’s for the best that the elven world doesn’t have this sort of infrastructure. They’d never be able to get anything done. 

“Thank you, Essie,” they smile to try and relieve some of the tension. “Maybe Marin’s humans have the right idea. I’ve got to get outside more”. 

“We should both touch some grass,” she adds.

“What?”

“Wild human internet slang”.

Amedi stretches like a cat and laughs. “I’m going to tell Ishtar’s kids all about it”.

….….….….….

Every day is a good day to think about The Princess Bride.

Esther has a fully functional computer in her room (Part 15). No, she is not going to tell anyone. 

The phrase “touch grass” is a slight anachronism (it didn’t really become popular until COVID) but I think it's funny. 

[mariana-oconnor]

The Greek Interpreter pt 1

I remember this one. Yet again, I remember details, but no solutions. But I might recall more as I read along. I've definitely read this one multiple times and seen the Granada version of it. I will absolutely try not to spoil if I remember anything that gives the ending away.

I actually find it surprising how many times I have read some of these and how the thing I almost always forget is the solution. Weirdly, with Agatha Christie mysteries the who and how is usually the thing that sticks in my mind, apparently with Sherlock Holmes, I remember weird details rather than the relevant stuff.

Anyway, on with the tale:

During my long and intimate acquaintance with Mr Sherlock Holmes I had never heard him refer to his relations, and hardly ever to his own early life. This reticence upon his part had increased the somewhat inhuman effect which he produced upon me, until sometimes I found myself regarding him as an isolated phenomenon, a brain without a heart, as deficient in human sympathy as he was pre-eminent in intelligence.

The first thing I thought was 'Spock', because that post kept going across my dash a little while ago about how many 'surprise' relatives Spock had during TOS. And this whole thing reads very vulcan. I'm going to assume that's because Spock was intentionally or subconsciously based on Sherlock Holmes.

However, here we get the modern and very uncomplimentary image of Sherlock as 'a brain without a heart', which we've seen multiple times to be untrue. I'd say that anyone can fake empathy and kindness, and that a lot of people affect having more of these than they actually feel, that in many ways is part of the social contract. Perhaps I am cynical.

But particularly in the case of Mary Sutherland, where Sherlock threatens her stepfather and appears genuinely angry on her behalf, and on several other occasions where he refers to villains in very scathing and angry terms, we see evidence of feeling that seems genuinely emotional on behalf of someone else. That seems less potentially fake to me than the gentleness. (I'm not saying the gentleness is faked, I'm just saying that there's more of an argument to say that he could/would be faking with that - to put people at ease, to get more information out of them - as opposed to the more negative emotions he declares to himself or to Watson in private which have little purpose other than to vent emotion.)

However, Watson's being a little unfair, here. Also, his reasoning is faulty.

His aversion to women and his disinclination to form new friendships were both typical of his unemotional character, but not more so than his complete suppression of every reference to his own people.

None of this is a sign of someone who doesn't have emotions. These are just signs of a queer introvert with a complicated relationship with their family, Watson. In fact, I'd also suggest that someone who effectively never mentions their family probably has quite strong emotions about that subject. You don't avoid talking about something you don't care about one way or the other.

I get that this is all set up, but I just wanted to say.

...one day, to my very great surprise, he began to talk to me about his brother.

Mycroft time is upon us!

In a bit we're going to get to one of the character descriptions that sticks in my brain the most out of all the things I have ever read. It's Watson's description of Mycroft and Roald Dahl's description of the Twits. Those two haunt me to this day.

...the conversation, which had roamed in a desultory, spasmodic fashion from golf clubs to the causes of the change in the obliquity of the ecliptic, came round at last to the question of atavism and hereditary aptitudes.

I swear I'm not going to quote every paragraph of this part. But this is such a lot of words. 'Obliquity of the ecliptic'? I literally work with words and have a degree in them and I had to look that up.

Wikipedia tells me: 'Obliquity of the ecliptic is the term used by astronomers for the inclination of Earth's equator with respect to the ecliptic, or of Earth's rotation axis to a perpendicular to the ecliptic.'

The ecliptic being the orbital plane of the earth.

So it's the angle between the axis the earth spins around and the circle of the earth's orbit around the sun. Which... has Holmes learnt that the earth revolves around the sun now?

So I guess what Watson is saying is 'we were having a very clever discussion like very clever people'.

But now they've gone onto the classic nature vs nurture debate.

Watson is all for nurture, while Holmes is arguing for nature because... drumroll... of his brother Mycroft!

"My dear Watson," said he, "I cannot agree with those who rank modesty among the virtues. To the logician all things should be seen exactly as they are, and to underestimate one's self is as much a departure from truth as to exaggerate one's own powers. When I say, therefore, that Mycroft has better powers of observation than I, you may take it that I am speaking the exact and literal truth."

Holmes has an excellent sense of self-worth, and I like how this centres the fact that he is realistic about it. He doesn't believe in false modesty, but he is willing to acknowledge some people are better than him even at the things he prides himself on.

"The Diogenes Club is the queerest club in London, and Mycroft one of the queerest men."

Yep. That's Mycroft. This is not the description I was talking about above. But boy, how the evolution of language changes the potential meanings of a text for readers.

"But he has no ambition and no energy. He will not even go out of his way to verify his own solution, and would rather be considered wrong than take the trouble to prove himself right."

Mycroft is also very relatable. He could try to prove himself right, but why bother when his chair is so comfortable and he already knows he's right? There's no point. And he'd have to move, ugh. I actually quite like Mycroft as a character, even in the original stories, and I like that he cares so little about other people's opinions that he doesn't care if they think he's wrong. Mycroft is a hobbit and you cannot convince me otherwise. He sits in his comfy hobbit hole, smokes pipeweed and eats food and people watches, and doesn't want anything to do with adventure, no sir. Why would he want that when there's a comfy chair, a nice pair of slippers and second breakfast about to be served?

Mycroft Holmes was a much larger and stouter man than Sherlock. His body was absolutely corpulent, but his face, though massive, had preserved something of the sharpness of expression which was so remarkable in that of his brother. His eyes, which were of a peculiarly light, watery grey, seemed to always retain that far-away, introspective look which I had only observed in Sherlock's when he was exerting his full powers. "I am glad to meet you, sir," said he, putting out a broad, fat hand like the flipper of a seal.

Here it is. The description that will stick with me forever: 'like the flipper of a seal'. That's just so... very evocative. And unflattering. All those wet, clammy implications. Also, Watson really wants you to know Mycroft is fat, btw. In case you didn't notice. But yeah, not a flattering description, but not as judgemental as his descriptions of other people. There is a certain respect in this description - until we get to that seal simile. Yeah... the seal thing really gets to me. It makes me shudder a bit every time. It's strange, because I always remember the bit before as being more scathing, but it's actually quite matter of fact, if repetitive. It's the seal thing that really adds a weird edge of mild disgust to the whole thing. And I love seals.

Is there an animated version of Sherlock Holmes where they're all animals and Mycroft is a seal? There should be.

"By the way, Sherlock, I expected to see you round last week, to consult me over that Manor House case. I thought you might be a little out of your depth." "No, I solved it," said my friend, smiling.

The sibling energy is strong in this whole exchange. Just that competitive little edge they have with each other.

"An old soldier, I perceive," said Sherlock. "And very recently discharged," remarked the brother. "Served in India, I see." "And a non-commissioned officer." "Royal Artillery, I fancy," said Sherlock. "And a widower." "But with a child." "Children, my dear boy, children."

Just the utter rhythm of this and the clear fact that this is a game they have played with each other for years, both trying to outdo the other, but it all seems quite amicable. It reminds me of playing games in the back of the car with my big brother on long car journeys. He was always better than me at them, but we still had fun.

The Sherlock-Mycroft double act is a well-practised performance. I love it. Then Watson gives them the opportunity to show off their working and they do that as a double act as well.

I think you can absolutely see Mycroft's existence as explaining things about Sherlock - why he enjoys having Watson around to explain things to and show off for. As a child, clearly he was always the one slightly behind his brother and it makes sense that he enjoys having someone impressed by him the same way he was probably impressed by Mycroft as a child.

Absolutely no case in this section. Just Mycroft. And honestly I am fine with that. This scene is iconic.

[othernaut]

Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society: the funniest fucking Wikipedia article I've ever read.

It starts off so, so strong.

You know you're getting into some prime, dry-narrative/hilarious-subject Wikipedia magic here. The sheer absurdity of the phrase slaps you in the face like a single, tyrannical testicle. But what is the subject, if not Hitler's lonely genital? To quote:

"Hitler Has Only Got One Ball", sometimes known as "The River Kwai March", is a World War II British song, the lyrics of which, sung to the tune of the World War I-era "Colonel Bogey March", impugn the masculinity of Nazi leaders by alleging they had missing, deformed, or undersized testicles."

And again...

"The song has been cited as an example of morally-correct disrespect that used political mockery to boost morale in wartime."

So, in short, a meme song. A World War II meme song. About Hitler's balls. Ball. But Hitler's ball does not stand alone! We have so many other nads to talk about, as the lyrics propose:

"Hitler has only got one ball, Göring has two but very small, Himmler is rather sim'lar, But poor old Goebbels has no balls at all."

And which, being magical, beautiful Wikipedia, came...

... with reference images...

... the world's most beautifully captioned reference images...

... for every single line...

... of the song. Fuck me, I need these printed on a flag, that I might wave it around at protests.

The article then just delves into analysis, the kind of in-depth Hitler Study analysis that comes from generations of bone-dry academics with respected positions and better salaries than me picking apart every single word, reference, and poetic intimation of a four-line World War II meme song. For example...

Suggestions, opinions, papers written about Hitler's one ball. Respected academics whistling the ball song in between measured responses. And what the hell is mad studies?

Well, that's going to be me for the rest of the night. But no! We mustn't get distracted! If we do, we miss the gender theory!

The Shakespeare!

The guy trying to profit off of the meme song!

The apocrypha!

And the second verse!

Rommel has four or five, I guess, No one's quite sure 'bout Rudolf Hess, Schmeling's always yelling, But poor old Goebbels has no balls at all.

Which is where we get into the most wonderfully Wikipedia part of it all as, being a hyperlinked encyclopedia of everything, every single reference, diversion, supposition, paper, field of study, side subject and random-ass tangent links into an evening's worth of wide-eyed eurekae initiated, again, by a World War II meme song about testicles. Nothing has made me want to donate two bucks to Wikipedia more than this.

History is a liquid. It takes the shape of its container, that being the cultural context of the present moment. The most magical moments in history, I find, are those points when people act like people - Pompeii's dirty graffiti, the fart enlightenment poem, the sports riots, the little obsessions, in-jokes, and memes. That jolt of connection when you see a 2,000-year-old dick drawn onto a latrine wall and recognize not only what it is but why it is - that is actually, seriously one of the most compelling feelings of human unity there is. People are still people. People were always people. Farts will always be funny. When we're alone and scared, we'll sing songs about balls, and that's unironically what makes us wonderful.

And so, in the same vein, to the same melody, but for a new time, I'd like to submit...

Bezos' dick fell off in space

Jerkin' it on the human race

Elon's has got no feelin'

I don't think Zuck had one in the first place.