#Stephen Wight

[olympain]

#andoredit #starwarsedit #swedit #andor #diego luna #cassian andor #stephen wight #lee boardman #kravas #verlo #star wars #original #*gifs #phew coldest open

[oodlesofd00dles]

How close are Bunting and Sandpiper? Didn’t you say they knew each other at one point? 👀

Putting this under a read more because I wrote a lot :pensive:

They are (were) very close! Best friends!! They have known each other for many years and I do mean many years- I did the math, they’re almost two hundred years old. Lmao fun fact Sandpiper used to wish they were more than friends a few times in their youth, and my brain is undecided if she still feels that way (or, uh, felt..since...*gestures vaguely to Colin and Walter*) but I know she is/was really devoted to the ymbryne lifestyle so even though she was catching feelings, she never did anything about it, since ymbrynes aren’t allowed to marry. I am also going to assume they cannot date or have children either since it wouldn’t make sense for that to be allowed but not marriage. Makes me wonder how much rarer they must be compared to other peculiars... But I also know that where there are forbidden romances, there will always be people trying to get around that- Shit, Bunting came from a family where his grandmother was an ymbryne....she never actually accepted her responsibility as one though and didn’t even complete her training, just went off and lived her life. When Bunting was discovered as an ymbryne he was pressured into it by his family, doing what his grandma never did.. But yeah, ANYWAY. Bunting knew Sandpiper felt that way about him and he wanted to remain friends  but not gonna lie sometimes I do want to make them a Thing...like, really bad. But I am still on the fence about it lol--

They’ve met as kids at an ymbryne academy and they continued to be friends as adults. Sandpiper used to send letters to him constantly and he’d write back. I think in the earlier days, he would visit her too, but after some time Bunting went and settled down and he didn’t have the time to stop by anymore. Sandpiper’s letters slowed over the years...and one day they stopped entirely.

#stephen speaks #my ocs #enid sandpiper #charles bunting #colin probably did find and read the letters when he found sandpiper's loop...but he could not get a location #neither of them put their actual addresses on there.. I do not believe peculiars use the postal system lol #they definitely have ways to share things amongst each other #while also being lowkey for both normals and wights to not catch on/trace them #I was thinking of ethel being the one that delivers their letters since she already travels a lot #she tracks and kills wights for funsies (hashtag girlboss) #I can see her sending messages or notes back and fourth between loops because she likes to check in on them #ask if they need anything and whatnot #and if they've seen anything #of course she'd need to be careful and make sure no one follows her into one #and she'd probably feel insanely guilty after finding out what happened to sandpiper #she wouldn't know that it was actually mikhail who brought colin to the loop #but still #she and bunting can bond over that I guess #yay shared trauma and grief #q

[canyourfavesurvivecastledracula]

could frodo from lord of the rings survive castle dracula🤔

Stephen King I know this is you

This one just makes me sad. Hasn't he suffered enough? It's also surprisingly difficult for me to get a read on it, despite me knowing the character very very well. He's just a little guy...

Frodo is not going to refuse anyone's gifts, and being unexpectedly protected by forgotten gifts is something he's very good at. He also doesn't shave so that's a thing. He does get very very subjected to the Horrors, and all hobbits are remarkably good at enduring hardship, even if they complain about it. Frodo is on the less complainy side of the spectrum, but the more hardship side of the spectrum.

He is plucky and courageous in a pinch. He would go exploring, with probably comparable results, although he may not be able to get into the blocked door. Would the Girlies want him? Well he's not that young but he is extremely baby sized. I think they'd be disappointed because they'd be expecting Delicious Baby and instead get Middle Aged Guy Going Through It. He knows he's not going to be able to oppose Dracula physically or mentally, so he won't get himself killed trying. He already has queer dreams. He already doesn't need shoes.

I think he would have a harder time psychologically in the Castle - Tolkien characters really don't like not being able to see the sun or feel grass between their toes - but an easier time with the Jon-a-Thon if that makes sense? But again he handled the Barrow-Wights (up to a point) and that's a really comparable situation. He keeps his head under extreme pressure, even if he loses his mind a bit. And he does just keep putting one foot in front of the other while all his other faculties fail him.

Based on the escape from the Emyn Muil I am confident Frodo could make it down the wall. He'd probably be happier if he had Sam's rope but again he's used to using his toes for things. He's got the right amount of courage to be making the daring attempts he needs to and the right amount of cowardice to not be eaten by wolves.

I'm ignoring the Ring because I don't think it helps him in this situation (see: Griffin Invisibleman). If anything it just adds to the psychological burden and he's better off without it.

In the final analysis I think Frodo Baggins can survive Castle Dracula, but he'll never be okay again.

Damn you Stephen King, you can't keep getting away with this.

ah NB this analysis is done with respect to Frodo as he appears in the the books. Movie!Frodo is 20 years younger and much more passive a character. I don't know if Movie!Frodo would think to go out the window unprompted, for instance, but I really don't know.

#Frodo Baggins #the Lord of the Rings #lotr #stephen king can't keep getting away with this #despite handling the Castle in comparable ways I do NOT think Frodo would be making Jonathan's choices in the back half of the novel #unindexed

[justforbooks]

Stephen Salter, who has died aged 85, was the inventor of the Salter’s Duck, a wave-power device that was the first of its kind and promised to provide a new source of renewable energy for the world – until it was effectively killed off by the nuclear industry.

In 1982, after eight years of development under Salter’s direction at Edinburgh University, the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) was asked by the government to see if the duck might be a cost-effective way of making large quantities of electricity. To the great surprise of Salter, and others, the UKAEA came to the conclusion that it was uneconomic, and that no further government funding should be given to the project.

A decade later it emerged that thanks to a misplaced decimal point, the review had made Salter’s duck look 10 times more expensive than the experiments showed it was likely to be. The UKAEA claimed this was just a mistake, but Salter, who had never been allowed to see the results of the secret evaluation, put it another way: asking the nuclear industry to evaluate an alternative source of energy was like putting King Herod in charge of a children’s home, he suggested.

By then, however, Salter had become interested in other projects, and as a result his duck has never been tested at sea – although wave-power devices using some of his technology are now in development in the Orkneys and off the coast of Portugal.

The prototype ducks, developed in a multidirectional wave tank of Salter’s invention, are now in the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, where there are a number of other exhibits with links to him, including the only remaining Black Knight rocket, a UK ballistic missile from the 1950s, and Freddy the Robot, from the 60s, the first machine to have artificial intelligence that could “see” and had a sense of touch. He also invented the Dervish, a low-cost method of clearing landmines, by using a revolving three-wheeled mechanism with a constantly changing path.

Perhaps the range of those projects sums up Salter’s mind better than anything else. Colleagues who worked with him said that while other scientists concentrated for years on one subject to the exclusion of all others, Salter was fascinated by new problems.

Although it was the oil shock of 1973 that first stimulated his interest in renewable energy, he later became one of the first scientists to realise the dangers of climate change. Doubting that the slow pace of cutting fossil-fuel use would be enough to save the planet from dangerous overheating, at the turn of the 21st century he set up a scheme to develop marine cloud brightening – an idea to produce more and brighter clouds in the middle of the oceans in order to reflect sunlight back into space, thereby keeping the oceans cooler and reducing sea-level rise.

He designed a project to build a large number of automated ships spraying aerosols from sea water into the atmosphere to create and brighten clouds in the middle of the world’s oceans and – having made a considerable fortune by selling some of his inventions – was able to set up the Lothian School of Technology just outside Edinburgh for £2.4m. The centre provides premises for up to 60 of his students to work on inventions and develop them commercially beyond their time at university.

Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, Stephen was the son of British parents who had emigrated there, Rachel (nee Floyd) and Willoughby de Carle Salter. His father joined the Royal Navy as a meteorologist during the second world war and afterwards the family moved to Britain, where Willoughby became head of a prep school in which Rachel also taught. Stephen attended two boarding schools and then Framlingham college in Suffolk.

By that time he was designing, building and flying model aeroplanes, and his ambition was to take an engineering degree at Cambridge University. But he failed to get good enough grades, instead becoming an apprentice at Saunders-Roe, an Isle of Wight aero- and marine-engineering company, where he was involved in the Black Knight rocket project. After studying at night classes he was finally accepted at Cambridge to study natural sciences including metallurgy.

He moved to Edinburgh University in 1967, aged 29, to become a research fellow working on artificial intelligence in robots. Within six years he was also a lecturer and had begun his work on wave energy. In 1984 he became professor of engineering design.

Perhaps Salter’s left-leaning politics and his willingness to take on the London establishment prevented him from being showered with the honours he deserved, but he was elected to a fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1991, made MBE in 2004, and inducted into the Scottish Engineering Hall of Fame in 2021. He never stopped working, becoming an emeritus professor at retirement age and continuing to research, advise companies and refine his inventions until the end.

He married Margaret Donaldson, a professor of development psychology at Edinburgh University, in 1973. She died in 2020. He is survived by his younger brother, Edmund.

🔔 Stephen Hugh Salter, inventor, born 7 December 1938; died 23 February 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#just for books #Stephen Salter #in memoriam

[violsva]

February Reading

I liked doing the reading post in January and thinking about books is better than thinking about family things! so here's another one.

Recent: Not all that recent now, but I finished Imre at the beginning of the month and I did actually enjoy it very much. It's very Edwardian, both in style and attitude, but along with the Weird Ideas about ethnicity there's also a sincere attempt to refute misogyny in gay male culture. And idk, the romance is just sweet.

Also read Wired Love by Ella Cheever Thayer, which I first heard of somewhere on tumblr most of a decade ago, and loved that too! And this one actually has surprisingly little in the way of Period Typical Attitudes. People respect each other's boundaries (or, at least, the good ones do) and there's a very nice portrait of life in urban boarding houses in the late 19th century.

Read Paladin's Faith by T. Kingfisher, which I loved all the way through, but I finished it at a point when I had kind of a lot of pain and PMS, which means I have ended up with no ability to comment on it. I liked the ground wights. Oh, also halfway through I decided Wren should ditch her party and marry me. Possibly I have a Type.

Reread an early Cat Sebastian, which, well, it's nice to see how much she's improved.

Still reading and listening to a lot of RWRB fic. I don't think there's anything I want to specifically call out as good, but it's nice and non-demanding. At least as long as I stick to AUs or shove it into the wish-fulfillment area of my brain rather than the class-conscious part. Oh, and I relistened to the first chapter of Life of Crime the other evening, that was great.

Current: In the middle of the climax of Gwen and Art Are Not in Love - thank god for skip-the-line copies, I have been reading this very slowly over the last six weeks. Recommended if it sounds at all like your kind of thing. Hopefully I will finish it on my commute tomorrow.

Have started The AI Who Loved Me by Alyssa Cole, because sometimes reading about living in a dystopia is, what's the word, sympathetic.

Last year I read The Astonishing Adventure of Jane Smith by Patricia Wentworth and wondered why she doesn't have the same reputation as, at least, Ngaio Marsh or Josephine Tey. Now I'm reading The Coldstone and finding it somewhat less impressive. Possibly because of SAD and possibly because it doesn't have any characters I straight up like as much as I liked Jane Smith. But the bit I read today had some very fun sneaking around at night pretending to be a ghost. Also a bicycle. I should read more books with bicycles.

Also I got Poetic Designs by Stephen Adams (one of my university professors) from my brother (we should have two copies between us, but mine has disappeared in a box somewhere) and am rereading that for nice practical unemotional nonfiction and nostalgia.

Future: I am going to pick up a gay sci-fi regency romance that I found in the local library and hope it is as awesome as it could be. And either Sixpenny Octavo by Annick Trent or One Night in Hartswood by Emma Denny, depending on whether I feel more like even more regency or even more medieval by then. And I have If You'll Have Me by @eunnieboo on hold at the library.

At some point I'm going to go through my reading file and run the stats to see if I'm actually reading more queer fiction this year than usual. Probably not, honestly.

#books #reading #reading log

[keep-tilting-at-windmills]

Born on the Isle of Wight, on June 13, 1795, Dr Thomas Arnold, was an English historian, principally known perhaps as having been headmaster of Rugby School from 1828 to 1841; where he introduced reforms refining masculinity and achievement, so widely copied by other prestigious public schools, as to indicate Arnold's unprecedented influence on the educational system of England.

Educated at Winchester College and Corpus Christi College, Oxford, Thomas Arnold was made a fellow of Oriel College, and whilst no great enthusiast for sport, it was permitted at Rugby as an alternative to poaching or fighting with local boys; as such, sport did not become part of Rugby's curriculum until 1850.

Arnold, said to have described his educational aims as being “the cure of souls first, moral development second, and intellectual development third“, has been portrayed in several film adaptations of 'Tom Brown's School Days' (from the novel of the same name by Thomas Hughes); including those by Sir Cedric Hardwicke (1940), Robert Newton (1951), Iain Cuthbertson (1971) and Stephen Fry (2005).

Thomas Arnold died on June 12, 1842. He rests in the Chapel of Rugby School.

Depicted: Thomas Arnold (by Thomas Phillips; given to the National Portrait Gallery, London, in 1923)

[georgefairbrother]

Towards the end of March 1963, Dr Richard Beeching presented his controversial report on the future of Britain’s railways. British Railways (soon to be renamed British Rail) was at that time losing 140 million pounds each year, and Board Chairman, Dr Beeching, was determined to ‘make the railways pay’.

The report found that only one half of the network’s services were financially viable, and accounted for 98 % of total passenger numbers. One quarter of the total traffic began at just 34 stations out of a total of 7 000.

The Beeching report argued that approximately 2 000 unviable stations should close immediately, and 250 train services cease running. Some stations were on small branch lines, but others identified for closure were in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Liverpool. The report called for major reductions in services to the Scottish Highlands, Wales, and the West of England. Dr Beeching told reporters that he anticipated the first closures would take place within months, that 70 000 jobs would be lost, and metropolitan fares in London would jump by at least 10 %.

Officially, the Conservative government welcomed the report, but not everyone was happy. Mark Woodnutt, Conservative MP for the Isle of Wight, threatened to resign over the proposed loss of the island’s railway.

The chairman of the National Council on Inland Transport, Labour Peer Baron Stonham, said;

“…Far from gearing the railways to the needs of the 1960s, it will in some areas reduce public transport to a lower level than in the horse age…”

There was a change in government in 1964, with Labour coming to power for the first time since 1951. After producing a second report in 1965, Beeching resigned over differences with the new Wilson government. Despite widespread protests against line and station closures, and hopes that the new government might see things differently, cuts outlined in Beeching’s original report were enacted. According to the BBC, a total of 2128 stations were closed, and 67 700 jobs were lost.

In the mid-1990s, David Croft produced and co-wrote a sitcom set in a small village station facing closure under the 'Beeching Axe', featuring Paul Shane, Su Pollard, Jeffrey Holland, several more familiar faces from You Rang M'Lord, and Stephen Lewis as the unsmiling signalman. The theme, sung by Su Pollard, adapted lyrics from Will Hay's Oh, Mr Porter!, previously a music hall standard.

Oh, Dr Beeching what have you done? There once were lots of trains to catch, but soon there will be none, I'll have to buy a bike, 'cos I can't afford a car, Oh, Dr Beeching what a naughty man you are!

#british railways #public transport #railways #social history #dr beeching #uk government #working class history #uk politics #social justice #society #modern history #Youtube

[rattkween86]

Top 5 books

OH THIS IS A GOOD ONE!!! This changes all the time, so it's just a top five for right now 😅

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

Universal Harvester by John Darnielle

Everything's Eventual: 14 Dark Tales by Stephen King (Probably one of my all-time favorites - will always make this list. It's a collection of short stories, and I DEFINITELY recommend.)

Satan's Affair by H.D. Carlton (this is NOT for everyone, and I can't stress enough that there are multiple trigger warnings. Definitely research this before reading.)

The Cradle Series by Will Wight - I think Blackflame is my favorite so far.

Thank you sm for this question!! I really enjoyed it 🥰

#thank u sm for the ask!! #ily💕 #moots<3 #ask games #top 5 #books n such

[lailyn]

Rainy, with A Chance of Kisses

Rating: T

Relationships: Loki/Stephen Strange, Loki & Thor

Summary: A mysterious illness strikes Loki down. Thor seeks Stephen’s help.

Warnings: Mild graphic depictions of illness

At first, Loki put it all down to exhaustion. He had worked himself ragged, using magic and physical strength both to build the school from the ground up.

The light-headedness he could explain away easily; food was scarce, and what he could obtain, was hardly palatable. He'd much rather forage in the woods behind his house for edibles, and leave the slop they serve in the mess hall for the children.

He was not starving himself. He would have needed an appetite to begin with. 

It was a blessing that Thor was away, gallivanting with his Galaxy Guardian friends. Most of the time, Loki was left to his own devices, reporting to Valkyrie once in a while on his progress. 

The school was a surprise project, a gift for when Thor came home next. There were a number of people young and old he had identified, some with reservoirs of seidr still untapped, who could benefit from proper training.

Prince or not, Loki must earn his keep. 

But lately, a new symptom had been plaguing him, a much more troublesome affliction with not a single shred of decorum. 

You carry tension in your stomach, my love, Loki recalled Frigga's words from centuries ago, back when he was a child. 

Thor would echo these words decades later, more frequently as of late. 

Loki was no stranger to pain, of course. One did not live to be a thousand years old and not know pain. 

But this was…something else. There was no rhyme or reason to this malady; he could be perfectly fine one second and doubled over shaking like a leaf the next.

They were engaged in light banter over breakfast when the pain struck, swift and sudden. 

Whatever it was, he was hoping he could shake it off before Thor's scheduled return to New Asgard. But as always, luck was never on his side when he needed it the most.

"Loki." A gentle hand, calloused as it was, cupped the bend of his elbow.

Loki sighed. “I’m fine, Thor.” 

Thor’s searching gaze roamed his brother’s hunched figure anxiously. “This can't go on. You need to see the Healers.”

"I have gone to the Healers, remember? It was you who dragged me there," Loki said irritably. 

"That I do remember. What I don't remember is you telling me what they found," Thor said.

"There's nothing to tell," Loki said simply.

Thor's only response was the lifting of one very sceptical eyebrow.

"They said there was nothing physically wrong," Loki mumbled.

"That was it?” Thor asked incredulously. "What do they expect you to do about the pain?" 

Loki shrugged. "Live with it, I suppose?"

"I don't like the sound of this," Thor boomed, clearly dissatisfied. He turned to Korg. "Do you like the sound of this?"

"I am made of rocks, mate. I could make a conjecture but it’s not one that is particularly relevant to our situation, I reckon.”

“If our own doctors can’t help, surely there are others abroad from whom we can get a second opinion.” 

“You know I cannot leave New Asgard, Thor. I will not jeopardise our fragile alliances just because of a minor ailment.”

“I've seen wights heartier than you. Minor my arse,” Thor muttered under his breath. “Does Val know about this? She can pull some strings, let me have a word with her - ”

“Her Majesty has pulled enough strings for me, Thor,” Loki said firmly. “As have you.”

Thor sighed.“Maybe I should stick around for a bit…”

Loki bristled at his brother’s complete lack of subtlety. “Thor, I’m not a child. I do not need coddling.”

“Jane probably knows some people.” Thor’s countenance darkened at the memory of his ex-girlfriend. “That doctor whatshisface, Boris? Blake?”

"I appreciate the sentiment, Brother, but all this concern is unnecessary," Loki complained. "Whatever this is, it will pass.”

"Convince me, then," Thor challenged. "Eat something and I will get off your back."

Loki rolled his eyes. "You're ridiculous, you know that?" 

He grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and viciously bit into it. "There. Happy?"

Thor made a face. "Marginally." 

**************************************

The apple did not stay down. 

The breakfast rush was in full swing when Loki felt his stomach twist into a knot once again, only this time much more painful. All he could do was dig his nails into his wrist to keep from folding as he waited out the cramp.

A long, torturous minute passed. Then another. And another. 

Instead of abating, the pain in his stomach intensified. When black dots started to appear in the peripheries of his vision, Loki began to panic. 

What the Hel is wrong with me?

“Thor,” he croaked, his garbled plea barely audible. Help me. 

Acid surged in the back of his throat, and before he could stop himself, he spewed what little he had eaten onto the table.

Thor’s face drained of colour at the sight of apple flecks, swimming in a puddle of blood on Loki’s plate. 

No one moved quite as fast as Thor in times of crisis; one moment his brother was sitting across the table from him, the next he was hauling Loki out of his seat. 

“Come on, Brother,” Thor urged. “Lean on me.”

Loki’s knees wobbled like jelly, but he tried his best to walk despite the vertigo. And the pain - the awful, monstrous pain - every step he took was a knife to the gut. 

Thor soon had enough of Loki dragging his feet; before he knew it, his legs were swept out from under him. Loki involuntarily let out a whimper. 

Oh, how pathetic, to be carried like a child in front of so many eyes watching, but the violent spasms in his abdomen were unrelenting.

The terror in Thor’s eyes he had not seen in a long time, certainly not since Svartalfheim. 

"Thor," he gasped. His chest screamed for air, but he could not seem to catch a single breath. “Am I dying?” 

HIs brother refused to answer, only quickening his pace as he bulldozed his way through the crowd. “Let us pass, damn you!”

**************************************

“You just can’t stay out of trouble, can you?” A cocky voice wafted across the room.

Loki knew that voice. He knew that voice very well.

True enough, a staticky portal flickered into existence, and out came a very familiar, very annoying figure. 

“You oaf,” Loki moaned, painfully aware of how feeble he sounded. “Of all the people you could have called!” 

“I apologise, Brother,” Thor said, his face stricken with guilt and anxiety. “I didn’t know who else to call.”

“Why are we here, instead of the infirmary?” Stephen asked, for some reason sounding somewhat angry. “I thought you said he was dying?”

"I simply wanted to make him comfortable…"

"If it's an acute abdomen like you suspect, he should be on an operating table. Comfort doesn't appear in the equation at all!" Stephen ranted. 

He cast a quick look around the shabby cabin and sneered, "Nice digs. Very comfortable."

"Strange," Thor growled. 

"Fix him, yes, yes."

The Sorcerer Supreme towered over Loki, his majestic cloak billowing around him like an inflated hot air balloon. 

An armchair miraculously appeared at Loki's bedside.

"Whereabouts is the pain?" Stephen dropped into the chair and pulled his gloves off, all business-like. "Show me."

When Loki took too long to respond, Stephen asked impatiently, "Do you want my help or not?"

Loki would have loved to engage in a battle of words with the man, but the pain mauling his insides was unreal.  

His hands reluctantly fell away from his abdomen. "I hate you." 

"Uhuh." 

Appalling bedside manners aside, Stephen's hand was warm and gentle as he prodded Loki's belly. 

"Your liver's enlarged," Stephen said, his suddenly hushed voice tinged with a trace of puzzlement.

He scrutinished the palm of Loki's hand next. 

"Interesting…" He fingered the dark, round spots marring the pristine white canvas of Loki's skin. "And you said the doctors found nothing amiss?"

“I don’t see what you can possibly do for me that the doctors here haven’t already done,” Loki said, fatigue bleeding from every pore. “They’ve exhausted all the tests.”

“Only the ones they could think of…” Stephen’s voice trailed off, his gaze suddenly drawn to something in the distance.

“What are you thinking, Wizard?”

Stephen had climbed to his feet and was now walking slowly toward the window. He peered outside. “Is that a well?”

Loki curled up onto his side once more.

“My, what amazing power of observation you have,” he said acerbically.

“Loki,” Thor growled. 

“Thor,” Loki mimicked.

Ignoring the bickering, Stephen pressed. “A working well? And you’ve been using the water?” 

There was a peculiar urgency in the doctor’s queries that was not sitting right with Loki. “And what of it?”

“Is that your only water source here?”

Loki and Thor exchanged looks. 

“No. The settlement receives a certain amount of treated water daily from the neighbouring town. We were just making sure the people are catered to first,” Thor said slowly, uncertainly. “Did we do something wrong?”

Stephen hummed. "Let's find out, shall we?"

**************************************

A few hours later…

"Arsenic?" Thor thundered. "Are you saying someone has poisoned him?"

"I think there is a more innocent explanation," Stephen said haltingly. "You, Mister, have unwittingly poisoned yourself."

Loki blinked blearily. "Oh, that's new."

"Explain," Thor growled.

Stephen gestured towards the view outside the window. "Volcanic rocks make up most of the mountains surrounding you. Arsenic can then leach from these rocks into groundwater in high concentrations."

Loki groaned aloud. "You have got to be joking."

"I wish I was, believe me," Stephen said, tersely. "The signs and symptoms you are displaying are pathognomonic for arsenic poisoning. Not to mention the sample I took from your well, which gave a reading of five hundred micrograms per litre. That is way above the safe level for drinking water."

"What was it supposed to be?"

"Less than ten."

"Oh." Thor sagged in his chair. "You've really outdone yourself this time, Brother."

Loki, being the expert on dying, jumped straight from bad news to advanced directives. "I don't want a state funeral, Thor."

“We missed out on the first couple of times,” Thor objected, a crestfallen expression contorting his haggard face. 

Stephen could not believe what he was seeing. “I’ve heard you guys were dramatic, but this…this is something else.”

“Dramatic? You wear a flying cape!”

“It’s a Cloak, and you’re one to talk,” Stephen retorted. “Besides, you’re not dying. Not if I have any say in the matter.”

“Your tone doesn’t inspire confidence, Doctor.”

Stephen studied his patient, who was looking the worse for wear, despite the continuous infusion of fluids and analgesics. “The treatment itself can be…painful.”

“He can take pain,” Thor said abruptly.

He grabbed his brother’s hand and squeezed. “Can’t you, Loki?”

**************************************

“What is that?” Loki asked, dimly aware of how slurred his speech was. It was becoming increasingly difficult to talk; his tongue felt ten times its size. 

“This? This is the antidote,” Stephen said distractedly, emptying the content of the vial into a syringe very carefully, making sure not to waste a single drop of the precious medication. “Dimercaptopropane-1-Sulfonate. Very expensive and very hard to get.” 

He looked up momentarily. “You’re very lucky, Odinson.”

Loki licked his very dry lips, his throat so parched it might as well be on fire. “I don’t feel very lucky.”

Stephen fished an ice cube out of the glass on the nightstand. “Here. Suck on this.”

Loki endured the temptation with great fortitude. No way in Hel was he going to let this insufferable mortal hand-feed him like an infant. 

“There’s no one here but us,” Stephen said in exasperation. “I don’t have all day - "

"So leave!"

"- and neither do you," Stephen snapped. 

The meaning behind the doctor's angry words was not lost on his belligerent patient, who instantly clammed up.

Why do you care? Loki longed to ask. 

Was it pride? It must be pride. 

The man had saved the multiverse. Saving one lowly Jotun must be a piece of cake. 

But there was a fear in Stephen's eyes he had seen before, in his brother's. 

Speaking of his brother, where was the big oaf?

"Thor?" he mumbled. 

"I asked him to leave," Stephen answered grimly. "He will not want to see this."

Again, an understanding passed between them, and Loki nodded, swallowing hard. "Probably for the best."

"This will hurt," Stephen warned. 

I can take pain. I can take pain. 

"So you've said, Doctor."

For Thor.

Everything for fucking Thor.

"I'm ready," Loki whispered, and Stephen pushed the plunger.

The first drops of the medicine entered Loki's bloodstream, and he uttered a loud gasp. 

It was liquid fire. Fire coursed through his veins, travelling up his arm and collecting in his heart.

He must have screamed, but he could not hear it for the liquid fire in his head, blunting his senses.

The fire pooled in his belly, burning everything in its path as it seized control of his legs, down to the tips of his toes. 

It was an agony unparalleled, a kind of pain that obliterated all sense of self and dignity. 

Loki's hand shot out, gripping the front of Stephen's tunic for purchase. 

"Please," he begged. "Kill me."

"That would be the easier thing to do, wouldn't it?" Stephen's voice may be hard but his eyes were full of sympathy. He made no move to pry Loki's fingers off his clothes. Instead, he covered the trembling hand with his own. "I don't do easy."

"It's okay," Loki gasped. "I've lived long enough."

"Then live!"

"I can't," he wept.

"Yes, you can," Stephen said. "You've gone through worse."

A crazed laughter brayed; blood sprayed and clung to lips fissured with cracks. "You don't say."

"You are Loki of Asgard,” Stephen stressed. "You survive."

“I survive,” Loki chanted, every whisper more desperate than the one before, “I survive. I survive. I can. I will.”

“You will,” Stephen said fiercely.

In a move that surprised them both, he gathered Loki’s fingers into a fist, crushing it against his chest. “And I am right here with you.”

**************************************

Days passed in a blur, days that were spent flitting in and out of oblivion.

Pain was a constant companion, its peaks and troughs only manageable with the help of the potent drugs Stephen procured through his various connections in the medical fraternity. 

Yet, even through the delirium, Loki was aware of the doctor's presence, comforting and never too far away. 

Loki had heard stories about the Sorcerer Supreme, of how the man had cheated death countless times, the sacrifices he had made, how he could see into the future.

Loki was starting to believe in those stories, for how could Stephen know to hold a basin under his head seconds before Loki would retch and retch and retch? Or press an ice cube to his lips whenever the unbearable thirst reared its head like a beast?

He woke up one morning with an inner stillness that he never thought he would experience again. 

Loki inhaled. Breath filled his chest, so easily it brought tears to his eyes. 

Against all odds, he had won.

"Loki," a familar voice rumbled.

There he was, Loki's ray of sunshine. 

"Thor," he mumbled. "Is it over?"

"It's over, Brother," said the sun. "It's over."

**************************************

Stephen skimmed Loki's latest blood report and made a pleased sound. 

“There is news, Doctor?” Thor inquired politely. 

Stephen waved the piece of paper around in triumph. " 'What do we say to the God of Death? Not today.' " 

At the blank looks all around, Stephen visibly deflated. "Game of Thrones? No?"

Thor cocked his head. "I assume my brother is out of danger? You are making jokes."

"Wow, tough crowd," Stephen muttered. He cleared his throat loudly. “The treatment’s working. The toxin’s almost cleared from your system.”

Loki turned to his brother. “You heard the good doctor. You can stop now.” 

“Stop what?” Stephen asked. 

“He’s been making it rain for days on end. It’s embarrassing.”

“We haven’t collected near enough,” Thor said stubbornly. “Friend Stark has set up a super-fine filtration system with super-high rainwater catchment efficiency for Loki. Oh, and Banner’s coming in a few days to study the soil and the extent of pollution.”

Loki cupped his hands over his face to muffle his groan. “Why don’t you just tell the whole world, Thor?”

Stephen turned to hide his face.

“What?” Loki snapped. How he could sense Stephen’s smile behind covered eyes was anyone’s guess. 

“Nothing,” Stephen said serenely. “You guys are so cute.”

“Aw, thank you.” "What are you still doing here, Second-Rate?" Thor and Loki spoke at the same time. 

“Aw, what’s the matter, Snow White?” Stephen asked sassily. “Here I thought we were finally becoming friends.”

Loki scoffed. “You wish.”

His spirits restored, Thor jumped to his feet. “Well, I’m off!”

“Where are you going?” Loki asked, unable to keep the panic out of his voice. 

“It’s dinner time, and I ought to share this good news with the others,” Thor beamed, his face the brightest it had been in days. “Will you stay a while, Stephen? I will come back with some supper.”

Stephen nodded. “I should still be here. Loki’s due for the last dose of the night in a few hours anyway.”

“Thank you,” Thor said sincerely. “For everything.”

Stephen shooed him away before things could get any more awkward. “It’s no big deal. Just doing my job.”

“Play nice, Brother,” and Thor closed the door behind him. 

They spent the next few minutes studiously avoiding each other's eyes.

"It is rare that one should choose to bear my company for longer than is necessary."

"I'll tell you a secret about doctors. Half the time, we don't like the patients we see," Stephen said. "The other half, we're too tired to care."

"Thank you for your indifference."

Stephen was taken aback by a complete lack of sarcasm in what could and should have been poisonous words, coming from one such as Loki.

In fact, to his amazement, Loki sounded…grateful.

“As erroneous as your Healers were, you should have tried therapy,” Stephen said in a low voice. The walls looked thin. 

“Therapy?” Again, Loki surprised him by displaying no disgust at the idea, only an apathy that hinted at a preconceived notion shared between them. “Talking, you mean.”

“It could have helped with the psychosomatic side of things, you never know,” Stephen said. “These things, they’re very often multifactorial.”

“I don’t like to talk,” Loki said flatly. 

“Does anyone?” Stephen murmured. 

“You’ve made my brother’s acquaintance,” Loki deadpanned.

“He cares a great deal about you,” Stephen said. “You’re very lucky.”

“You keep saying that,” Loki said, crinkling his nose. “It’s distasteful.”

“What, having a brother who thinks the world of you?”

“No. Chancing everything on luck.”

“What would you rather call it? Fate?”

“It has been kind to me as of late, yes,” Loki said simply. “Too kind. I suppose I had this coming.”

Stephen winced. “That sounds like a miserable way to live. Do you always stare a gift horse in the mouth?”

Loki stared at the sorcerer blankly. “Do I what now?”

Stephen shook his head. “Never mind.”

A long silence ensued, awkward and heavy.

“How are you feeling now?” Stephen asked finally. 

“Much better,” Loki said. He did not even have to lie; the pains in his stomach had largely settled and his head felt clearer already. The strength too was returning to his limbs. 

To test it, he pushed himself up slowly. 

“Easy,” Stephen cautioned. 

Loki waved away the proffered hand. “I am perfectly capable of sitting myself up."

Stephen nodded in approval. “You do look better.”

Loki self-consciously tucked his hair behind his ears. “Goodness. I must look a fright.”

“You look fine,” Stephen said kindly. "But going forward, please be careful - "

"Careful's boring."

"As I was saying," Stephen raised his voice a notch, “No more drinking untreated water."

Loki emitted a sound, a cross between a whine and a disgruntled grunt.

"You aliens, it’s like you have a death wish or something,” Stephen muttered. “Rule number one when you’re on a foreign planet, assume everything can kill you until you can prove otherwise.”

“No promises, Stephen.” 

And time stood still. 

Oh shit -

 Loki almost choked upon realising his faux pas, cursing his despicable, traitorous tongue. “Strange! I mean, Strange.”

Was that a smile on Stephen’s face?

“I’ll allow it. ”

Loki’s own face burned. How infuriating. 

More infuriatingly, Loki now owed Stephen one. 

In all the centuries he had lived, Loki had fought for his life on numerous occasions, but this was the first time he had not had to do it alone.

“Thank you, Doctor.” Never let it be said that Loki of Asgard was without manners; it would only bring disgrace to the memory of his late Mother.

Good grief. Stephen was now smiling openly! An actual, genuine smile! 

“You’re welcome, Loki.”

Loki had long since lost his autonomy over his inner thoughts, for better or worse. No one had the right to look that devastatingly handsome just from smiling. 

“I started a magic school,” Loki blurted out. “If you happen to be interested.”

The heavy air of hesitation hanging over their heads proved too much for Loki to bear, prompting a hurried disclaimer. “No pressure, of course. Absolutely none.”

“I’d be more than happy to take a look,” Stephen said. “If you’ll have me.”

What was this thrill coming over him, this furious, indescribable longing, this tremendous restlessness? 

“We can go take a look now?” Loki suggested. 

“Nice try.” Stephen laughed. “How about next week? You kinda need to stay off your feet for a while.”

“Is that an order, Doctor?”

“Depends. How likely are you to do as you’re told?”

“Hmm. Not very.”

Stephen pursed his lips in thought. After a while, “Not even if I ask you to kiss me?”

“Are you?” Loki’s heart thundered. “Asking me?”

“Yes.”

For someone so recently ill, Loki was spry; with his renewed strength, he lunged and caught Stephen’s lips with his. 

The kiss tasted incredibly sweet, too sweet in fact -

Is this real? Or simply survivor’s euphoria?

More importantly, why is Stephen allowing this?

Oh no. 

What if it's pity?

Stephen must have read his thoughts, for he was quick to cup the back of Loki’s head. 

“Lucky me,” he breathlessly professed his good fortune, and claimed Loki's lips once more. “Another.”

FIN

#strangefrost #froststrange #fic #sick Loki #Loki whump #doctor strange

[misspeppermint2003]

Fact: Shaun was young when his father had passed away. Until when he was 12 years old, his mum Barbara remarries his stepdad, Phillip, who becomes her second husband. Phillip and Barbara have been married for 17 years, making Shaun now 29 years old. From the very beginning, it is obvious that Shaun and Phillip have a strained relationship. It is only later in the film that the two have something akin to a reconciliation. By his clothes and demeanor, it would appear that Phillip lives an upper-middle-class existence. His appearance is very neat, and his prized Jaguar indicates a successful life.

Phillip pays Shaun a visit at Foree Electric. He is there to remind Shaun that it’s time for his bi-monthly visit. Shaun, of course, seems to resent the reminder. Phillip also suggests that he bring flowers this time, since he forgot to do so on Mother’s Day. Phillip then weakly smiles and tells Shaun that they look forward to seeing him. After pointing out to Shaun that "You’ve got red on you," Phillip leaves.

As the events of Z-Day unfold, we next hear about Phillip when Shaun talks to his mother on the phone. She tells Shaun that some men tried to break into the house (zombies), and one of them bit Phillip. This doesn’t seem to bother Shaun in the least, and he and Ed begin to casually plot the best way to kill Phillip before he can turn into a zombie.

Shaun and Ed eventually arrive at Phillip’s house. As Ed admires Phillip’s Jaguar, Shaun relates a story about Phillip once chasing him around the garden with a bit of wood after a much younger Shaun tampered with the car. Shaun then goes inside to dispose of his stepfather.

Shaun greets his mother and inquires about Phillip. She tells Shaun that he’s in the living room and then starts preparing some tea and sandwiches. Shaun takes his cricket bat and walks into to the living room. Phillip is there, sitting quietly with his eyes closed. His face is pale, and he looks to have been sweating. Shaun believes him to already be dead, so he raises the bat over his head and prepares to strike. At this point, Phillip speaks.

A moment later, Shaun’s mother enters the room. Shaun urges her to leave the house, but she says that she will not leave without Phillip. She mentions that she has called the doctor, and Phillip seems to object. He believes all the reports on television are nonsense, and the hysteria has been caused by a bunch of rampant drug addicts.

At the mention of his bite, Phillip assures Barbara that he ran it under some cold water. He also mentions that they received their vaccinations when they visited the Isle of Wight.

Shaun continues to try to convince his mother to leave Phillip, even going so far as to accuse him of child molestation (which he quickly admits is a lie). Phillip enters the room. Shaun once again contemplates killing him, but can’t bring himself to do it.

The trio head outside and prepare to leave in the Jaguar (Ed wrecked their other car so that he could ride in the Jag). Several zombies ambush them, and Phillip is bitten in the neck. He is reluctant to give Shaun the car keys, but finally relents and tells Shaun to protect Barbara.

As they drive towards the apartment of Liz, Shaun’s girlfriend, Phillip complains about the loud music which is being played on the radio. Ed and Shaun ignore him. When Barbara mentions the loud music, Ed politely turns it down.

After stopping to rescue Liz and her roommates, everyone piles back into the car. Phillip is looking worse, sweating and bleeding profusely. He weakly nudges Shaun’s arm and apologises to him. Shaun dismisses him at first, but Phillip is persistent.

Phillip tells Shaun that he was hard on him because he didn’t want Shaun to give up after the death of his father. He always knew Shaun had potential, but he just lacked motivation. He thought Shaun needed someone to look up to and always hoped that it might be him. He tells a tearful Shaun that he loves him and then passes away.

Moments later, Phillip rises from the dead and attacks. The group escape from the Jaguar and locks Phillip inside. As Shaun tries to convince his mother that nothing is left of the man she married, a zombified Phillip reaches into the front seat and turns off the stereo (which was once again blaring). The group then flees on foot towards the Winchester, leaving Phillip locked inside the Jaguar.

He is never seen again. He may have been killed later on.

#the cornetto trilogy #shaun of the dead #hot fuzz #the world's end #fandom questions #fandom #character quiz #quizzes #three flavours cornetto

[captainpetebradshaw]

Movie Diary 2022

And here's my movie diary for 2022. Once again, these are the movies that I watched for the first time this year - no rewatches. And despite seeing Top Gun: Maverick a total of 17 times this year, I managed to see 113 other movies (3 more than 2021!). As always, my favorites are bolded.

1 Belle

2 Encanto

3 Don't Look Up

4 Sing 2

5 Ghostbusters: Afterlife

6 Stephen King: A Necessary Evil

7 New Gods: Nezha Reborn

8 A Hero

9 In The Heights

10 Riders of Justice

11 Shiva Baby

12 Bigbug

13 Being the Ricardos

14 Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom

15 Nightmare Alley

16 The Worst Person in the World

17 Parallel Mothers

18 The Adam Project

19 Turning Red

20 Bright Night (Nachthelle)

21 Spencer

22 Cheaper by the Dozen (2022)

23 Coda

24 The Monkey King: Reborn

25 Moonshot

26 Skyscraper

27 Dein Leben gehört mir

28 The Bubble

29 The Bad Guys

30 The Karate Kid

31 Stand by Me

32 The Karate Kid Part II

33 Uncharted

34 The Karate Kid Part III

35 The Outfit

36 The Batman

37 Everything Everywhere All at Once

38 So Close

39 Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

40 Our Father

41 White Hot: The Rise & Fall of Ambercrombie & Fitch

42 The Tragedy of Macbeth

43 Mostly Minimalistic (Alles in bester Ordnung)

44 Official Competition

45 Licorice Pizza

46 Song Lang

47 Pariah

48 Love My Life (2006)

49 The Unbearable Wight of Massive Talent

50 Fire Island

51 Show Me Love

52 I Care a Lot

53 Top Gun

54 Benedetta

55 Top Gun: Maverick

56 Crush

57 Paris, 13th District

58 Jerry & Marge Go Large

59 Thor: Love & Thunder

60 Chip'n Dale: Rescue Rangers

61 The Bob's Burgers MOvie

62 The Sea Beast

63 The Affairs of Julia

64 Broker

65 Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 2

66 The Lost City

67 Prey

68 Decision to Leave

69 Nope

70 The Roundup

71 DC League of Super-Pets

72 Emergency Declaration

73 The Client

74 Jerry Maguire

75 Do Revenge

76 Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 3

77 Risky Business

78 Titane

79 Losin' It

80 Bodies Bodies Bodies

81 Raw

82 War Dogs

83 X

84 Black Adam

85 Valkyrie

86 Bone Tomahawk

87 Pearl

88 Ginger Snaps

89 Bros

90 The Innocents (2021)

91 See How They Run

92 Weird: The Al Yankovic Story

93 Enola Holmes 2

94 Three Thousand Years of Longing

95 Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

96 Ticket to Paradise

97 The Wonder

98 The Menu

99 Collateral

100 Cha Cha Real Smooth

101 Footloose (2011)

102 My Father's Dragon

103 Eastern Promises

104 Interview with the Vampire

105 Moon-young

106 Bullet Train

107 Oblivion

108 War of the Worlds

109 Herman Kills!

110 Troll

111 Bleed for This

112 Argentina, 1985

113 Meet the Parents

114 Meet the Fockers

115 Avatar: The Way of Water

#2022 #movie diary

[spicytunapotato]

Queen's practice

Dearest creature in creation,

Studying English pronunciation.

I will teach you in my verse

Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.

I will keep you, Suzy, busy,

Make your head with heat grow dizzy.

Tear in eye, your dress will tear.

So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,

Dies and diet, lord and word,

Sword and sward, retain and Britain.

(Mind the latter, how it's written.)

Now I surely will not plague you

With such words as plaque and ague.

But be careful how you speak:

Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;

Cloven, oven, how and low,

Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,

Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,

Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,

Exiles, similes, and reviles;

Scholar, vicar, and cigar,

Solar, mica, war and far;

One, anemone, Balmoral,

Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;

Gertrude, German, wind and mind,

Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,

Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.

Blood and flood are not like food,

Nor is mould like should and would.

Viscous, viscount, load and broad,

Toward, to forward, to reward.

And your pronunciation's OK

When you correctly say croquet,

Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,

Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour

And enamour rhymes with hammer.

River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,

Doll and roll and some and home.

Stranger does not rhyme with anger,

Neither does devour with clangour.

Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,

Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,

Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,

And then singer, ginger, linger,

Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,

Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,

Nor does fury sound like bury.

Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.

Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.

Though the differences seem little,

We say actual but victual.

Refer does not rhyme with deafer.

Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.

Mint, pint, senate and sedate;

Dull, bull, and George ate late.

Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,

Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,

Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.

We say hallowed, but allowed,

People, leopard, towed, but vowed.

Mark the differences, moreover,

Between mover, cover, clover;

Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,

Chalice, but police and lice;

Camel, constable, unstable,

Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,

Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.

Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,

Senator, spectator, mayor.

Tour, but our and succour, four.

Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Sea, idea, Korea, area,

Psalm, Maria, but malaria.

Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.

Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,

Dandelion with battalion.

Sally with ally, yea, ye,

Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.

Say aver, but ever, fever,

Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.

Heron, granary, canary.

Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.

Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

Large, but target, gin, give, verging,

Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.

Ear, but earn and wear and tear

Do not rhyme with here but ere.

Seven is right, but so is even,

Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,

Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,

Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!

Is a paling stout and spikey?

Won't it make you lose your wits,

Writing groats and saying grits?

It's a dark abyss or tunnel:

Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,

Islington and Isle of Wight,

Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough?

Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?

Hiccough has the sound of cup.

My advice is give it up!

[naran-blr]

Joanna Mary Boyce, Joanna Mary Wells (1831-1861) pintora británica.

Nació en Londres, en el seno de una familia relacionada con el arte, su padre, George Boyce, era marchante y su hermano Geroge Price, también fue pintor.

En un primer momento su inclinación por la pintura la llevó a ser autodidacta no pudiendo iniciar hasta los 18 años su formación artística formal, inicialmente en la escuela de Francis Stephen Cary (en 1849) y posteriormente en la de James Mathews Leigh (en 1852).

También fue alumna del pintor y profesor de pintura francés Thomas Couture.

Durante la primavera del año 1852 visita París con su padre, quien murió al año siguiente, sumiéndola en una gran tristeza.

Su primera obra, Elgiva, el dibujo de una cabeza de mujer, fue exhibida en la Royal Academy of Arts en 1855, y consiguió la alabanza del crítico de arte John Ruskin en su primer folleto de la academia, pese a no saber nada de la artista. Gracias esta primera obra empezó a ser reconocida como una pintora de talento.

Más tarde, en 1855, vuelve a París y es en ese momento es cuando estudia con Couture.

En 1857 inicia un viaje por Italia entre 1857 y 1858. Durante su estancia en Roma se casa con el también pintor Henry Tanworth Wells, a quien conoció en 1849, cuando ella estudiaba pintura con el maestro David Cox, en Betws-y-Coed, en el norte de Gales.

Su matrimonio no supuso el abandono de su carrera de pintora, de hecho en Roma empezó un cuadro importante, The Boys' Crusade, y ejecutó varios bocetos y estudios.

A finales de marzo de 1858 regresó a Inglaterra. Aprovecha su regreso a Inglaterra para viajar por diferentes lugares del país inspirándose. Así, en otoño de 1858 estuvo en la colina de Hoimbury en Surrey cerca de la colina de Leith, donde pinta su cuadro Los Marginados, que fue rechazado en la Real Academia y luego expuso en la Exposición de Invierno.

En la Exposición de la Academia de este año, tres de sus cuadros fueron catalogados por los críticos.

Pese a ser una gran paisajista, con obras destacadas como Isla de Wight o la obra costumbrista, The departuire, el gran número de bustos que pintó hizo que ciertos círculos la calificaran como “pintora de cabezas”.

Joanna tuvo una muerte temprana, sobrevenida por fiebre puerperal tras el parto de su tercer hijo, con sólo 29 años.

Al morir de esta manera tan inesperada dejó obras por terminar.

En 1935 se realizó una exposición individual de su obra en la Tate Gallery.

En la actualidad se pueden contemplar muy pocas obras de esta pintora prerrafaelita, ya que sus obras más importantes se destruyeron en los bombardeos al territorio inglés, durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial.

#pintoras británicas

[byneddiedingo]

Brad Pitt in Babel (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2006)

Cast: Brad PItt, Cate Blanchett, Mohamed Akhzam, Peter Wight, Harriet Walter, Michael Maloney, Boubker Ait El Caid, Said Tarchani, Mustapha Rachidi, Adriana Barraza, Gael García Bernal, Elle Fanning, Nathan Gamble, Clifton Collins Jr., Michael Peña, Rinko Kikuchi, Koji Yakusho, Satoshi Nikaido. Screenplay: Guillermo Arriaga. Cinematography: Rodrigo Prieto. Production design: Brigitte Broch. Film editing: Douglas Crise, Stephen Mirrione. Music: Gustavo Santaolalla.

I would like to watch a movie about the calamity that befalls a Moroccan family when they acquire a rifle to shoot the jackals that prey on their herd of goats. Or a movie about a nanny for a well-to-do San Diego couple who unwisely decides to take her employers' small children with her when she goes to her son's wedding in Mexico. Or a movie about a deaf Japanese teenager who suffers from sexual confusion in the aftermath of her mother's suicide. But I don't want to watch them all at once, which is what Babel forces us to do. It's a terrifically ambitious film, with some stunning location work in four widespread countries, and it has some great performances, particularly by Oscar nominees Adriana Barraza as the nanny and Rinko Kikuchi as the teenager. It probably deserved the nominations for best picture and for Alejandro González Iñárritu's direction, too. (It won for Gustavo Santaolalla's score.) But intercutting the three stories mentioned above and centering them on the plight of the San Diego couple (Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett) severely reduces their dramatic force and interest. Why, I wonder, were Pitt's and Blanchett's characters on a bus tour of Morocco with a bunch of rather unpleasant Brits? If, as the movie seems to suggest, it's to work on their relationship after their loss of a child to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, it's a very odd choice indeed. Their movie-star presence also skews the film away from the performances of the less well-known international stars. Structurally, the Japanese story seems poorly integrated: Its link to the other stories is that the rifle that turns up in Morocco was originally owned by the Japanese girl's father. What struck me as strongest about the movie was its subtext: the bureaucratic paralysis of the American superpower in the wake of 9/11. Pitt and Blanchett are unable to get the help they need in Morocco because of the paranoia about Islamic terrorism that forces an unwanted and unnecessary caution on the U.S. State Department. American immigration policy also prevents a sensible resolution to the problem of the nanny and the children. Babel is certainly not without its rewards, but a scaling-back of its ambitions might have produced a better movie -- or maybe three or four of them.

#Babel #Alejandro González Iñárritu #Brad PItt

[bloopington-indiana]

[revolutionarywarhistory]

Favoring the British Crown: enslaved Blacks, Annapolis, and the run to freedom [Part 2]

Continued from Part 1

Reprinted from my History Hermann WordPress blog.

© 2016-2023 Burkely Hermann. All rights reserved.

Notes

[1] Grumbelly was related to Capt. Keelings (of Princess Ann/Anne County, VA), with some of the people in bondage running away to join the British lines including Argyll, who joined Royal Artillery Department, and Robert. Grumbelly is also within this book. It would make sense it is Virginia's Eastern Shore rather than Maryland's, although this cannot be confirmed. William was undoubtedly one of many who was part of a small plantation within this area.

[2] Others would be evacuated on the La Aigle. His bio says that "William Keeling is assumed to be the husband of Pindar Keeling. They travel near to each other on board the Clinton and despite the presence of other Keelings, they are not listed in the Birchtown Muster." Perhaps they settled in a different area or died on the voyage North. Pindar was formerly bound to a Norfolk slaveowner named Willis Ball. One transcript of the manifest says  "William Keeling, 40, feeble fellow. Formerly the property of Grumbelly Keeling of the East Shore, Virginia; left him 6 years ago. GBC." This being the case, then it makes sense that he cannot be found in Maryland records. It also clarifies that on 31 July 1783 the Clinton was Clinton bound for Annapolis [Royal, Nova Scotia] & St. John's [Saint John, New Brunswick]. This means it was going to Nova Scotia ultimately. The GHOTES Genealogy and History of the Eastern Shore group on Facebook lists 38 enslaved blacks who had left New York, originally enslaved in the Eastern Shore (presumably Virginia's).

[3] The word "loyalist" is used in quotation marks as it is an inexact term, and like Patriot it was used positively by those supporting the British Crown. Instead, the term supporter of the British Crown or any of its derivatives is used instead.

[4] Alan Taylor, American Revolutions: A Continental History, 1750-1804 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2016), 21-22; A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., In the Matter of Color: Race & The American Legal Process: the Colonial Period (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), 91-95, 98-99.

[5] Specifically referring to Abbaco (John Rootes, Benjamin Guy), and unknown location (Solomon Slaughter, William Causins, Francis Wright, John Morris, Thomas Fisher. Here the locations of those included in the above chart: Norfolk, Virginia (John Hirst, Matthew Godfrey, Robert Gilmore, Samuel Bush [Boush], John Willoughby, David McClaurin, William Mallery, William Egerson, James Hunter, Edward Hack Moseley [Mozely], Joseph Mitchell, Thomas Newton Snr, Robert Barns, Charles Connor, Samuel Elliot,  Simon Hogwood, William Hancock, Archibald Campbell or Arthur Campbell., Thomas Hoggart/Hogwood, Mr. Scarborough, Stephen Tankard, William Hogwood/Hopgood Sr.);  Nansemond, Virginia (Mills Wilkinson, Henry Burgess, Solomon Sheppard, Willis Wilkinson); Crane Island, Virginia (William Connor, George Robertson, Andrew Stewart [Stuart]); Portsmouth, Virginia (Willis Wilson, Andrew Sproule, Richard Brown); South Carolina (Captain Hullet, Bland Steward);  Princess Anne/Ann County, Virginia (Edward Moseley,  John Loveat); Pennsylvania (James Stewart); Mecklenburgh, Virginia (Richard Sweepston); Dismal Swamp (James Wright Moore); Petersburg, Virginia (John Holloway); Tanners Creek, Virginia (Anthony Walker [Walke]); Isle of Wight (Richard Jordan, Andrew Mckay); Suffolk, Virginia (Lambert Reddick); Greatbridge, Virginia (Alexander Foreman).

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