#midland line

[starbuck]

john darnielle will say “no you don’t understand guys, this line was SO bad, it’s literally the worst thing ever i couldn’t even release the song because it was so awful and i couldn’t fix it,” and then the line will be “I've got a Kenmore single-room window unit air conditioner.”

[daiisoo]

Midline coming back 👐👐👐

[ahollowgrave]

Day 28: Love

Grief is a friend.

Odette, as a character, is all about Life and Death, Love and Grief. How they are the same coin, how they’re vital cycles. Knowing Death awaits you at the end of your life doesn’t mean you don’t live while you can.

Knowing that grief will be a common house guest doesn’t stop us from grasping love with both hands, shouldn’t stop us from loving as loudly and proudly and fully as we can.

When you meet grief for the first time it is easy to think of it as an antagonist. But grief has always been your friend.

[prudentfolly]

Day Six - Memory

A younger Prudence sits outside the Skysteel Manufactory on a much-needed smoke break.

[the-wardens-torch]

Man, 7.1 is really hitting us hard with these elegantly lit, lingering closeups of our WoLs' faces, isn't it? I got like 8 of these in the first 10 minutes of the MSQ. I know a lot of people are dissatisfied with the graphics updates, but I've been staring at Fal for nearly 10 years now (I've never once fantasia-ed) and he's never looked better.

[mountaingoatsfirstlineaday]

HOLD ON IS MIDLAND FROM JENNY'S PERSPECTIVE

[melivora]

Every time Phil mentions being from the north I get so northriotic even though I barely pass as northern lmao

[uomminecraftsociety]

Part 12 in shipping different railway companies together, I guess this, like Part 10 isn't exactly a ship.

May I introduce you to the London Airport Express Group. They aren't a relationship or anything, just a LinkedIn group of airport workers in and around London. They work on a fast, frequent and efficient working.

The group consists of: Heathrow Express, she is the prestigious and classy one. Gatwick Express, he does a fast intercity service serving a much larger region out of anyone in the group. Stansted Express, she is the dedicated in the group but still works well, though doesn't work quite as efficiently.

Other people want to join the group: East Midlands, who doesn't operate a proper direct service. Greater Anglia, who doesn't even try to work efficiently. Elizabeth Line, which does work is kind of accepted as a friend of the group as she was a friend of Heathrow Express' now dead sister (Heathrow Connect).

[fletchlingfletcher]

|| Oh, and my love    did I mistake you for a                                         sign                                                from                                                       god ||

[streetsofdublin]

GREAT WESTERN SQUARE IS A NICE AREA AS IS THE SMALL PARK

The Great Western Square area is located just south of St. Peter’s Church and school on the North Circular Road. It is bounded by Great Western Avenue to the north, Broadstone Bus depot to the south, the railway line to the west and Avondale Road to the e

PHIBSBOROUGH 4 JANUARY 2025 It is a while since I last visited this area. The Great Western Square area is located just south of St. Peter’s Church and school on the North Circular Road. It is bounded by Great Western Avenue to the north, Broadstone Bus depot to the south, the railway line to the west and Avondale Road to the east. The area includes Great Western Square and Great Western…

[mjalford98]

British Rail class 50s no 50007 & 50049 double head a southbound train of InterCity carriages under the wires of the West Coast Main Line, passing over the River Penk on the approach to Penkridge with the returning "Grampian Highlander" railtour organised by Pathfinder.

I took these shots from the nearby road bridge, setting up my DJI gimbal camera on a tripod to film the train while I took the still images on my Fujifilm camera, whose annoying electronic shutter squeak can be heard in the video. This was also on a tripod, which was great for getting a full set of reasonably sharp images, from which I could then select the best composition - shame about the noise, but I'm not too bothered. I actually think the bit of noise helps make the shot feel like it might have been taken in the 1980s, when trains looked just like this, and of course the timeless landscape only lends more visual interest and period atmosphere to the scene. Good for prints, merchandise, and stock photo/video downloads, so I'm quite excited to have bagged these, even if I'm currently £50 poorer for it!

[trainphilos]

...of Anoraks, Pufferküsser and Tragics!

A short foreword and explanation: My friend Michael in London has been doing a blog since blogs became a thing. He started out to review, comment on and complain about all things Apple. Hence the blog’s URL: www.macfilos.com. However over the years his obsession with photography and cameras, in particular Leica equipment, became the main focus of his blog. The blog name stayed the same, but it is…

[blueiscoool]

Stone With 1,600-Year-Old Irish Inscription Found in English Garden

A geography teacher, Graham Senior, stumbled across a rock with mysterious incisions while tidying his overgrown garden in Coventry, England. The discovery of a small stone carved with an early form of Celtic script has caused excitement among archaeologists.

The rectangular sandstone rock was found by Graham Senior in Coventry during lockdown in 2020 while he was weeding, but its true value was only recently understood.

The 11-centimeter-long and 139-gram rectangular sandstone rock had cryptic inscriptions on it that suggested a history spanning over 1,600 years, all written in the mysterious Ogham alphabet.

Ogham is an early medieval alphabet used to write the Archaic Irish language from the 4th to the 6th century and Old Irish from the 6th to the 9th century. It is usually found carved on stones in Ireland, Wales, and western Britain. It was the first written language in Ireland. The majority of the 400 or so known inscriptions from the Archaic Irish period are family name pillars that were built to announce land ownership.

Ogham is an extremely unique writing system among all writing systems, with lines arranged in groups of one to five only. The stones provide insight into the Irish language before the use of the Latin insular script.

Finds liaison officer for the Birmingham Museums Trust, Teresa Gilmore, told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland that the discovery on an Ogham stone in the English midlands was a rare find.

“These finds do not turn up in the midlands. The bulk of Ogham inscriptions are found over in Ireland,” she said.

Professor Katherine Forsyth of Celtic Studies at the University of Glasgow conducted additional research that shed more light on the stone’s provenance. Her findings point to a period suggesting a timeframe ranging from the fifth to sixth centuries, with the possibility of an even earlier date in the fourth century.

The stone is inscribed on three of its four sides. The inscription on the stone, “Maldumcail/S/ Lass,” puzzled researchers, with interpretations pointing towards a version of the personal name Mael Dumcail, but the meaning of the S and LASS is unclear. Given the usual purpose and significance of ogham stones, it may be a location reference.

Theories regarding the origins of the stone abound, with speculations ranging from migration patterns to the presence of early medieval monasteries in the region.

The rock will be displayed at the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry, to which Senior has donated it permanently. It will feature in the forthcoming Collecting Coventry exhibition, which opens on 11 May.

By Oguz Kayra.

[baddywronglegs]

England doesn’t have a North-South divide. But if it did have one, Cornwall would be in the North.

Now I’m not saying there isn’t a big geographical divide between like, Manchester and Canterbury, or that the country’s a homogeneous patchwork, what I’m saying is this divide isn’t north-south and thinking about it as such masks a lot of things.

Oh, and I am, for necessity of discussing this divide, going to be ignoring the Midlands. I hope you forgive me ignoring the deep cultural ties between Birmingham and Rutland.

Map Men made a video about the North-South divide in England (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENeCYwms-Cc&ab_channel=JayForeman), which focused on the line determined by Danny Dorling in 2008.

… Which isn’t a north-south divide. It’s a northwest-southeast divide, going up at more than 45 degrees – it’s more an east-west divide than it is a north-south. It also includes Wales in “the North” but we’ll get to that.

But it was a north-south divide he set out to find, so a north-south divide he sort of drew, excluding exclaves and enclaves where the metrics he was looking at would make that not a north-south divide.

Notably, several would seem to put the west country peninsula in “the North”… So what’s up with that?

(Dorling's full paper is here, and I recommend looking through the whole thing to see how he arrived at the divide he eventually concluded: https://www.dannydorling.org/wp-content/files/dannydorling_publication_id2938.pdf)

Anyway. This is what’s up with that:

This is a geological map of Great Britain (and the Isle of Man, which isn’t actually part of the UK or any of its constituent countries but I guess it’s here anyway.)

Here again, in the boundary between Jurassic and Triassic geology, is that diagonal line from the Humber to the Severn, but continuing past both. For convenience, here are those two lines superimposed on one another.

With Danny Dorling’s line (frequently following county boundaries or other administrative boundaries) in blue, and the geological divide in red.

One line was drawn in 2008, the other has existed over 200 million years.

This isn’t a coincidence – it’s the reason for the divide.

What made “the North” is the industrial revolution. And one thing that drove the industrial revolution was the mines: coal, iron, silver, tin, the rocks beneath our feet and the people who dreamed they were worth more than the people they sent into the dark to bring it into the light.

Towns grew around mines, from Walker to South Crofty, and more than just the mines defining them, it was the mines closing that would cement the divide.

“Byker Hill and Walker Shore, collier lads forever more”

“Cornish lads are fishermen and Cornish lads are miners too”

- Two folk songs about regional identity’s roots in its industry, from opposite ends of this dividing line

In the West Midlands, the Black Country didn’t earn that name with caviar; it, like Manchester and Leeds, reinvented itself when the industry collapsed: cities built in the brick ruins of the temples built to the exploitation of the workers, blackened by the smokes of the cremation of its labour industry. When the light catches the steel and glass just right, you can still see the ghosts.

Even the country life outside the cities is shaped by this geology: the terrain north-west of this line doesn’t lend itself to large, flat expanses of land for arable farming, and the divide is visible again when looking at agriculture:

With the majority of land south of the Jurassic-Triassic line being arable, mixed and market gardening, with a fair amount of cattle in the Cotswolds and Chilterns and along the north side of the Thames, and the majority north-west of it being cattle and sheep – which are almost absent from the south side of the divide with the exception of the Isle of Wight and therefore, ironically, Cowes.

Not all farming is the same, the yearly flow of labour and of marketable goods between livestock and arable having little in common beyond being intensive work out-of-doors and taking huge amounts of land to accomplish.

But one thing that also goes hand in hand with this is that sheep aren’t mostly farmed for their meat but for their wool, and what drove industrialisation in the Pennines was the steam-loom: the mechanisation and mass-production of wool.

(Incidentally, on this map arable farming and market gardening also correlate with several types of English traditional dance: Molly, Border an East Midlands and East Riding plough dances, which began as a way for seasonal farmhands to make ends meet by busking with menaces in the winter off-season, but that’s for a later Morris ramble).

But hang on, that puts Hull on the same side of the divide as Kent, not, for example, Liverpool. So what gives there?

The East Riding isn’t built on mining - a kid with a bucket and spade could find the water table in most of the county.

Hull, and other ports of Yorkshire with it, was built on whaling – and not many industries have collapsed harder than whaling. For once, the geography of the land has little impact on this, but the geography of the sea does:

Between England and the European continent is a shallower stretch of sea called Dogger Bank – named for the Dutch cod-fishing boats known as Doggers which fished on it. But shallow water isn’t great for whales. So where is there water good for whales?

Well, whalers from Great Britain would venture as far as the Antarctic ocean in search of whales, and often hunted off Greenland – but there was water closer to home where whales did and still do frequent:

(There is still whaling in the North Sea. Around 500 minke whales are killed by Norwegian whalers each year “in objection to” the global ban on commercial whaling.)

Outside of this, there’s also a divide between port cities dealing primarily in cargo or primarily in passengers, something which is somewhat evening out by one means or another, but here’s a current map of UK passenger ports and their passenger numbers:

Or at least circles sized to correspond to their passenger numbers - source with stats: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/sea-passenger-statistics-all-routes-2021/sea-passenger-statistics-all-routes-2021

Compare this with a map of cargo ports by load:

Source with numbers: https://safety4sea.com/uk-ports-record-steady-performance-during-2018/

Generally showing passenger numbers getting lower the further you get from Dover, but not the same correlation with cargo (Plymouth and Holyhead both bucking this trend at a glance).

So, if not “The North” and “The South”, what name does make sense for this divide?

I propose “the South” be known as Lloegyr.

These names still exist: Domnonea still exists in Brittany both as a name for that same region from which Brittonic settlers came to Brittany and an area of Brittany named for them, and in Welsh, yr Alban is Scotland, Cymru is Wales and Lloegr is England.

Wales isn’t part of “the North”. “The North” is part of Wales.

[dollwrites]

𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 ∣ smut ( minors dni ), fem!queen!reader, sex on command, degradation, Griffith is lowkey misogynistic, titty fucking, spit kink, cum marking, all characters featured are aged 18+

𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 ∣ please reblog && leave feedback. not proofread so there’s probably mistakes. thanks for reading < 3

𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘁𝗼𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟯 ∣ day two [ griffith + tit job ]

“I can be the most perfect gentleman that a lady could require, but I have an sneaking inkling that Her Majesty wants a scoundrel, instead. A dirty mercenary, a ruthless animal, to fuck her the way her king never could.”

you should’ve had him apprehended the moment he murmured those words, close enough to your ear to kiss the shell of it. you should’ve seen him in shackles, whipped and tortured, for daring to speak in such a way to the Queen of Midland, but you didn’t. you stared, straight ahead, and bit your tongue to keep from expelling a breathless moan. you allowed him to leave your side after that, melting into the crowded ballroom, mingling with the other nobles. his eyes lingered on you only for a moment, before they drift away, to keep from being overly suspicious. you had merely stood there, in shock, as you process his willingness to approach you in front of the Courts and your husband, and whisper something so heinous.

something so true.

it had been at your own behest, after all, that the young mercenary would become your plaything whilst fighting for your country, but it had been an arrangement brought to him in secrecy by your ladies in waiting, and he was meant to act discreetly. you glanced around, and realize that no one had been any the wiser. not even your husband, whose sharp eyes seemed to always watch you with disdain, had noticed Griffith whisper to you.

when you look back at him, he’s no longer focused on you, but there’s a hint of a smile on his face that you knew had to be for you, and not the generals he was conversing with. he must’ve caught your flustered seeking from his peripheral vision, and it must’ve amused him to no end.

damn him.

you managed to sit through the majority of the festivities, pretending to be enthralled by your husband’s banter with his retainers, but every so often, you would carve a line of sight directly to Griffith. you would stare at him, admiring each flawless detail from the plumpness of his lips to the long, heavy lashes that fan the apples of his porcelain cheeks, to the silvery curtainous tresses that were so carefully secured in a low ponytail to cascade down his back. he was so beautiful, and you began to fantasize about what his silken locks would feel like if you were to grip fistfuls of them, how his velvety pout will feel as he presses it flush to your sex, the way your back would arch if he pushed his tongue inside your hole, aching and clenching for him…

when you started to shift in your seat, rubbing your thighs together, you knew you had to make an escape. you couldn’t go another moment without Griffith in your bed, and so you promptly excused yourself, and several of your servant girls followed you up to your bed chamber.

Griffith’s sapphire gaze was keen enough to notice you leave, and he waited several more minutes, inching towards the exit until he could slip away, completely undetected.

Griffith’s let in to your bedroom before he can knock, and the ladies are swift to leave the two of you alone before he can close the door behind him. “Have you considered my counter offer, Your Majesty?” he asks with a soft tinge of amusement in his voice. he pushes the heavy, wooden lock in place against the door, his glacieresque gems focused only on the way you approached him, staring up at him with sparkling awe in your eyes. “Would you still prefer to have me as you wish, or would you find more pleasure in allowing me the honor to use your body?”

“I don’t want the obedient gentleman,” you blurt out, grasping the thick lapels of his coat, to pull yourself closer to him. “I want the scoundrel. The beast.”

“Is that so…?” Griffith grabs your shoulders, halting you in place as you speak, the ghost of a smirk tickling his lips. “Then the beast is what you shall have.” it’s a whisper, heavy with desire as both of his hands glide down to envelope the shape of your breasts through your gown. the fabric is thick, but as both fists reach up for the neckline, your breath catches in your throat. a swift yank, and silk screams as he tears at the neckline, stretching and ripping until your breasts jiggle free. your nipples harden almost instantly as they’re exposed to the cool atmosphere, and your back arches— the force and carelessness he exhibits in order to expose your chest pulling you off balance. he swoons at the sight, cradling your breasts with both hands. your nipples slide along the webbing between his thumb and forefinger, before he experiments with pinching the hardened buds. you let out a soft whimper.

Griffith’s hands are almost unnervingly soft for a mercenary general, and they’re warm as he kneads your breasts. your head tilts back and you expel a long, heavy breath as he tilts his head to watch your countenance closely. “I’ve hardly touched you, Your Majesty, and you’re already mewling for me.” his pupils are blown out as he tugs on your nipples, and watches in delight as you squirm and moan. “I suppose these pillowy tits of yours are sensitive enough to make you cum all alone…” his knee worms under your multitude of skirts, to press against your sex. with a surprised gasp, your thighs clamp around his leg, but it was already too late. his digit tips roll over your nipples in smooth teases, pressing them like buttons as you squirm and gasp, and grind your slick against his knee. “The king must not appreciate them. But I will.”

groping thick handfuls of squishy flesh, a groan gurgles at the back of his throat as he pushes your tits together, smashing them against each other, and his icy gaze flickers up to you. “Do you know what I love the best about a woman’s tits?” he asks, in a soft baritone that seems to send a quake straight to your core. you moan, breathless, and shake your head, before his own dips low enough to run his tongue in a thin stripe that creeps up the length of your cleavage, before he expels in a whisper, “They’re soft and warm, and when pressed together like this, create such a delicious hole to fuck.”

your head was spinning already at his words, so when his hands glide upwards and grip your shoulders, forcing the Queen of Midland to her knees in front of him, breasts jiggling and exposed and dress askew on your frame, you bent to his will without protest. “There we are. A pretty, obedient queen. Are you so awestruck by the visage of my peasant cock sliding between your royal breasts that you fold so easily?” there’s a faint smile on his kissable pout now, a powerful one, and he grasps hold of your chin with one hand, using the other to undo the complexity of his breeches. he forces your face up, to stare at him directly, and you swoon at the hard grip on your chin. “I will enjoy defiling you, little queen. But what’s even more exciting is that you will enjoy it so much more.”

your face was flushed of its usual tone, eyelids fluttering as they struggle to stay open. the heat between your bodies was almost too much to bear already. “Use me…” you plead, quietly, needy. “Use me, mercenary, degrade me. Do so and I will see to it that you climb the military ranks to your heart’s content.”

this pleases Griffith, and he runs his thumb over your trembling bottom lip, looming over your kneeling frame as he pumps his cock to attention. as it swells, and hardens, your eyeline drifts downwards and you become entranced at the thought, your mouth hanging open in expectancy.

“Such a beautiful mouth, warm and wet,” Griffith purrs, pushing his thumb in to anchor it against the fleshy inside of your cheek, “you know well a woman’s duty and where and how to take a cock, and I’m certain your mouth has been well trained by your husband.” your cheeks heat up with humiliation as he teases your gag reflex with his fingers, you cluck and try to push his fingers out, but they remain, and you only end up dribbling drool out of your mouth with an embarrassed whimper. “But I will need you to save these talents for him, your lovely mouth is your weapon, and you’ve just become my greatest ally in my war for my dream. You will use it so efficiently, pleasing your husband and whispering those persuasive words in his ear, until I have surpassed every general in his army. You will do this for me, yes?” you nod, batting your eyelashes, swirling your tongue around his fingers. Griffith was so breathtaking, and in this moment you were so aroused and at his mercy, that you would’ve agreed to do anything for him. “Very good, my desperate little queen. Now, save these lovely lips for their task, and I will fuck your luscious tits, instead.”

both of his hands find their way to your breasts again, and he takes a step forward, his stance wide imposing as his feet plant themselves on either side of your poofy skirt. the way his thick, hard cock lays against your chest is almost as if it had sought out its new home, and he pushes your breasts to mold around it, forming a tight canal as he teased a couple of strokes. with a slow rock of his hips, his cock tunnels between your breasts, the puffy, pink tip peeking out by your chin, and he rolls his head on his shoulders, eliciting a soft and pleasured sigh. “Very soft.” he croons, closing his eyes, his fingers digging into your squishy tits as his pace starts to pick up. “The perfect sheath for my cock, don’t you agree?”

you were too busy staring at the display, watching his sex glide between your breasts, that you simply elicit a quiet babble of a yes, your arms bent up by your sides, your hands balled into fists.

“My dear queen has never been degraded quite like this, her body used by cock in ways her sweet, little brain couldn’t even imagine,” he all but moans at the realization, working his jaw for a moment. “Look up at me, little queen. Let me see your mouth hanging open, the desire to suck what’s just out of your reach.”

you do as instructed, but you hardly so much as peek before you hear the sound of him expectorating— his spit splattering against your top lip and dripping down into your waiting mouth, mixing with your own that had gathered in a thirsty pool. you flinch, surprised, but then look up at him, wide eyed.

no one’s ever spit on you before.

and you liked it.

a lot.

Griffith’s grin is loose, his lips parted as he starts to pant, bucking his hips more forcefully, faster, fucking your titties with reckless abandon, kneading them roughly.

“You liked that, did you?” it was as if he could read your mind, his icy blue irises seeming to glow in the dim candlelight of your bedroom. “You are more and more fetching, the filthier I discover that you are.”

“A—again,” you whine, only to be graced with another shower of spit, and you moan, gratefully, before blurting out, “Thank you!”

the depravity in your voice was something you’d never heard before, especially not from yourself, and it should’ve been humiliating. but it wasn’t. it was exhilarating and liberating.

“Close,” Griffith grunts, his chest heaving, still adorned with his ruffled tie. the fact that he was still mostly clothed made this encounter all the more promiscuous, “I’m right there… right… there…” he was grinding his teeth, because you’d tucked your chin, pressing your lips together in a lazy O, letting his tip kiss the shape over and over. each time he drew back, you could taste the sticky sweet precum he left stamped to your lips. “Ah,” Griffith releases a sound, a croak as he grabs your hair at the root, pulling your head back and allowed his other hand to fall from your breasts, taking hold of his cock at its mighty base. his fingers rub against the fluffy, silver pubic hair his cock sprouts from, before starting to pump up and down wildly. “I will paint those beautiful tits of yours, my whorish queen. So you can smell of me. And remember how thoroughly I’ve fucked them—“

he hardly gets the words out before his release erupts from the swollen head of his cock, casting long, warm white streamers over your heaving breasts. your hands scramble to push them together, mimic the way he had to fuck them, so you may gather the entirety of his semen upon their expanse, and you peer up at him with wide, happy eyes. “G—Griffith…”

his ragged breath starts to slow, his platinum bangs damp and sticking to his forehead and his temple when he finally releases your hair with a heavy, satisfied sigh, “Did you enjoy that, Your Majesty?”

watching him come undone and quickly recover had your mind going blank, and your thighs sticky with your need, but you thoughtlessly nod, attempting to form the words themselves, but none came to your lips.

it’s all right, though, because Griffith pulls you to your feet. “Lovely, because now I will bend you over your vanity and tend to that sopping wet cunt of yours.”

[herpsandbirds]

if i can ask, your extensive post about lizards of maine made me really curious about what kinds of reptiles are in new england. garter snakes? turtles? are there any new england lizards?

New England Reptiles:

Hello, you wouldn't think that New England has that many reptiles, and in fact, there is only one species of lizard that barrrrrely ranges into far western Vermont. There are a decent number of snakes and turtles that range into New England.

Here's a list...

(According to the good book, the Peterson Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of Eastern and Central North America)

Common Five-lined Skink

Eastern (Common) Snapping Turtle

Painted Turtle (Eastern and Midland subspecies)

Blanding's Turtle

Wood Turtle

Bog Turtle

Northern Diamondback Terrapin

Eastern Box Turtle

Eastern (Common) Musk Turtle - "Stinkpot"

Northern Black Racer

Eastern Milksnake

Smooth Green Snake

Eastern Worm Snake

Northern Ringneck Snake

Eastern Hognose Snake

Northern Watersnake

Dekay's Brown Snake

Northern Red-bellied Snake

Eastern Ribbon Snake (Common and Northern subspecies)

Common Garter Snake (Eastern and Maritime subspecies)

Eastern Copperhead

Timber Rattlesnake

Northern Five-lined Skink (Plestiodon fasciatus), juvenile, family Scincidae

photograph by Peter Paplanus

Common Snapping Turtle (Chelydra serpentina), family Chelydridae

Photograph by Sam Stukel

Timber Rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus), family Viperidae

Venomous.

photograph by Christina Shaffer