#new acquisitions

[u-mspcoll]

Next week! Discover Hidden Treasures: New Additions to our Collections of Manuscripts and Rare Books

Part of the opening  page of "Epistulae ad familiares," a fifteenth-century Italian manuscript written in Latin, by Marcus Tullius Cicero, c. 1450.  

Join us next Thursday, 16 January between 4-6p for our first Third Thursdays at the Library event of the semester!

This event will feature a selection of recent acquisitions that enhance key areas of our collections, including early Western manuscripts, fifteenth-century books (incunables), and the history of medicine and astronomy.

Would love to see you there!

[hdslibrary]

Currently Reading

A gorgeous batch of new old books! Well, they are new to us, donated by the family of a booklover and scholar of religion.

Among these rare books awaiting cataloging and boxing are Foxe's Book of Martyrs (1684), Calvin's Institutes (1611), and Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana (1702).

We may not get to read them cover to cover, but they certainly captivate us.

[voidlesscreator]

AU where Danny is a stressed college student student aerospace engineering and is caught up in a fear gas attack, but since he's half ghost his biology is slightly fucked up when it comes to drugs and chemicals so it does the exact opposite and he's now as high as a kite while everyone is screaming in fear.

Meanwhile Scarecrow is curious about the young man who started giggling when he inhaled the fear gas and slips a little note into the man's pocket before dipping and the bats show up.

Cue Danny ending as the- actually paid- tester for Dr. Crane's new and other improved gasses which are actually good for him and awful for others. Like one guy is sent into hysterics as everything just hits him all at once, the air being audible, that one flickering light being ear shattering. Meanwhile Danny has just pulled out his notebook for his aerospace engineering class and started writing down new ideas with this sudden hyperfocus that seems chill to him.

This eventually leads to the bats finding out while Danny's just being given vapes filled with that overwhelming gas so that he can actually focus on his exam studying without getting distracted.

(Scarecrow is probably in the giddy stage of a new test subject that has positive feedback for his work. Mans had a contract written up and prescriptions made for Danny to use the gasses legally for himself.)

[pieruru]

fuckass creature

[witchofthesouls]

I love your bayverse Isekai AU, will there be any more snippets on the shenanigans with our feral wildling prime with equally feral newsparks and politically rogue sentinel actively failing and somehow successfully courting the said feral prime while simutaneously giving the metaphorical middle finger to the council regime.

You're standing in the middle of a pale desert. The white sand ripples without wind, and it's endless without anything in sight. A stark divide between the ground and dark sky. The stars are strange. Dripping like a child's clumsy first ventures into watercolors; saturated, vibrant hues fading into weak trailing brushstrokes. With enough concentration, you parse out the shapes of the stars, outlines squirming, moving back and forth, bleeding across the night like odd-shaped marbles.

Someone calls out, and you turn to see a fluttering-

______

You wake up, and the dream fades. The remaining echoes of crying easily meld into the newsparks' wails for your attention, even under Thundercracker's crooning engines, calm field, and fuel production. They look for you, blindly reaching out, fields refusing to settle until well entangled under your own and dozing on your chest.

______

Because you and information slugs don't mix, you're learning the old-fashioned way: direct practice.

And there's nothing in this current life nor your past human one that could prepare you for Iaconi dining etiquette and their culinary practices.

Sentinel is surprisingly patient and encouraging. Star Saber, on the other hand, is demanding and pompous as usual.

A few pieces of the cutlery are familiar in a vague shape-sense, like a spoon should be a spoon, but the spoons' handles have delicate metal leaves with tiny bundles of shiny berries. One grouping is so fragile that the shells jiggled as it rose from a well-hidden compartment from the table. Another clutch isn't round but more hexagonal. A blue hexagon-like raspberry with reddish fuzz.

There's also a tool that looks like a love-child between a well-used slinky and nunchucks and a doohicky that combined a two-pronged fork with a honey dipper.

There's nothing on the table that looks remotely close to honey or a sauce to use said dipper.

You deeply yearn for the simplicity of Thundercracker's cubes and her endless supply of snacks.

Biting the bullet, you commit to a spoon, and Star Saber exudes disdain as you try to scoop out the plain tofu lookalike on your plate. It jiggles and warps the moment the utensil touches it, and the berries, every single one, fall off. The hard ones bounce off, tinking across the table and floor, and the fragile ones splatter the tofu. A contained mess of color and sound clash as discordant strings and chimes overlay and warp.

Sentinel is then right by you. "Like this," he says, and he takes your hand to pick up the fork end, guiding you to twirl the dipper right over the plain tofu block. It quivers, and there's a lovely wind-chime noise before the entire thing flows upward, carving into long, unbroken chains by following the grooves, and artfully twirling backdown into a nest.

A plate of color-splattered noodles now sits before you.

Sentinel uses the slinky, applying the nunckuck ends to his thumb and middle finger and gently bounces the slinky over the noodles. The noodles slither their way into the middle, and after a mouthful is gathered, he brings the contraption near his face, flicking off the thumb attachment and the flexible tubing and 'drinks' his food as if it's a straw itself.

A sharp, ringing hum grabs your attention, prickling over your senses at vibrates in your field. When Star Saber stops circling the rim of the wine glass, the hum dies down as well.

"You failed when we entered." You stare blankly at the Seeker, and he clicks his glossa before explaining, "The most prominent member signals the rest to sit."

"But I waited for you because you're the most experienced!" Star Saber had literally spent weeks beating it into your processor about the teacher-student dynamic: who sits, who stands, who dismisses, and many other important, little steps of social nuance.

"Yes. If this was an educational setup, but this is a formal meal, it's the established Prime that signals to everyone else to sit."

You throw all caution to wind and reach over to the turn table in the middle. Sentinel laughs as you manually spin it until you reach your target: the deconstructed savory pies basket.

Star Saber remains unamused as you take a bite of the sphere, and spices flood your senses, coating your glossa with a hearty, thick gravy. The 'wrapping is supposed to be peeled, but it's completely edible and flaky layers.

It's a performance piece with the right sounds and gestures. The wrapping would gracefully unravel, and the contents reorganize itself into a sophisticated piece of art before settling into cups to be eaten one by one.

You find it more comfortable to eat the pie in one whole go. Star Saber deeply sighs at your atrocious manners and actually snaps at Sentinel when the mech decides to follow your lead.

[houghtonlib]

Houghton Library acquires a copy of the Green Book for 1949, a vital guide for African American travelers in the Jim Crow era.

Green, Victor H. The Negro motorist green book: an international travel guide. New York, N.Y. : Victor H. Green & Co., [1949]

2023-638

Houghton Library, Harvard University

[shadowuserannie]

playing a notes game for motivation. to write my Nezha older brother to MK AU for Chinese/Lunar New Year. :D

Context; I celebrate Chinese/Lunar New Year. I want to write/kick crying out into the world my Nezha older brother to MK AU on AO3 for the occasion, which is as said. It's an AU in which Tang and Pigsy pray to the protector deity of children, after finding a random child left on the doorstep. Nezha hears the prayer and, throughout the years, finds he cannot leave MK alone and accidentally becomes something of an older brother figure.

This was previously named Accidental Brother-Sorry Babysitter-Acquisition, which when I came to my senses has now been deleted and changed to...idk actually but I can have fun with it--

anyway go check out the teasers still under that name on here. Just search #accidental brother sorry babysitter acquisition au on my blog ig?

Edit; for teaser one and teaser two

Hey so how are you doing? mentally and physically? Is there anything affecting you rn? And if you don't want to say publicly, my DMs/anon asks are open if you want to vent.

what's the weather? It's raining constantly for me here, thanks to monsoon season.

(limit to 5 notes per user)

10 notes; prologue/chapter one (Nezha first meets MK)

20 notes; chapter two (Nezha helps MK home when he gets lost)

30 notes; chapter 3 (Nezha beats up a full child trafficking ring)

40 notes; chapter 4 (Nezha starts actually babysitting and Pigsy begins the process of mental adoption)

60 notes; chapter 5 (MK starting school and the trials and tribulations and Tang signing Nezha up for a rollerskating competition.)

80 notes; chapter 6 (Wukong bugs Nezha into letting him meet the kid that he's gotten newly attached to, Nezha meets Mei and gains the heart attacks that come with it)

100 notes; chapter 7 (MK's crisis, realization he's trans, further troubles and Nezha kicking more ass as a result.)

120 notes; chapter 8 (MK and Mei and romance, and Nezha trying not to murder mandatory heterosexuality-obsessed idiots.)

140 notes; chapter 9 (MK graduates, Nezha gets guilt tripped by Red Son)

160 notes; chapter 10 (Nezha dodges canon like it's a speeding bullet, Lunar New Year slash Spider Queen slash Wukong finally doing the smart thing and telling at least one person, aka Nezha, about LBD's return.)

180 notes; chapter 11 (Nezha gets chewed out by Wukong for taking the full brunt of a self-destruct seal he made for the Samadhi Fire map himself, the reveal of godhood proper to Nezha's found family)

200 notes; chapter 12 (intermediary before diving into season 4.)

I'm not ending at season 4 beginning/end. There's more after that, I'm just physically incapable of that much cramming.

....now--

@cer-rata @crippling-pages @ohmygoly @kotlcpuppetshow @thelasttaleofthepari @telugu-girl-13 @solangelo-taylors-version @fantasygeek-134 @theaspengrove @sabrine-bree-the-bravery @emmlivia @floofeeeeee

[huh-1260]

Wind is in for a shock

Because today is the day he's getting Whump

[egginfroggin]

Happy New Year, here's an unpolished comic about a 12-year-old having a breakdown over space peanuts with his great-aunt

Ford, sweetie, I love you, but your glasses (and that sixth finger) are going to be the death of me

Mabel, you're fine, except for your boots, why did I give you fuzzy boots, fuzz is hard

Transcription below; please let me know if I should put it under a cut, and thank you for reading! Happy New Year ^^

Mabel: "Here, try these." "You've been missing Earth foods, right?"

Ford: "?" "What are they?"

Mabel: "Nuts! They taste just like peanuts."

Mabel: "Well, almost. They're a bit sweeter, like they're candied!" "They keep pretty well, too!" "We could get a bunch to go..." "...?"

Mabel: "Hey, what's wrong, Pine Nut? Are those ones bad?"

Ford: "..." "... No, it's not that..." "Lee always liked toffee peanuts... these taste just like them."

Ford: "... Lee would love these."

Mabel: "..." "Well, then, we'll have to pick up some more before we get you home, then, won't we?"

Ford: "... Yeah..."

(program: Krita; time taken: about 8 hours 30 minutes)

[rowena-rain]

I know things like number of kudos don't super matter, but I'm happy that I reached 1000 kudos on a fic for the first time today since I started posting on ao3 in July. On my dead dove accidental baby acquisition that I just started writing on a whim, of all things! Crazy! That's it, that's the post lol.

But seriously, thanks so much for your support 🙏 🥺❤️❤️. It really does help motivate me I'm weak and require external validation okay

[tending-the-hearth]

Noah: We call that a traumatic event. Noah, turning to Mirage: Not a "bruh moment". Noah, turning to Kris: Not a "Major L". Noah, turning to Bumblebee: and not an "OOF lmao".

[sincericida]

Wow.

Read more...

(from @Discussing Film tt)

[affairsmastery]

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has urged Google to reconsider renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the "Gulf of America," following an executive order by US President Donald Trump. The change applies only to US-based users, while the historical name remains elsewhere.

Mexico argues the US cannot unilaterally rename an international water body beyond its territorial waters. Google defended its practice of following official government sources but has yet to respond to Mexico’s concerns. Playfully, Sheinbaum quipped that Mexico might request its own renaming—suggesting "Mexican America" as a counterpoint to the move.

[spontaneousglitterbees]

I've been meaning to ask, is Kokichi's black ring meant to be an ace ring? I only ask because it's black and on the finger one would typically wear an ace ring.

This is probably funnier if Kaito doesn't know about Alter Ego yet

TL;DR: yes!! Very happy you noticed~

[awesomelyanon]

He's catching a quick nap between disasters

[sshbpodcast]

Character Spotlight: T’Pol

By Ames

We’re continuing through our Enterprise character spotlights with a much more likeable character than last time: the ship’s resident Vulcan, T’Pol! And though she starts out mostly as eye candy for the 10-year-old boys watching (kinda like Seven of Nine), the sub commander really grows into something more than just a cat-suited female (also kinda like Seven of Nine!). Over the four seasons of the show, Jolene Blalock really nails the “Vulcan nuance,” as we’ve dubbed it, and becomes a character greater than the sum of her voluptuous parts.

She may spend most of the series making suggestions that go unheeded, bearing the brunt of Archer’s xenophobia against Vulcans, and being exploited for the sake of the viewers to ogle her in the decon room or performing Vulcan neuropressure, but the hosts of A Star to Steer Her By really grew to appreciate T’Pol’s presence. The Vulcan Science Directorate has determined you should read on below and listen to this week’s podcast episode (tractor beam to 59:08) for more on our logical first officer!

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

I’m the sanest one here! After T’Pol warns everyone not to go down to the planet until they’ve scanned it (amateurs!) in “Strange New World,” everyone on the away mission inevitably goes crazy on pollen. But she keeps her wits about her and manages to not get shot by a batshit hallucinating Trip. Instead, she concocts a clever plan with Hoshi to survive the storm and save everyone.

Tractor beam > grapplers While Archer is racial profiling the Vulcan crew of the Ti’Mur all over the place in “Breaking the Ice” and assuming they’re there to spy on the Enterprise, T’Pol is busy keeping rational and logical, as is her wont. She eventually convinces Archer to swallow his pride and ask them for help when they need the use of Vulcan tractor beams over their miniscule grapplers, which suuuuck.

You have the power to control the waves We really don’t get enough scenes between Hoshi and T’Pol, but when we do, they’re always lovely together. When Hoshi is stressing out while on the Klingon ship in “Sleeping Dogs,” our Vulcan friend doesn’t hesitate to share some meditation techniques with her. And in “Vox Sola,” we see more of T’Pol’s awkward way of showing affection for the ship’s cunning linguist.

My mind is my mind, my thoughts are my thoughts There’s a lot of negative things we can say about “Fusion” (and we will in just a moment, so don’t despair), but none of those things can be laid at the feet of T’Pol, who’s the only person acting on her behalf for most of the episode. I shouldn’t have to say it is good for women to stand up for themselves because “no means no,” but this is the world we live in.

The Science Vulcan Directorate has determined that time travel is not fair T’Pol’s in a rough spot again in “Shockwave” when the Suliban have taken over the ship in Archer’s absence. They interrogate the poor woman for a while, and she holds her own somehow, and clings to her logic that time travel should absolutely be impossible. And after torture, she’s able to jump into the crew’s plans to re-commandeer the ship!

As usual, Vulcans are immune to the anomaly of the week In typical Vulcan fashion, T’Pol does not suffer the obsessiveness that plagues all the other crew members when they study a trinary black hole system in “Singularity.” So it’s up to her to rescue the rest of the characters from themselves (or from Phlox, in the case of Mayweather) by knocking everyone except Archer out cold and saving the day!

An AIDS allegory a few decades too late While a lot of “Stigma” doesn’t hold up today because its AIDS allegory feels like too little too late, everything T’Pol stands for in this episode rings true. Even while every man on the show is telling her what’s best for her, she firmly states that anyone with Pa’nar syndrome should be treated as justly as she is as someone who was forced into a nonconsensual mindmeld.

We can stop the film if it’s disturbing your conversation I do find it annoying every time Archer forces T’Pol to do things outside her comfort zone just because she’s Vulcan, but this little moment is cute. It might just be because of how damn obnoxious we find Phlox sometimes, but watching her tell that Denobulan sycophant to shut up during a movie in “Horizon” was all of us in that moment. Phlox, Shut Up.

Every day is exactly the same Even though it’s kind of an alternate timeline, the T’Pol that we see in “Twilight” does some very commendable stuff. Sure, there’s taking command of the ship when Archer is incapacitated, but there’s also resigning that commission to take the most thankless job there is: taking care of memory-less Archer for years on end and explaining life to him over and over.

There’s a human expression: You gotta give ‘em that hawk tuah We get another alternate T’Pol in “E²” and she’s just as compelling as “Twilight” T’Pol. The older, wiser T’Pol is astute enough to see the flaws in her son Lorian’s crazy plan and provide her younger self a better, just as crazy plan. Add that to the literal self-reflection she shares about getting over her trellium addiction and learning to love Trip and it’s all great stuff!

Blood is thicker than plomeek soup This is one of those complicated episodes, so you’re going to see “Home” on both lists, but let’s start with the good. We’ve got to respect T’Pol a bit for sucking it up and marrying Koss even though they’d called the engagement off (not to mention that she has a thing for Trip). But it was to save her mother’s reputation and get her reinstated at the Academy, so that’s nice of her.

Her name is Elizabeth We don’t get a lot of T’Pol with baby Elizabeth in “Demons” and “Terra Prime” but what we do get is heartbreaking. We’ve really got to give credit to Blalock and Trinneer for some beautiful acting when a doomed Human-Vulcan infant is thrown in the mix, especially in their final scene of “Terra Prime,” which is utterly devastating.

—

Worst moments

You were only there for three days and you couldn’t restrain yourself While Vulcans throughout Enterprise are typically bitchy and blunt, it seems a bit illogical how T’Pol jumps to the conclusion that Trip must have acted ungentlemanly during the course of “Unexpected,” resulting in his getting pregnant. This before he’s been able to tell a word of his own story. That’s just rude, T’Pol. Get all the facts first, then make your judgement.

Don’t blame the victim We’re not victim blaming T’Pol for what happened to her in “Fusion.” No, we’re blaming the writers, who did a bad bad thing in this episode that we largely loathed. For some reason in Trek, the writers treat it like a requirement for the sexy lady character to get mind-assaulted, and to treat it as sexually as possible, and we’ve been fed up with that since Troi and Seven.

Oo-mox always makes the list! I will always put oo-mox on the bad list, because too often it feels like sexual degradation. Lwaxana does it. Crusher does it. Jadzia does it. And in this parade of women performing mild sexually-implicit acts on Ferengi, we see T’Pol perform oo-mox on Krem in “Acquisition.” It’s just disgusting how the writers keep falling back on making this gross joke over and over.

The spy who neck-pinched me We learn in “The Seventh” that T’Pol was an operative for the Ministry of Security, which is idiotic enough on its own. She also sides with Archer on what to do with Menos, which is never a good idea, after the resurfacing of some wiped memories of all the messed up shit she did. Worst of all, the writers forget about her spy training and foist it off on Reed being in Section Thirty-fucking-one, but we’ll cover that later!

Pon farr also always makes the list Almost as much as I dislike oo-mox, I dislike pon farr. We already covered this in “Blood Fever”! It’s yet another device to sneak sexiness into episodes, but it is in no way consensual. Blame pon farr all you want, but for all of “Bounty,” we’re subjugated to watching T’Pol run around in her underwear trying to rape Phlox just to titillate the teenaged boys, and that’s disgusting.

I don’t believe it, now my pants are chafing me Like our last Enterprise spotlight, most of the bad moments are coming from season 3. This is when we’re subjected to countless instances of T’Pol engaging in Vulcan neuropressure with Trip, which is NOT her job. Relenting to Phlox and doing this was bad enough, but did she really have to trick Trip into it in “The Xindi”? And why did she HAVE to be topless for it?

Green-blooded with envy We promised you last time lots more moments from “Harbinger,” so here we go. Vulcans wouldn’t typically find it illogical to be jealous of other people, but that doesn’t stop T’Pol from getting all jealous when Trip starts hanging out with Amanda Cole. It makes her look like a petty, whiny teenager all episode long. Green is apparently not a good color on you, T’Pol.

I just don’t like being compared to a lab rat Oh look, more examples from “Harbinger.” The Tri’Pol shippers get their moment when the two of them hook up, and who can blame them? But having T’Pol pull the rug out from under Trip the morning after is just cruel and tactless. She claims (if you can believe her) that she was just curious what intercourse with a human was like, as if she were just checking it off a list. Next!

I’m sorry, Captain, I can’t obey that order Another episode that ranks among some of the worst of Enterprise is “Hatchery.” Everyone except Archer is perfectly content to let the Insectoid babies die, and T’Pol disobeys when captain orders the crew to help save them. She doesn’t even know the captain is compromised yet! She just doesn’t think he’s committing enough war crimes, evidently, and mutinies about it!

Big green monkey, everyone’s a junkie Again, no victim blaming here; addiction is a serious condition, and kudos to T’Pol for eventually getting help from Phlox. But. The writers fail T’Pol’s logical character in making her a trellium-D junkie, as is revealed in “Damage.” You want to explore an addiction plot? Fine, then make it make sense for her character. Have her seek to build her immunity. Have it be to relieve pain from turning zombie in “Impulse.” Chasing the dragon doesn’t work for a Vulcan.

You brought me sixteen light years just to watch you get married to someone you barely know A second ago, we were giving T’Pol credit for marrying Koss to help her mother unsully her reputation (which was neither of their faults to begin with, mind you) in “Home,” but it’s also just plain sad to watch her have to acquiesce to being blackmailed into a marriage she does not wish to be in. And to have to treat Trip like he’s dog meat is also painful to watch! Tri’Pol shippers, unite!

You’re wondering if I’ve been having any daydreams about you? Speaking of the Tri’Pollers, they get a smorgasbord of Trip-T’Pol material in “Bound,” most of it juvenile as hell. Ever since they got together in “Harbinger,” T’Pol has been dancing around this “do you like me” bullshit like a teenager (or worse, like Shakaar in “Crossfire”) and it gets so frustrating. Why can’t the Vulcan just be upfront about this stuff? Why is she in high school?

—

It is only logical to end the blogpost here. Make sure you’re following along as we keep the Tri’Pol ship chugging along next week, when our spotlight swings to everyone’s favorite Floridian! Also keep watching along with our watchalong of Discovery over on the SoundCloud or wherever you podcast, do some Vulcan neuropressure with us over on Facebook, and remember to wear a hat whenever gallivanting around in the past!