Suchian Musings And Ramblings About General Designs Involving Notable Estuaries

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  • Well, it's been nearly five years.  It's time to stop being so angry at Parker and Stone all the time for their play.  I can't have such a hate be represented by a statistically significant portion of a century.  Considering how the play is no longer performed due to the pandemic, I can claim that I have, in fact, fulfilled my desire to live to see it ended, and close the book with a victory of some sort.
  • I mean, I know that things will reopen, and that it will outlive me, and that it represents a larger audience, a larger cultural impact, and more money than I ever will, not to mention more of Tv Tropes, but at least at this point, I continue and it is stopped.
  • Huh.  I thought somebody would have responded by now.
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    *paps*
  • So, I'mma talk a little about the name of King Arthur's sword.

    In some of the oldest stuffs, it's named Caledfwlch, which I cannot pronounce because my linguistic nerdery is etymology-focused rather than communication-focused, and as such I do not have the mad skills of pronouncing certain Welsh things properly.  

    The latinized version of this name Caledfwlch has a couple of versions, but the two most common are Excalibur and Caliburn.  Older, less popular/enduring name-types include Excalibor, Escalibor, Escalibur ( which is an anagram of Claire Bus), Caliburnus, and Chalabrum.

    Caledfwlch also shares a root with Caladbolg, another named sword associated with other hero-figured (sometimes Caladbolg is spelled as Caladcholg), but Caladbolg and Caledfwlch are different swords.

    It's generally well-accepted that Excalibur is the name of the Sword given to Arthur by the Lady of the Lake, rather than the name of the Sword In The Stone.  As a kid, that was a bit of DEEP LORE trivia right up there with China and Japan being different countries.  However, just as the "Frankenstein is the name of the Scientist, not the monster" trivia-trap can be evaded with "Since Victor Frankenstein, the scientist, is the creator of the monster, he is, in a way, the monster's father, and since Frankenstein is a last name, technically Frankenstein could apply as a name belonging to the monster as well", the trivia-trap of "Excalibur is the name of the sword from the Lady of the Lake, not the name of the Sword In The Stone" can be evaded with "Some of our main sources for the Arthur Legends make no such distinction, so perhaps both swords were called Excalibur or the confusion extends to the original authors themselves, also, in at least one tale, the Lady of the Lake gave a sword named Galatine to Gawaine, so technically, you could say that the name of the Sword from the Lady of the Lake is Galatine OR Excalibur depending on which of her swords you're talking about".

    Some people will try to tell you that King Arthur's sword which is The Sword In The Stone is named Clarent.  The source for this seems to be The Alliterative Morte Arthure from about 1400, but that work never says that Clarent was the Sword In The Stone.  It does, however, say that Arthur's swords are Clarent and Excalibur, but Arthur never used Clarent for violence (he only used it for knighting, coronations, and such things, keeping it clean).  Also, the same work has Mordred steal Clarent and use it as his sword, with which he kills Arthur.

    If Clarent was the Sword In The Stone, then a lot of things start to make more sense.  Under this idea, it's symbolic of his right to the throne, and the reason we don't hear it mentioned by name all that often is that we focus more on battles than on knightings.  Mordred stealing it is symbolic of his lack of right to the throne.  It's also kind of beautiful and heartbreaking to have Arthur be killed with the Sword In The Stone, the sword he had kept clean of blood all those years.  Just as Excalibur begins and ends with the Lady of the Lake, so would Clarent be a bookend, beginning and ending Arthur's reign.  Two Swords, two names.

    The only flaws are that traditionally Arthur loses the Sword In The Stone and then gets Excalibur as a replacement, some works have Excalibur as a replacement for Arthur's sword which broke in battle (or have Excalibur be the sword that broke in battle and was replaced), and, as mentioned before, the Alliterative Morte Arthure never says that Clarent was the Sword In The Stone.

    Also, some works have Excalibur as Arthur's sword, but have Excalibur be wielded by someone else on Arthur's behalf (usually Gawaine).

    My headcanon is that Clarent is the Sword In The Stone and Arthur somehow managed to find it again after he lost it.  I like the Gawaine-Mordred parallel in having Gawaine sometimes bear Excalibur and Mordred bear Clarent in the last battle, and also Gawaine gets his own special sword from the Lady of the Lake but Mordred has to steal Clarent because he's not worthy of earning anything that cool.
  • stepolopisnepaf
  • 19919991919919919919111191919191
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    PEIguUg.png
  • Today's my sister's birthday!
  • To believe in the possibility of Dystopia but not Utopia is strange.

    Perhaps the idea is that good is to be striven for, rather than perfectly achieved, and virtue is objective/perfect and thus outside possibility, while vice is subjective/imperfect and thus inherent to all attempts at virtue?

    Or perhaps it is good that is seen as subjective (and thus nonexistent, or not 'substantial') and evil/bad that is seen as objective (and thus undeniable and 'true'), in that what may seem a utopia to some looks like a dystopia to others?
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    Aliroz I feel you would enjoy the book Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
  • ^ I will look into it.

    So, during the last three weeks, the original Trash Heap of the Tv Tropes Forum was killed (I really need to keep archives of all the things important to me on the internet, so that even if they are deleted, I have a copy).

    That was one of the last major archives of that part of my life still left on Tv Tropes.  

  • You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
    I feel similarly. That was the thread that I posted in most often, and it's easily the biggest surviving archive of my posts from before we moved primarily to HH.

    But I'm also, like, not all that proud of the person I was back then, so I don't know that I would necessarily object to seeing it go.
  • Jokes on you, Central, I just learned that the Wayback Machine is a thing and now I'mma preserve ALL THE THINGS.
  • So, over the last few weeks, I've been trying to get into Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.

    I really like stories that have overarching plots over generations of the same family, so that's cool, but, on the other hand, for something that supposedly has a "confusing and extensive family tree", the Joestar Lineage is pretty weak-sauce.

    I mean, Jonathan has six descendants in the five generations after him.  My Grandma (dad's mom) had 66 living descendants when she died.
  • edited 2021-02-01 01:32:37
    I mean, kudos for having that many generations in an ongoing story, but I guess I just really want a story where two of the main characters can be third cousins once removed and when they meet the audience is all "OHMIGOSH THIS IS SO COOL" (because we, the audience, know these people, and their parents, and their parents, and so on) and then they go on adventures or something.
  • edited 2021-02-01 03:55:42
    I know this is an oooooooold take, and I'm at least 30 years behind everyone else, but I love how Dio Brando is seven million different kinds of evil.

    Like, seriously, this is some Count Olaf level of making the audience loathe a character, except Dio regularly gets righteously facepunched and the heroes are actually allowed to have some success against his schemes.
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    Rozzie what is your opinion on Speedwagon.
  • edited 2021-02-02 00:39:13
    Speedwagon is a bro (in the good sense) who clearly is still in mourning for Prince Albert, given that he not only wears black, not only wears a black bowler hat, but wears black with a black bowler hat with a black belt as a hatband (no joke, having a black belt as a hatband for a bowler hat is a style that may or may not have originated with the funeral of Prince Albert and the desire of people to wear non-black bowler hats while still showing mourning by wearing some black on their bowler hats), all in the Victorian era.

    image

    But sadly, this becomes insufficient when the Baron Zepelli dies (in wearing a tall top hat with the black headband, Zepelli is also mourning Prince Albert, whose favorite type of hat was the tall top hat), so, in grief for the late Baron, Speedwagon wears his hat.

    This is all brilliant foreshadowing to the fact that Speedwagon's role in the plot is to mourn those he holds in esteem, surviving while the heroes around him die young despite his efforts  (indeed, after Jonathan's Death, Speedwagon wears a couple of different hats, all of which are either black or seem to have a black headband).

    In the end, his legacy is upheld by a foundation of people who assist the Joestars and wear black hats, except these people wear the name SPEEDWAGON on their hats, placing him among the hat-mourned heroes.

    Note:  Before anybody points out nonblack anime colorations, I would like to point out that such are CLEARLY black in the manga.  The fact that the whole thing is in black and white is LOOK OVER THERE!  *runs away*


    ...


    ...


    ...


    All messing-with-you aside, he's a great character who wears awesome hats, acts as a moral counterpart to Dio, and is a likeable support character who avoids stealing the spotlight. Also, his name contains "peed", which is funny because I apparently am super immature.  10/10 sidekick.
  • edited 2021-02-09 00:07:36
    Oh, for the bluebirds and the toads and the salamanders that once lived at this elevation just one or two generations ago!  Can anything of this era with its jet planes and cell phones be worth what has been lost?

    How do those who lived in that time so full of glory and wonder love the present and look to the future with hope, when I am overcome with mourning for what is gone and worry for what still is?
  • I suppose, down the line, if I live in a world without fish or birds at all, I will still have the sky and sun, and maybe that would be enough, maybe the beauty of sunrises and sunsets would be enough for me to live and love and be grateful.
  • You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
    I just want you to know you are a friend
  • Nothing is more insufferable than a person who is disappointed in the same thing as you but for different reasons.

    There's not quite a word for it, but that feeling that somebody knows, but does not understand, or that someone is barking up the wrong side of the right tree, is very frustrating.

    I suppose it might be like how notes that are too close together are dissonant.
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    Ali_Roz said:

    I suppose, down the line, if I live in a world without fish or birds at all, I will still have the sky and sun, and maybe that would be enough, maybe the beauty of sunrises and sunsets would be enough for me to live and love and be grateful.

    'Life is sweet, brother.'

    'Do you think so?'

    'Think so!—There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?'

    'I would wish to die—'

    'You talk like a gorgio—which is the same as talking like a fool—were you a Rommany Chal you would talk wiser. Wish to die, indeed!—A Rommany Chal would wish to live for ever!'

    'In sickness, Jasper?'

    'There's the sun and stars, brother.'

    'In blindness, Jasper?'

    'There's the wind on the heath, brother; if I could only feel that, I would gladly live for ever

  • edited 2021-02-27 22:36:04
    Odradek said:

    Ali_Roz said:

    I suppose, down the line, if I live in a world without fish or birds at all, I will still have the sky and sun, and maybe that would be enough, maybe the beauty of sunrises and sunsets would be enough for me to live and love and be grateful.

    'Life is sweet, brother.'

    'Do you think so?'

    'Think so!—There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?'

    'I would wish to die—'

    'You talk like a gorgio—which is the same as talking like a fool—were you a Rommany Chal you would talk wiser. Wish to die, indeed!—A Rommany Chal would wish to live for ever!'

    'In sickness, Jasper?'

    'There's the sun and stars, brother.'

    'In blindness, Jasper?'

    'There's the wind on the heath, brother; if I could only feel that, I would gladly live for ever

    Thank you, I needed this.  You do have a gift for finding these things.

    Unrelated:  It feels wrong to me that the Water-benders in Avatar can bend both fresh water and salt water.  With some exceptions, fresh-water fish cannot breathe or survive in salt water for very long (and, with some exceptions, salt-water fish cannot breathe or survive in fresh water for very long), and (again, with exceptions), salt water is generally bad for plants used to freshwater and fresh water is generally bad for salt-water plants.  Drinking salt water instead of fresh water for too long will kill you.  I mean, I know it's a continuum and not a dichotomy, but if I was a person who made fiction, I'd have salt-water-magic and fresh-water-magic as different magics. 

    Also Unrelated:  If blood-bending and vine-bending are things because living things contain water, why is there no equivalent way to bend the air inside of a living thing?  In fact, it's kind of sad that air-bending never got any branch-off things like lightning-bending was for fire-bending and sand-bending/metal-bending were for earth-bending and vine-bending/blood-bending were for water-bending.  I mean, sure, there was only two Air-benders in ATLA, but we saw plot-important individuals straight-up INVENT metal-bending and blood-bending, so it feels like Air got shafted and under-explored.
  • That awkward moment when you mom asks you what you know about Catherine the Great because she needs to know if the show she saw-half-the-first-episode-of-and-rejected-in-disgust was just making stupid crap up, and you don't know WHICH stupid crap myth about Catherine the Great she might have been exposed to and you don't want to expose her to MORE crap which would thus make you have to explain why you know this stuff and THIS IS WHY ONLY NICE AND POLITE PEOPLE WHO DON'T DO QUESTIONABLE THINGS SHOULD MAKE HISTORY.
  • I mean, I don't like Watchmen, it's quite overrated and not as influential as a lot of people seem to think, and it wastes some brilliant ideas.  Heck, I guess that's it.  It wastes some brilliant ideas.  Like, I don't frigging care about Rorschach's Bleak Backstory or Flashbacks To The Comedian Doing Horrible Things When The Narrative Wants Us To Feel Bad About His Death, or Silk Spectre's Disastrous Love Life (Involving Adult Content), or Why Dr. Manhattan Is Blue And Has God-Like Powers.

    But the bad guy's plan is brilliant and the way the story frames it, and the weight of the scenes just during and after that point is as heavy as almost anything I've read.

    It's a rare case where the payoff is way better than the setup.

    Also, there's a movie, but APPARENTLY they changed Ozymandias's outfit from being somehow-100%-the-coolest-thing-ever-while-being-100%-the-dorkiest-schlocky-lamesuit-in-a-way-that-can-only-be-compared-to Anakin-Skywalker's-Podracing-Helmet to being this overly angular void of interest:

    image
  • I mean, that doesn't say "I see myself as Alexander the Great", that says "Costuming department's either getting paid too much or too little, or has the wrong people".
  • Amnyways, the point I'm leading up to is that Danielle Hunt's Goblins:  Life Through Their Eyes is another flawed work that is a masterpiece in several alternate universes where the author has fewer life issues, and in this universe is notable for how good it isn't but almost is.

    Also, Goblins updated and I feel that what just happened is contrived, and I have nobody to talk about this with, so I'mma be vague and say opinions without backing them up because HA HA THIS IS MY THREAD I CAN DO WHAT I WANT.
  • Also, this video is one of the best things ever:


  • is it just me or is brutalism a popular architectural style for supervillains
  • This is my face when it turns out that the current capital of Egypt is Cairo and not Memphis:

    image
  • Ah gaht booorks fur mah borfdaay.

    Ah'm a happah gattor!
  • Alsoh sohmm computah gahms.
  • Never be with0ut a Hat!
    (2010 self)

    Ali_Roz said:

    Amnyways, parody being protected speech is such a stupid idea.


    I mean, who decided that it was okay to do whatever with whatever image/idea, but only if you were engaging in mockery?

    I need to kick that person.
    What the heck, future self?

    Are Mom and Dad murdered by a bunch of comedians between now and your time, or is there some horrible accident where I lose my sense of humor, or did you somehow manage to become incredibly uptight and a total sellout at the same time?

    Why are you so bothered by things that are actually okay, when you can't even manage to care about so many of the things I care about!
  • ...And even when your hope is gone
    move along, move along, just to make it through
    (2015 self)
    Be nice, you/me.

    If our 2000 self were here, you'd realize that you don't care about all the things you cared about ten years ago.

    Besides, 2000-us loved kicking annoying people.


  • Aliroz said:

    Be nice, you/me.


    If our 2000 self were here, you'd realize that you don't care about all the things you cared about ten years ago.

    Besides, 2000-us loved kicking annoying people.


    More like "loved kicking and annoying people".
  • Never be with0ut a Hat!
    (2010 self)
    Aliroz said:

    Be nice, you/me.


    If our 2000 self were here, you'd realize that you don't care about all the things you cared about ten years ago.

    I try!  I try to care about those things!  Shut up!

    It's easy for you to say change is inevitable, you already gave up on my dreams!
  • ...And even when your hope is gone
    move along, move along, just to make it through
    (2015 self)
    ... don't cry, I didn't mean it like that, little one.

    Hey, come on.  I still have hope, and I still want to become an author, unlike old grumpy fun-hater over here  (how that one ever turns into our cool 2025 self, I can't imagine).


  • Aliroz said:

    ... don't cry, I didn't mean it like that, little one.

    Hey, come on.  I still have hope, and I still want to become an author, unlike old grumpy fun-hater over here  (how that one ever turns into our cool 2025 self, I can't imagine).


    I'll have you know that I own more jigsaw puzzles and computer games than you two put together, so I am, in fact, incredibly fun.  The most fun.  So there.  
  • edited 2021-04-13 04:13:39
    Never be with0ut a Hat!
    (2010 self)
    I'm NOT crying.  And I'm not a "little one", I'm [redacted]!

    Resurgam.
  • ...And even when your hope is gone
    move along, move along, just to make it through
    (2015 self)
    -insert funny thing here-

    -insert book recommendations that nobody will read-

    Resurgam.
  • Well, that was a self-referential waste of time.   And so was that.

    Resurgam.
  • My dreams exceed my real life
    *pats the gator snout*
  • For years, I didn't understand the traditional representation of a tesseract, especially when it was represented rotating, it just looked like a cube inside a cube turning itself inside out.

    But, with this visualization, I was able to actually, for a few moments, see it as rotating rather than changing.  The colors help a lot:


  • edited 2021-04-21 18:01:39
    It's like how in this, you can see it as a cube that is rotating rather than some two-dimensional shapes that change size and shape:
    image
  • ooh i like that rotating thing
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