#none of my friends use tumblr

[sweetepic]

lately i feel like blogging again. i like posting hideous opinion pieces which i personally think is a good outlet for creativity. last time i had a blog it got deleted by blogger because evan williams is a fat stinking piece of shit. when i first started troubleshooting this is what the google help desk gave me.

just in case i wanted to kill myself i guess.

that was a year ago now. i tried at least getting the domain back but they wouldnt let me. i hope evan williams slips on a banana peel and falls down 34 flights of stairs.

but yesterday i did actually get my shit back. i had to do the code all over again because i lost the old one. i really hate coding. everything looks fine now except for the comment section. i dont expect to get comments anyway but id at least like to fix it to suit my taste. ill probably drop the link here whenever i finish it and start posting.

i dont have any other updates. im way behind on smuppet manufacturing because i was busy doing other shit. i made a big ass clown doll for my best friends birthday because he is obsessed with clowns. its fucking hideous but he loves it. im not posting it here because its sentimental.

i do have a pink smuppet somewhere thats halfway done. i think its on the floor in my closet currently. its a christmas gift so i wont be keeping it but ill still post pictures when im done. the shape has been looking a lot better than the last guy. i still hate these things and i hate myself for making them.

also ive been in contact with the puppet lady. we went over everything and its going to take $900 to get lil cals head done. i was really picky about the whole thing. hell have a functional mouth and moving eyes. the rest is on me because i dont trust anyone else to put him together in a way thats accurate. i have a kind of dedication to replicating my nightmares that frankly should be studied by psychologists across the globe. maybe ill actually talk about the real reason for all of this at some point but that would ruin the fun of speculation.

also shoutout to my man @ovkl for being my one and only fan on this journey. youre a real one.

heres something i did a while back to make my room a little more homey. its older than the goddamn smuppets but its still something for you to look at. its also my favorite thing on my wall.

hell yeah dawg

[corpsentry]

pick your battles

[northernfireart]

i have no idea how to work tumblr i have never been on tumblr but i am so desperate and starved for tenrose i found my way here sue me

[obiwan]

Are you really so blind that you think all Americans are racist idiot white fucks who fucking wanted this?? Okay fine fuck the rest of us who are going to suffer the direct consequences of this. Fuck The people who HAVE been suffering and whose votes were worth fuck all because of gerrymandering and threats of violence.

We will die before you ever face the consequences as a European because our own neighbours wanted us dead and you have already decided we deserve it. Your defeatism is not helping anyone anywhere in the fight against fascism.

We're fucking people. We deserve to live.

you have abhorrent reading comprehension if that was your takeaway from what i wrote. where the fuck did you even get that i’m okay with suffering of anyone who didn’t vote for that pos? i simply said it’s a decision that’ll affect the rest of the world for worse, so i don’t understand people who “only” see it as a US problem, because it’s not, it’s more of defeat for humanity. i’m from a middle eastern shithole dictatorship who’s had to follow each US election so i fully know what it entails but your self centered american ass wouldn’t comprehend that. now fuck off.

[babyrdie]

Paris and Vanity

[This is an extensive text of my opinion about the character of Paris. These are just opinions, not some super deep analysis! ALSO: I think it's interesting to mention that I use English editions because the post is in English, but I didn't read these editions in full, just the excerpts I wanted. I read editions in another language. So I'm not saying that I recommend any of these editions!!]

I find it interesting how the characteristic of Paris being vain makes perfect sense with his myths, regardless of the version (in this case, the Greek myths. I haven't read his Roman ones yet). Characters in Greek mythology tend to change their essence a lot depending on the version (I think one of the most obvious example is Menelaus), but Paris in his constant vanity always made sense to me.

The best-known version of the birth myth of Paris is the one in which Hecuba dreams that she will give birth to the one who will destroy Troy and, because of this, Paris is left to die on Mount Ida. But he is saved by Agelaus and grows up as a shepherd, unaware that he has Trojan royal blood.

Growing up as a shepherd, Paris did not have the status or wealth of royal lineage as his sibilings did. He was strong, but it's not like he had such grandiose adventures that would be enough to give him glory and fame. But there was something he undeniably had: beauty. Among Priam's children, Paris stands out for being very beautiful and, even when he thought he was a plebeian, this was already notable in him. At a time when he didn't have the power, the fame or the wealth, Paris had the beauty. I'm not surprised he became attached to his vanity. That was something of his, and it never stopped being his even when he wasn't a prince.

[3.12.5][...]The first son born to her was Hector; and when a second babe was about to be born Hecuba dreamed she had brought forth a firebrand, and that the fire spread over the whole city and burned it.227 When Priam learned of the dream from Hecuba, he sent for his son Aesacus, for he was an interpreter of dreams, having been taught by his mother's father Merops. He declared that the child was begotten to be the ruin of his country and advised that the babe should be exposed. When the babe was born Priam gave it to a servant to take and expose on Ida; now the servant was named Agelaus. Exposed by him, the infant was nursed for five days by a bear; and, when he found it safe, he took it up, carried it away, brought it up as his own son on his farm, and named him Paris. When he grew to be a young man, Paris excelled many in beauty and strength, and was afterwards surnamed Alexander, because he repelled robbers and defended the flocks.228 And not long afterwards he discovered his parents.

(The Library. Translation by James George Frazer)

Then once he was called to be a jury in the dispute between Athena, Hera and Aphrodite to decide which of the goddesses was the most beautiful. Each of them, in an attempt to gain his favor, offered him a different reward if she was chosen. He chooses Aphrodite and, as a reward, Paris has the most beautiful woman in the world: Helen of Sparta, already married to Menelaus.

[E.3.2] For one of these reasons Strife threw an apple as a prize of beauty to be contended for by Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite; and Zeus commanded Hermes to lead them to Alexander on Ida in order to be judged by him. And they promised to give Alexander gifts. Hera said that if she were preferred to all women, she would give him the kingdom over all men; and Athena promised victory in war, and Aphrodite the hand of Helen. And he decided in favour of Aphrodite51; and sailed away to Sparta with ships built by Phereclus.52

(The Library. Translation by James George Frazer)

I often joke about how Paris's choice is really dumb to me because I would never choose the most beautiful woman over Athena and Hera's other much more interesting gifts, but I actually think it makes sense. A woman so beautiful that she's desired by everyone, that she is known for it, that she elevates her husband's status just by being with her? I think Paris chose Helen over the other options because she had a different status, much more than choosing her because he was out of simple lust. There are different wealth and achievements out there, but he couldn't specifically have the most beautiful woman in the world if he didn't choose her now as she was already married. And since he's already so aware of his beauty, I wouldn't be shocked if Paris felt entitled to the most beautiful woman because he's so handsome. And then discovering that she has the divine blood of Zeus? Helen represented even higher status.

Even in The Odyssey, Proteus makes it seem like the main reason Menelaus is destined to go to Elysium is that he's Helen's husband and consequently this makes him Zeus's son-in-law. Of all the things he could say to Menelaus, the one he chooses to use to assure him that he will have Elysium is his marriage. Helen, as a wife, actually elevated Menelaus' status in a way beyond just marrying her putting him into the lineage of Sparta (which was already a big deal). She elevated him to the point of guaranteeing a good afterlife for him, at least in the Homeric tradition — this, of course, is not a fixed tradition in the myths because almost nothing is; Helen is not always married to Menelaus in Elysium, Pausanias even offers a version in which she is married to Achilles.

So I spoke, and he in turn spoke up and made answer: “That was Odysseus son of Laertes, who makes his home in Ithaka, whom I saw on an island, weeping big tears in the palace of the nymph Kalypso, and she detains him by constraint, and he cannot make his way to his country, for he has not any ships by him, nor any companions who can convey him back across the sea's wide ridges. But for you, Menelaos, O fostered of Zeus, it is not the gods' will that you shall die and go to your end in horse-pasturing Argos, but the immortals will convoy you to the Elysian Field, and the limits of the earth, where fair-haired Rhadamanthys is, and where there is made the easiest life for mortals, for there is no snow, nor much winter there, nor is there ever rain, but always the stream of the Ocean sends up breezes of the West Wind blowing briskly for the refreshment of mortals. This, because Helen is yours and you are son-in-law therefore to Zeus.”

(The Odyssey. IV, 554-571. Translation by Richmond Lattimore)

In The Iliad, unlike what usually happens, Paris has his consort status tied to Helen instead of her having her consort status tied to him. He who is "fair-hatred Helen's consort". It's she who gives status to Paris, and not the other way around.

Hesiod, for example, generally puts the active role in the masculine character. It's the husband who takes a wife, it's the man who takes a woman in his bed. But he doesn't seem to do this with Helen. In the fragments we have from the "Catalogue of Women", where Hesiod describes a lot of female characters from Greek mythology, it's the male suitors who want to be something for Helen. It's Helen who has the choice of choosing who she will take — when, in the myth of the Oath of Tyndareus, Helen chooses Menelaus, he is the one being given the honor of being her husband.

FRAGMENT 6838 - SUITORS OF HELEN (translation by Evelyn-White, H G.)

Berlin Papyri, No. 9739:

(ll. 31-33) to horse-taming Castor and prize-winning Polydeuces, desiring to be the husband of rich-haired Helen, though he had never seen her beauty, but because he heard the report of others.

(ll. 34-42) And from Phylace two men of exceeding worth sought her to wife, Podarces son of Iphiclus, Phylacus' son, and Actor's noble son, overbearing Protesilaus. Both of them kept sending messages to Lacedaemon, to the house of wise Tyndareus, Oebalus' son, and they offered many bridal-gifts, for great was the girl's renown, brazen . . . golden ((lacuna)) . . . (desiring) to be the husband of rich-haired Helen.

Berlin Papyri, No. 10560:

(ll. 52-54) . . . sought her to wife. And after golden-haired Menelaus he offered the greatest gifts of all the suitors, and very much he desired in his heart to be the husband of Argive Helen with the rich hair.

(ll. 63-66) But from Euboea Elephenor, leader of men, the son of Chalcodon, prince of the bold Abantes, sought her to wife. And he offered very many gifts, and greatly he desired in his heart to be the husband of rich-haired Helen.

Having talked about how Helen for me was more a choice of status than of desire, let's return to another aspect of Paris's vanity. Agamemnon contemptuously mentions how pompous Paris was on his visit to Sparta. 

"[...]Then there came to Lacedaemon from the Phrygians the man who, Argive legend says, judged the goddesses' dispute; in robes of gorgeous hue, ablaze with gold, in true barbaric pomp; and he, finding Menelaus gone from home, carried Helen off, in mutual desire, to his steading on Ida.[...]"

Iphigenia in Aulis. Translation by E. P. Coleridge.

Considering that this happens in Iphigenia in Aulis, the same play in which Iphigenia even says "and it is right, mother, that Hellenes should rule barbarians, but not barbarians Hellenes, those being slaves, while these are free", this could just be a stereotypical and xenophobic portrayal of the Trojans. Or Agamemnon could be exaggerating, after all he has more than enough reasons to want to throttle Paris. But, in this specific case, I think that's really how it is. Having spent years as a shepherd and then suddenly returning to being a prince, Paris would certainly show off his wealth much more than the other Trojan princes and princesses. This is because others were used to wealth and status, they had it since birth. Paris, however? This was all very new to him, and he was going to overdo it to the fullest.

As to how Helen was taken, sources seem to disagree. Homer seems to be going the way she was kidnapped and didn't want to go, judging by Helen's behavior towards the war, Paris and Aphrodite. Some versions place the Helen who was in Troy as not even being the real Helen (such as the play Helen, by Euripides). Some versions seem to reaffirm that she went because she wanted to, like Iphigenia in Aulis. Others are too ambiguous to know who to trust, as is the case with The Trojan Women. Etc etc.

Here I will be taking an excerpt from The Trojan Women. Helen tries to defend herself to Hecuba and Menelaus because Menelaus is convinced to punish Helen, while Hecuba is convinced to try to get her punished, as she sees her as one of the reasons for her misfortune. With each explanation that Helen gives for being innocent, Hecuba finds a way to counter it in a way that would be convincing enough for Menelaus to take seriously.

Faced with Helen's argument that she was taken by force with the help of Aphrodite, who gave her as a prize to Paris, Hecuba says:

"[…]You won’t persuade people with sense. You say Cypris —that’s a laugh—came to Menelaus’ house with my son. As if she could not have stayed peacefully in heaven and brought you and Paris, Sparta, Amyclai and all, to Troy? My son was preternaturally handsome and your mind, on catching a glimpse of him, was turned into Cypris. All that mortals lust for becomes Aphrodite to them. Even the goddess’ name has come to suggest immodest desire. When you saw him in his exotic foreign attire shining with gold, you went mad with lust. You had little luxury in Argos where you lived, but once rid of Sparta you hoped to overwhelm the city of the Phrygians flowing with gold with your sense of style. The palace of Menelaus was too puny for your extravagance to run rampant […]"

(The Trojan Women. Translation by Cecelia Luschnig)

Paris' expensive clothes are mentioned again, this time by Hecuba (considering that Agamemnon's previous speech is from a play by Euripides and that this play is also by Euripides, this similarity makes sense). And also, once again his beauty is reinforced. Right after Hecuba gives reasons why Hera and Athena's beauty dispute is an absurd idea (the reasons: Hera is married to Zeus, Athena is a virgin goddess), she gives explanations why it doesn't make sense for Aphrodite to help kidnap Helen. One of the reasons is that Aphrodite could simply make her appear in Troy, the other is that Paris was immensely beautiful, well dressed and something new in Helen's boring life and that's why he was seductive.

I got the impression that, although Euripides leaves it open-ended as to what happened, he was trying very hard to frame Helen as being guilty as well. However, regardless of whether she was kidnapped as she says or not as Menelaus and Hecuba think, the point is that Paris here is once again characterized as a portrait of opulence and beauty. More than that, here his characteristic as "exotic interest that seduces a married woman out of her life" is made even more evident than in Iphigenia in Aulis. Paris being the typical character archetype of a person from a foreign land, with immense beauty, seductive personality and exotic air is something common for his character. It's not like only Euripides imagined him like that.

In The Iliad, other characters constantly highlight Paris' vanity as a flaw. Hector mainly, but not only. For example, Diomedes uses this as immediate offense after being hit by an arrow from Paris. And throughout the Iliad, we see how Paris has a chance to give up Helen and end the war, but doesn't. He was too proud to give up what Helen meant in the first diplomatic contact between Achaeans and Trojans years ago, and after ten years he is even more immutable in his opinion.

It's been ten years, why give up now? Menelaus surpasses Paris in status, being a king while he is a prince, and in power, being stronger than him and having almost defeated him if not for Aphrodite's intervention. Menelaus may not be the favorite of a specific god, as is the case with Hector with Apollo or Odysseus with Athena, but he also receives divine help. The only "thing" Paris now has that Menelaus doesn't is Helen, and he won't give it up.

So Paris's vanity being something consistent is something that makes so much sense! Paris grew up as a plebeian with the distinguishing characteristic of being very handsome will be very aware of this. Consequently, he sees in beauty something that he has more than other people. Being so different, he is entitled to have more. When the goddesses offer him 3 reward options, the status Helen offers is seductive to him. Beginning to rise in status with Aphrodite's favor and his return to Trojan royalty, Paris is fascinated by wealth and status, so he acts like a peacock. As a prince, he is still concerned about always maintaining his beauty, as this is the only characteristic that has been with him his entire life and the one he trusted most. When Troy is threatened by his actions, Paris refuses to give in because he is too proud to give up what Helen means.

[kindaasrikal]

I’m so terrified of people that sometimes i stare at their socials and think ‘i should talk to them’ and then just don’t and then realise I’m a lost cause and i go back to drawing depressingly

[sea-jello]

bmc as out of context quotes my friends and i have said cause im copying other people

christine after deactivating all the squips: i am so proud. i converted my friend from really mean to homosexual

----

jeremy: i am genuinely scared michael will break up bc i dont like jerky

jake: man its fucking dried beef

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christine: i can’t read japanese but i’m gonna estimate. 300 CUPS OF MILK

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jenna: slay pussy girlboss queen

brooke: please dont use those words to describe my aunt

----

rich: these are making me consider heterosexuality again

jake: UR STRAIGHT????

rich: IT WAS A JOKE

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(waiting in line talking about how he didnt know the eiffel tower lights up at night) jeremy: i dunno i dont catch up with,, paris,, lore

(still waiting in line) michael: who here do you think has the intention to murder someone

jeremy (spaced out of his mind): i dunno isnt it like,, illegal

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(different group of people talking about if it snows in paris)

christine: im not gonna lie the only knowledge of paris i have is from miraculous ladybug

brooke, jenna and jeremy: somewhat similar versions of "oh my god me TOO"

[shi0n]

got jumpscared by friend who suddenly said "me kin id" how do YOU know that... i need to eliminate him

[beyondbirthdayzzz]

Honestly? I'd rather kms than share my tumblr with a real-life friend.

[faefulli]

while im here posting art, have my babies ------------- ✝Aurora (white) uses They/Them only, Azzy (red) uses He/Him✝

[panb1mbo]

hi lemme bug y'all for a sec with my nerd birth work shit (if you don't have kids idc u might still fuck with this) i'm looking for non-gestational parents to interview for an assignment. the purpose is to get a better understanding of how to support partners as a birth worker. this link is to an anonymous questionnaire on google forms regarding your experiences as a parent. i would appreciate any and all info you're willing to share. thanks, and feel free to reblog even if you don't have kids. the more answers the better :)

[matryoshkalex]

prompt 1: holes

so since im not doing in/kto/ber for many reasons, i decided to do what im dubbing aletober lol. basically just asking my friends for random words and using those as my prompts hehe. im suuuuuper busy this month tho so i dont know how many ill actually get done in october but im just going to do them when i have time and itll probably bleed into november which is fine

havent done an ink drawing in a while, i forgot how much i love doing it

[astranauticus]

todays orv mood: standing at the water dispenser under my dorm building waiting for my instant noodles to cook just pacing in circles and swearing

[scarletanpan]

Scavenging thru the damaged merchandise they make me store in my fucking trunk to use their battery powered lights bc who's gonna fuckin know and we might not get power back for a week, miles of road on every side of our neighborhood have power lines completely knocked over by huge trees

[bookworm-2692]

After the absolute carnage and chaos of Session 3 and 4, I desperately wanted to see a graph of everyone’s life left compared to each other, and this is the result of that. I will include close ups of each session below the cut, as well as screenshots of the full (colour-coded!!) data. Updates: Session 5, Session 6, Session 7, Session 8.

Note that I’m using the times that everyone should have based on their kills and deaths, and not what was actually shown (since I know Tango was accidentally given 1.5 hours for his boogey kill instead of just 1 hour, and Skizz hasn’t yet received his 30 minutes for killing Tango), so we’ll see if these times are rectified for Session 5, or if I will adjust my graph to show what is actually used.

Before I show the close ups, I just want to explain the colours used. I picked a base colour for each team and then used a different shade of that colour for each member of the team, to make it easier when looking at a mess of lines. TIES are red because Tango made the bowtie on the tower red (and also because of the red tie in Skizz’s skin, and also Tango’s skin is red). The Bad Boys are green because of all their crops (wheat and potatoes and carrots so far). The Nosy Neighbours are purple because of Watcher-related reasons. Mean Gills are teal because of the coral reef and the warm water colour (and also Scott’s hair). Clockers are orange because Minecraft clocks are gold, and orange is the closest colour to that. Below is a screenshot of all the colour choices I had, and I labeled each one with the player I picked for it

Now for the close ups of each session, with labelling for where each player is at at the end of each session. The grey squiggly downward line is simply the average of all the players’ times at that instant, and the green, yellow, and red horizontal lines mark out 24, 16, and 8 hours respectively. There are no markings for the number of hours, but each gridline is an additional hour, so you can count up and down from the colour-coded lines.

Session 1 close up

Session 2 close up

Session 3 close up

Session 4 close up

So as you can see... there’s less than three hours between the bottom nine people, and a much larger gap from them to the top five. And all three of Skizz’s teammates are amongst those with the most time, so I don’t think Skizz will be first out if TIES play their cards right.

Next I am going to show the data tables I used to generate the graphs! I colour coded them so you can easily see green lives vs yellow lives, and also how often some people switched between them (and you can also see the single second Scar technically turned green during Session 3 before dying, which is also the weird orange vertical line on the graph).

There’s a new row every ten minutes, and every death created two new rows, the first of which is the times a second before the death, and the second is after the death, in order to create the sudden vertical drop.

Deaths are marked with red borders around the box, and time being gained is marked with a green border. All times are in hours and only display to two decimal places, but were calculated down to the second (and the times in hours, minutes, and seconds can be seen at the very left.

Without further ado:

Session 1 data

Session 2 data

Session 3 data

Session 4 data

I find this is a super good visualiser of all the green and yellow switches during the session.

And to visualise the absolute chaos of a specific ten minute segment during Session 3... below shows how much space the chaotic ten minutes takes up in the data due to all the deaths... compared to the entire two hours before it (remembering each row is a new ten minutes or a new death... so for a single ten minute segment to take up almost as much space as two hours, really shows a lot)

Anyway, I had an absolute blast putting all this data together and I’ve spent so much time since the weekend just staring at all the pretty graphs and data. I hope this helps other people keep track of all the death and carnage and times and so on, like it helped me.

[transgendermilesprower]

the tumblr sonic community is like 500 million times better than the sonic twitter community, like,,, unironically...

like the twitter sonic community lacks any media literacy skills to the point it kinda scares me, correction, it terrifies me