#the little ice age

[sillys-little-blog]

neapolitan ice cream 🍨 🎀🍼

[jackalopepaws]

ChocoCat Stimboard!!🐈‍⬛🍫🐾

A little self indulgent stimboard I wanted to make for my girlfriend after I saw Pixxiecup do an amazing chococat board!! :DDD

[mammoth-clangen]

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First

In which Pounce's panic attack is interrupted by my FAVOURITE LITTLE GUY!!

U will learn more about him in part 2 uvu

Fun fact, I was gonna have Pounce stalking a giant pleistocene Pika but literally cannot find any reference to how big they were.

And then i realised pika are just,,, insanely tiny,,, so i used a marmot instead. I like marmots now, they're so chunky!

I drew Pounce with proper sabers by accident, big cats have milk teeth until they're 1yr old, whoops! Let's say it's uh... an effect... from baring them... being stressed out... yup

[emacrow]

When Diana and her twin Jason was born after her, Jason was left to be disposed off in Amazon, only for him to disappear a second later.

Clockwork saw the possibility and took the freshly wet newborn swapping him with The Fenton's stillborn.

For what he saw in the possibility of the future was nearly endless as he did what he had to do.. for the best outcome to come forth..

A pebble here, a rocket ship toy there, an inch of furniture moved then so that incident doesn't happen, a poster paper on that tree. Minor tiny changes to help bring the visual to the present.

All leading to clockwork giving 19 year old sleep deprived danny an small yet important task to deliver a scroll in another dimension leading up to his body regressed in that dimension timeline the moment he slipped in and out the portal.

Diana knew she had a twin brother out there.. and she was going to find him.

What she didn't know that he was literally falling into her arms, when she and Superman went to check on the Glowing lararus pit portal made near metropolis.

Tiny little boy who look completely tired as he went unconscious holding a purple and green scroll in his hands, wearing clothes 3 times his size.

[jackyjackdraws]

It's that time of the year again

The year where my favorite show and my favorite boys came to life (at a different time but at the same time as well)

So I wanted to celebrate this occasion by redrawing an oldie from 2020 but at the same time do something new

Happy Birthday Gravity Falls and happy birthday to my beautiful boys 💕

[plusie]

[puppysplayground]

pastries and icecream🍰

agre safe stimboard:)

[melyasssy]

ICE CREAM STIMBOARD 🍦🍨🍧🪼🪻🩷🩵🫰🧋🪺🫧🩻

[guardian-angel12]

Sorry mom, the pirate “phase” never ended. It just kept evolving.

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

debate

(topic: how many and what configuration of kids do they give off vibes of having (either at present or in the future)(partner is irrelevant in most cases, some could be single parents for all i care))

[blanketyboy]

Snailagere’s 30 days of agree moodbards!

day 12: my favourite food!

Me luvs choccy!!!

[vaguely-concerned]

illario was so right... this one traumatized crow boy really can contain such a universe of pure and childlike wonder at the mere existence -- the concept! -- of wyverns. even through the horrors

[pocketramblr]

what do you mean sozin didn't have a kid until he was like eighty...

[abyssal-ilk]

thinking about if the blight ghilan'nain infected herself with hurts. or if there was any fear after she became mortal, any new enhancement of pain or feeling with the loss of her archdemon. would it of been the blight killed her, eventually? if lucanis did not? or if not killed her, would it of corrupted her to the point of being mindless, driven only by the blight she tried to tame? would elgar'nan have lost his sister no matter what?

[ride-thedragon]

Nettles and Race.

George is great at both analysing and subverting genre tropes. We see this with his portrayal of the Targaryens as bad white blonde powerful elf like people. Or his understanding consistently in his works that beauty doesn't equal morality. This is surface level, and he does have his shortcomings (how he portrays the Dothraki in a lot of aspects, etc) but I find it really interesting the amount of tropes and conventions he addresses and subverts with Nettles specifically in such a short span of the book. George uses specific racial imagery with Nettles that we don't see often from him, in short. Here's a list:

Implementation and Subversion

1. The most unlikely is, the most unlikely:

Oftentimes, in fantasy stories, the least likely is a white disenfranchised person. The majority of the time, it's because they are poor or treated poorly. Nettles is a black girl who is poor, orphaned, and marked for thieving, and none of that hinders her own feat of claiming a dragon or the accepting initially that she does. She's unlikely, extremely unlikely, the most unlikely choice.

2. Black girls are allowed to feel:

Nettles cries and grieves. Of all the dragonseeds, she's the only one positioned to feel remorse and loss after the Battle of Driftmark. She is foul-mouthed (though not written into the narrative) and fearless. Often times their is a need for black women to be strong (not have access to their emotions) or angry (the only emotion they're allowed because they're "loud"). Nettles is crass and sensitive. She's multifaceted.

3. White people don't center black narratives:

Typically, black characters in fantasy are centred around white protagonists. Nettles distinctly isn't when you focus on her. This is different from being impacted. To be impacted means you're a part of the plot. To have someone be centred in your narrative would be for your existence in the narrative to entirely depend on your relationship with them. You don't exist outside of them. Nettles does. She has an entire life up until she claims Sheepstealer without any intervention from the Targs, and after she leaves the main narrative of Fire and Blood, she has a life. This is even in a Targaryen history book.

4. Black girls deserve to be protected and loved:

Nettles is protected by the men around her in the narrative. Oftentimes, this is something not afforded to black characters, far less for black women in fantasy narratives, but she is protected. Not just by Daemon, who is someone who has extreme emotional stakes with her but by the men of Maidenpool and Lord Corlys. All of whom are white in the books. Nettles is protected by men unquestioningly. They may decide how to do it or have a bigger motive, but protecting her is never a question.

5. Promiscuity questioned:

Nettles is never shown to be a promiscuous character through an unbiased lens. Every time a person brings up Nettles' sex, it's through the lens of necessity or heavily implied to be a dramatic assumption. The two biggest cases, "her raising her skirts for sheep" by Septon Eustace is counteracted by the fact that she's marked as a thief and claims a dragon called Sheepstealer who she's likened to in the narrative and by Rhaenyra who is disproven from her "she seduced the prince with spells" theory by both the men of Maidenpool who don't believe her and Daemon who let's Nettles go. Anytime her promiscuity is presented, it's immediately questioned by who we are told she is.

6. White women tears:

Historically and in fiction, the tears of a white woman are enough to derail any existence of a black character permanently or are at least meant to. Black people, fictional or real, are consistently tormented with the notion of white woman tears or emotional outbursts. Their actions cause a major consequence with white women. With Rhaenyra, this would be Nettle slowing her head for her suspicions. Nettles does not and gets away from. The narrative. This is unheard of. In fantasy doesn't occur because most times, the black woman would be punished, but in fandom, this idea is also reflected in the call for Nettles to be replaced.

7. Relationship with the lead man:

Daemon, for better or worse, is the lead man of the dance. Nettles finds herself attached to him in a relationship that seems, for lack of a better word loving. They seem comfortable, happy, and he's doting towards her. They spend all their time together, and it's paralleled with his other 'living' relationships as well. She's portrayed as his last great love and in the universe, the singers say as much. Issues aside, this is rare. (Martha Jones, I'm sorry I wasn't your writer)

8. Power and Worship:

Nettles is worshipped and seems to become a Goddess in her own right at the end of her narrative departure. Nettles is viewed as a deity because of the power she claimed by herself. Revolutionary. Also it isn't some blink and you can avoid it thing. It ties into the main story of Game of Thrones and her clan, the Burned men helping Tyrion Lannister.

9. Mammy, Sapphire Jezabel ext:

Mammy: Maternal black woman. Lives to serve white people and nothing else.

Sapphire: Rude, loud, stubborn, malicious, 'dumb' black women, nothing else.

Jezabel: raw, sexual, can barely restrain their sexuality and live to tempt (white) men. Nothing else.

Not once does Nettles tie into any of these tropes without it being questioned in the narrative or simply ignored in her story. So many representations of black women, especially in fantasy, fall into the first two or friend not lover trope, help mate trope, etc. anything that justifies their existence by tying them to white characters with no other outlook. Nettles subverts this.

10. Season of the Witch:

Black witches and their history save me. Black witches and their history save. This aligns itself with African spiritually and the otherness assigned to enslaved women who practised both 'witchcraft' and medicinal herbology for lack of a better word.

Witchcraft is also often tied to the imagery of the irresistible black woman as it's almost inhuman to be that attracted to black women when white women are available.

So when it's said that Nettles is a witch, imagery similar to the justifications of white women during slavery are being invoked but not followed through because no one believes her.

11. Disposable Black Love interest

This is also a big issue across genres with black chapters. It happens with Laena in the show as well. When the plot calls for it (or in a lot of cases fans) you dispose of the black love interest in place of a white one. Nettles removal from the narrative immediately calls for both Daemon's and Aemond's removal from the narrative. She isn't disposable. She's a linchpin. Also, Daemon does not go back to Rhaenyra after Nettles leaves. He just dies.

12. Nothing Special:

Magical black negros that helps the protagonist, welcome to your tape.

The magical black negros trope is this convention within fantasy where a black character will appear only to be an aid to a white character by their use of magic. They don't exist or have a life outside this purpose. Nettles could've fallen into this trap.

The idea that she isn't Valyrian could have easily been tied with the spells angle outside Rhaenyra’s bias. Instead of that, however, we get the idea that Nettles is just smart and interesting. She's allowed to be smart and interesting. The narrative defends her being smart and interesting.

She might not be Valyrian. She might not be a witch or seductress. She might be just a really clever girl who defies the odds and conventions.

Conclusion

I think Nettles was both an active effort on George's part to defy conventions and subevert stereotypes and tropes as well as a way to question his reader's bias. Nettles is often reduced to trivial, replaceable, and minor when she's not. You just have to want to pay attention to her.

[little-pomni]

..Hello again. You doing alright?

Im.. doing... uhmm, well, I am sort of trying to help a stuffed me.. well, actually, not me?

They got shot, and they are patched up but still in pain. . .

O-other than that, I'm doing good. . .