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The Prague astronomical clock, or Prague orloj, is a medieval astronomical clock located in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic.

#prague #astronomical clock #<3

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The devastating difference between how much time it takes to write something vs how fast people read it lol

#writing

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personal reminder: stop being so fucking hard on yourself

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Evening dress, c. 1958

#gorgeous #vintage #vintage fashion

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My Biggest and Most Annoying Fictional Horse Pet Peeve

Big Horses are a Very New Thing and they Likely Didn’t Exist in your Historical and/or Fantasy Settings.

You’ve all seen it in every historical piece of media ever produced. Contrary to popular belief, a big black horse with long legs and long flowing mane is not a widespread or even a particularly old type of horse.

THIS IS NOT A MEDIEVAL THING. THIS IS NOT EVEN A BAROQUE THING. THIS IS A NINETEENTH CENTURY CITY CARRIAGE HORSE.

All the love to fancy Friesian horses, but your Roman general or Medieval country heroine just really couldn’t, wouldn’t, and for the sake of my mental health shouldn’t have ridden one either.

Big warmblood horses are a Western European and British invention that started popping up somewhere around 1700s when agriculture and warfare changed, and when rich folks wanted Bigger Faster Stronger Thinner race horses. The modern warmblood and the big continental draught both had their first real rise to fame in the 1800s when people started driving Fancy Carriages everywhere, and having the Fanciest Carriage started to mean having the Tallest and Thinnest Horses in the town.

Before mechanised weaponry and heavy artillery all horses used to be small and hardy easy-feeders. Kinda like a donkey but easier to steer and with a back that’s not as nasty and straight to sit on.

SOME REAL MEDIEVAL, ROMAN, OTTOMAN, MONGOL, VIKING, GREEK and WHATEVER HISTORICALLY PLAUSIBLE HORSES FOR YOU:

“Primitive”, native breeds all over the globe tend to be only roughly 120-140 cm (12.0 - 13.3 hh) tall at the withers. They all also look a little something like this:

Mongolian native horse (Around 120-130 at the withers, and decendants of the first ever domesticated horses from central Asia. Still virtually unchanged from Chinggis Khan’s cavalry, ancestor to many Chinese, Japanese and Indian horses, and bred for speed racing and surviving outdoors without the help of humans.)

Carpathian native horse / Romanian and Polish Hucul Pony (Around 120-150 at the withers, first mentioned in writing during the 400s as wild mountain ponies, depicted before that in Trajanian Roman sculptures, used by the Austro-Hungarian cavalry in the 19th century)

Middle-Eastern native horse / Caspian Pony (Around 100-130 at the withers, ancestor of the Iranian Asil horse and its decendants, including the famous Arabian and Barb horses, likely been around since Darius I the Great, 5th century BC, and old Persian kings are often depicted riding these midgets)

Baltic Sea native horse / Icelandic, Finnish, Estonian, Gotland and Nordland horses (Around 120-150 at the withers, descendant of Mongolian horses, used by viking traders in 700-900 AD and taken to Iceland. Later used by the Swedish cavalry in the 30 years war and by the Finnish army in the Second World War, nowadays harness racing and draught horses)

Siberian native horse / Yakutian pony (Around 120-140 at the withers, related to Baltic and Mongolian horses and at least as old, as well-adapted to Siberian climate as woolly mammoths once were, the hairiest horse there is, used in draught work and herding)

Mediterranean native horse / Skyros pony, Sardinian Giara, Monterufolino (Around 100-140 at the Withers, used and bred by ancient Greeks for cavalry use, influenced by African and Eastern breeds, further had its own influence on Celtic breeds via Roman Empire, still used by park ranger officers in Italy)

British Isles’ native horse / various “Mountain & Moorland” pony breeds (Around 100-150 at the withers, brought over and mixed by Celts, Romans and Vikings, base for almost every modern sport pony and the deserving main pony of all your British Medieval settings. Some populations still live as feral herds in the British countryside, used as war mounts, draught horses, mine pit ponies, hunting help and race horses)

So hey, now you know!

#horses #history

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Someday Chocolate Guy is gonna make a working time machine out of chocolate and we'll just be like. Of course. Of fucking course. It's the fucking chocolate guy, what did we expect.

#the chocolate guy #ok but seriously

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you will bloom if you take the time to water yourself

#true

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how?? just how?

#the chocolate guy #flamingo

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Okay I do need to ask about the Hospital Scene because A+ seriously <3

Haha, thanks, friend! 💜💜 and thank you sooooo much for expressing interest in my nonsense, I appreciate it 💜💜💜💜💜💜💜 Sooooo, the Hospital Scene (I need to come up with a better title before I post it lol) This is one of my favorite Jed & Abbey pictures in the world:

Seriously, look how adorable they are! 💜💜💜💜💜💜 The look on Abbey's face, she's doing her best to stay calm, but she's obviously worried, the position of her body, the way she's hugging Jed, making sure she doesn't hurt him, Jed with his hand on her back, the little hug, he's almost unconscious, but he's still holding on to Abbey... just 😭😭😭😭😍😍😍😍😍 The scene is obviously from "In the Shadow of Two Gunmen Part 1", because Jed's in pre-op and Abbey's wearing the purple coat (purple coat my beloved 💜💜) so I guess it takes place right after Abbey talks to Doctor Lee ("when all of this is over, tell the press, don't tell the press"--my queen!). Her stage directions from script book for season 1 and 2 read "Abbey looks at him (dr. Lee) a moment longer, then exits into the trauma room to join her husband."

Unfortunately, this photo is everything we've got. The scene can't be found in deleted scenes (like the 'Medea/Jackass' scene), and it's not in the script book (like the 'Mrs. Landingham knew about Jed's MS' scene). So, naturally, I have to write it 😂 What can I tell you about the WIP so far?

It's going to be short

There's going to be a lot of Bartlet fluff & drowsy Bartlet banter (think about "He Shall From Time to Time")

Sorkin was inspired by the assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan, so there are going to be loads of references to Reagan, like "Honey, I forgot to duck", "I hope you are all Democrats", "If I had this much attention in New Hampshire, I’d have stayed there", and "I have to be [a good patient]. My wife's a doctor."

Have a snippet:

“Abbey?” Jed’s eyes fluttered open.  “Hey.” Careful not to disturb his wound, Abbey sat on the bed. She took his hand.  “I forgot to duck.”  “It’s okay, Jed,” she said. "It's okay." “You mad?”  “At you? No! At whoever shot you? Damn straight!” Jed managed a weak laugh in response.  “I told Zoey you’d be pissed,” he said.  “I talked to the doctor and the anesthesiologist.” Abbey brushed his messy hair off his face.  “Did you scare ‘em good?” “No.” “Too bad, you’re sexy when you’re scary.”

Thanks for the ask, friend! Now I want to work on this fic, when I have a million other things to do 😂😂😂😂😂

#ask game #my fic

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Ask Game: WIP Excerpts

Note: I used the word “line,” but feel free to share more than one sentence! You can also alter any prompts that don’t apply to your WIP.

🌹 Share your most poetic line.

❤️ Share one of your favorite lines.

🗣 Share your favorite dialogue exchange.

🏝 Share your favorite description of a setting.

☂️ Share your favorite description of an object.

🤝 Share a line that introduces a character.

😂 Share your funniest line (or dialogue exchange).

💔 Share your most heartbreaking line.

☀️ Share a line with figurative language.

✍️ Share a line you’ve edited, and what it used to be.

☺️ Share a happy line.

✏️ Share the first line of any chapter.

📖 Share the last line of any chapter.

📝 Share the first line of your project.

🎬 Share the last line you’ve written.

🤯 Share a surprising line, or one where a character realizes something.

🎲 Using a method of your choosing, share a randomly-selected line.

🤨 Share a line that makes no sense out of context.

👤 Share a line that shows a character’s personality.

🫂 Share a line (or dialogue exchange) that shows the relationship between two characters.

✈️ Share a line where a character is traveling somewhere.

🤔 Share a line where a character makes a decision.

#wow this one's great! #ask game #wip excerpts #ask away

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Alison Friend - Mildred and Oreo (They bonded over their love of popcorn and became best friends), 2024

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Reblogging would be a great help, but don’t feel pressured to

#polls

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Someone said "Are you really so stupid to think that Africa has the same technological advances as us? If they did they would probably have clean water and not live in houses made of sticks and mud. Get over yourself and stop being so ignorant."..... Below is a tiny collection of images of the Africa they refuse to show you..

ches

I’m sorry you’ve been made to believe that the whole of Africa is poor, I really am..

#interesting #africa #usa

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unpublished fics game

I was tagged by @mihrsuri (thanks, friend 💜) you know how much I love talking about my fics, so if you want to know more about any of these, ask away 💜💜Anyway, I'm gonna sort my WIPs into three groups, based on the level of their WIPness 😂 Level 1: Fics I'm Actively Working On

The First Lady - my ongoing project, a series of post-eps and behind the scenes, which answers the most important question of them all: what was Abbey Bartlet doing during the episodes she doesn't appear in. The chapter I'm working on at the moment is a post-ep for "Evidence of Things Not Seen", part 1. Contains a lot of banter.

Substance of Things Hoped for - post-ep for "Evidence of Things Not Seen", part 2. Contains a lot of barbecuing.

Day Four - what happens between Abbey's return and the state dinner in season 5, ep. "Shutdown". Features the First Lady dressing a nice bird, Millicent Griffith as the voice of reason and a lot of Angst.

The Proposal - exactly what it says on the tin. Features a Ferris wheel, a beaver plushy and the phrase "hens etc."

Level 2: Outlines + a Scene or Two

The Hospital Scene - A deleted/missing scene from "In the Shadow of Two Gunmen". Feature a lot of cuteness and too many references to Ronald Reagan.

It Never Could Have Happened in New Hampshire - Jed and Abbey spend the weekend at her parents'. Features a malpractice suit, golf, Vermont maple syrup, Abbey's ex-boyfriend and an MS episode.

Level 3: Just an Idea or WIP's I'm Not Actively Working on

Jethro the Snowman - a holiday fic. Inspired by Jed's quote from season 7 that Abbey's dad took him on a six-hour hike in the dead of winter after he proposed to Abbey.

Abu el Banat post ep - a sequel to Day Four.

The First Meeting - exactly what is says on the tin. Features a lot of gratuitous nerdiness.

The Dead Irish Writers Missing Scene - not sure when I'll finish this one, so far I have only two scenes and one of them needs rewriting.

Tagging (no pressure💜): @claudiajcregg @holy-ships-x-red-lips @miabicicletta @librarianmouse @temperancecain @krazykitkat @hondagirll @muldxr @onekisstotakewithme

#unpublished fics game #my fic #ask game sort of

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Hello! I am a young -like, under eighteen- aspiring author and I am currently writing a book. I am nervous about the whole affair and would enjoy some advice! Why, I pretend I hear you asking? It's because I'm worried that the... uh, excrement will hit the fan.

I would really appreciate tips, especially from you, cause you're a literary genius and an author, so if you have any tips- well, I'd appreciate the advice.

In other words. HOW DO I WRITE PLEASE TELL ME YOUR SECRETS!

Thanks!

You write. You finish things. You write the nest thing. You make your peace with the things you write not being as good as the things in your head. You keep writing.

Once you've started writing things that aren't as bad as the first things, you start letting people see them.

#writing