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I forget where I read it, but I'm pretty sure that at some point there were millions of elves on Middle-earth, and by the end of the third age, it's down to a few thousand, aka a very small portion. These are the elves that got told way back in the first age, "Hey, just so you guys know, you're totally welcome to come back and live in heaven now without any worries" and responded, "No thanks, we're good!" and then proceeded to not only hold to that but survived the next 7.000 years of bullshit including but not limited to:

Multiple continents sinking into the sea

orcs

dragons

balrogs

multiple wars with Sauron, a literal divine being

The rise and fall of several human empires

more orcs

wargs

a bunch of their territory being overtaken and burned to the ground

And all of their loved ones either dying or sailing, even though we know that grief can and will kill an elf

Like, you can't tell me that third age elves start showing up in the undying lands, where everyone has spent the last few thousand years basking in the magical equivilant of free therapy and probably have as many defence measures as a suburban coldesac, and aren't viewed as the most feral, twitchy, paranoid mother fuckers; held together by suspicion, stubornness, and at least 25 contingencies for every situation they've collectively encountered during their time in Middle-earth.

My favorite examples of feral, hyper-vigilant behavior include:

Elrond: Security clearance; sure, Turgon may have threatened to kill anyone who tried to leave his hidden city, but he also took an entire army out of and back to the city at once, and then also didn't realize that his own nephew snitched on where the city was. His security protocols sucked. Meanwhile, Elrond had hundreds of strangers coming in and out of Rivendell for over 3,000 years, at one point completely surrounded by enemies and full of nothing but a bunch of refugees, and Sauron still never found it. You can't tell me that he didn't have at least 25 security checkpoints on the way into his city(sorry, house-that means it's private property, right?), even if you didn't know they were there.

Galadriel: Paranoia; This woman was magically keeping track of everyone she knew and even did it often enought that she knew what to look for of those she couldn't directly track (gandalf) and looking into their minds and testing them. All while having Sauron constantly clawing at the walls of her mind, at least for a few years

Thranduil: Spite; it was basically only his sheer audacity holding his nuclear bunker- cough cough- sorry, I meant vast underground halls together, while his next-door neighbor was some cursed ruins, a dragon-infested dwarf kingdom, and evil, man-eating, car-sized spiders on his front lawn.

Haldir: he blindfolded the fellowship when they tried to enter his city (super secret hideout), need I say more?

Multiple examples of groups of elves jumping out of trees fully armed and ambushing anyone who wanders into their territory. And while the characters seem surprised to be ambushed, they don't seem surprised that elves ambush people in general, leading me to believe this is normal behavior.

I forget where I read it, but I'm pretty sure that at some point there were millions of elves on Middle-earth, and by the end of the third age, it's down to a few thousand, aka a very small portion. These are the elves that got told way back in the first age, "Hey, just so you guys know, you're totally welcome to come back and live in heaven now without any worries" and responded, "No thanks, we're good!" and then proceeded to not only hold to that but survived the next 7.000 years of bullshit including but not limited to:

Multiple continents sinking into the sea

orcs

dragons

balrogs

multiple wars with Sauron, a literal divine being

The rise and fall of several human empires

more orcs

wargs

a bunch of their territory being overtaken and burned to the ground

And all of their loved ones either dying or sailing, even though we know that grief can and will kill an elf

Like, you can't tell me that third age elves start showing up in the undying lands, where everyone has spent the last few thousand years basking in the magical equivilant of free therapy and probably have as many defence measures as a suburban coldesac, and aren't viewed as the most feral, twitchy, paranoid mother fuckers; held together by suspicion, stubornness, and at least 25 contingencies for every situation they've collectively encountered during their time in Middle-earth.

My favorite examples of feral, hyper-vigilant behavior include:

Elrond: Security clearance; sure, Turgon may have threatened to kill anyone who tried to leave his hidden city, but he also took an entire army out of and back to the city at once, and then also didn't realize that his own nephew snitched on where the city was. His security protocols sucked. Meanwhile, Elrond had hundreds of strangers coming in and out of Rivendell for over 3,000 years, at one point completely surrounded by enemies and full of nothing but a bunch of refugees, and Sauron still never found it. You can't tell me that he didn't have at least 25 security checkpoints on the way into his city(sorry, house-that means it's private property, right?), even if you didn't know they were there.

Galadriel: Paranoia; This woman was magically keeping track of everyone she knew and even did it often enought that she knew what to look for of those she couldn't directly track (gandalf) and looking into their minds and testing them. All while having Sauron constantly clawing at the walls of her mind, at least for a few years

Thranduil: Spite; it was basically only his sheer audacity holding his nuclear bunker- cough cough- sorry, I meant vast underground halls together, while his next-door neighbor was some cursed ruins, a dragon-infested dwarf kingdom, and evil, man-eating, car-sized spiders on his front lawn.

Haldir: he blindfolded the fellowship when they tried to enter his city (super secret hideout), need I say more?

Multiple examples of groups of elves jumping out of trees fully armed and ambushing anyone who wanders into their territory. And while the characters seem surprised to be ambushed, they don't seem surprised that elves ambush people in general, leading me to believe this is normal behavior.

what does this have to do with boiling your surgical tools? well look, the boiling water releases bubbles of steam which carries the malign influences up to heaven. you boil a knife, you send all the miasmic particles off with the steam to heaven. if you rinse the knife off in a bucket the water isn't hot enough, the particles go into the water and then right back on to the knife. you gotta boil it to get the particles all the way away. how can a tool or rag or a bed have miasmic particles on it when you can't smell them? humans have a lousy sense of smell. look at your dog on the hunt. are there no rabbits in the woods just because you can't smell them? we know that miasma is carried on the air, and is what makes stench so dangerous, and we know that humans can't smell worth a damn compared to dogs cats horses etc. a dog can smell if a rat died in a corner of the room last week. you can't. do you think licking the spot where the rat died is going to go well for you? luckily, what humans lack in snout we make up for in brains. we have extra brains where our sniffers should have been. God set that up for a reason.

and why does a rinse with wine spirits work? man, look how fast alcohol evaporates. my guess is that because wine contains a lot more vice than water, it evaporates a whole lot faster, in sort of an equal and opposite way that a rock falls faster than a feather. if you want the miasmic particles to get off there FAST, you dunk it in something that's going back to heaven at a gallop.

And there are so many articles and videos and discussions. Like, the scientific community is buzzing about this.

So much research will have to be redone because the data was absolutely compromised, off by orders of magnitude, by using standard lab gloves.

The world is probably not horrifically contaminated by microplastics. Sterile laboratories, however, are contaminated by latex and nitrile gloves.

Sources beyond dude just trust me, for the skeptics.

https://www.technologynetworks.com/applied-sciences/news/scientists-lab-gloves-may-be-causing-an-overestimation-of-microplastics-411138

Nitrile and latex gloves may cause overestimation of microplastics - Phys.org (it’s a pdf)

I just had to collect all of these responses together in one place

Edit: And one from my friend, who doesn't have a tumblr (yet)

When described by the old man during the fire/Bond chapter he gets the description 'the somber young fella'. Which Id argue is strange given he breaks out laughing in front of that man. But it means he Is memorable to some degree. This isn't Kanako’s Life as an Assassin where she just is completely unmemorable to others.

But the bigger thing there to me is that Westalians Have a distinct way of speaking. It's not a surprise (it would be stranger if they didn't) but there is some expectation of an accent or different phrases/words used amongst Westalians. There Are cultural differences.

Our master spy would never be caught using Westalian slang as an Ostonian and I'm sure is Well aware of what means what to who. But it means he has No connection to his homeland like that. He's the migrant (spy) who went so far to make sure he could never be identified as a migrant (because spy) that he stripped himself of every hint of it.

Which he's made his peace with. It's fine. But I wonder if he doesn't at least think about the Westalian differences in customs. If they don't decorate the tree differently for Christmas and he Knows it's a Westalian custom so he Can't, can't risk implying that even one of his parents was. Can't fold the Challah the way his mother did because that's more common in Westalia. Never orders his favorite pastry because it's Westalian. Has the perfect turn of phrase from his home and has to settle for an Ostonian one that's not quite right.

Just... All the little ways he is isolated from his culture and Can't engage with it even slightly for fear of being caught. For the appearance of it. Because being seen as a Westalian sympathizer is dangerous too.

I want Anya to hear that quiet lament. To echo the phrase he Knows he never said. (Did one of her foster families have Westalian influence?)

To flip through the cookbook he has out and point to the folding style his mother used and ask for that. Because it's pretty.

To point to the tinsel and ask if they can't throw that on the tree because it's Shiny. (It'll make a mess) (I don't mind sweeping a little more if she enjoys it Loid) (Oh. Then I suppose it's fine.)

To order his favorite pastry and devour it. Or hand it to him because Papas right I don't like it. So he can.

He will never be allowed to be Westalian again. Not as Loid Forger. Not so long as that identity lives. But I hope they carve out space for him to connect to it.

I hope they add sour cream to their stews for Yor and fold their bread Westalian style for Loid and hold Anya close until she soaks up all their love and habits.

I want her to one day make something and say "it's not quite as good as Mama and Papas. But here it is." In the way we all hand down recipes and phrases and mannerisms through the generations. I want her to have stolen back hints of Loids culture too. Just like she stole his heart.

Like we know Yor gathered food from their local area (killed a boar, mushrooms and such which implies they're living in a place where that was an option and the frames we have do make it look more rural which is probably a good thing) but even after the Garden starts paying her food is undoubtedly tight during those times and I'm sure there were struggles with rationing and not having an adult to advocate that they get their share as well.

And that's discounting Yor's inability to cook. At least that trained her and Yuri to eat whatever they had without being picky. But it's not like her and Yuri Don't have taste buds. They both recognize Loid's cooking is better than Yuri's. (I just reinspected his cooking, there's a literal salt shaker in one of the dishes, never mind he's also terrible. I had DEFENDED YOU YURI. The nice dishes are all Loids...)

And we Know Loid was in a bad way after his mother died. The day the bombs dropped and kill her, he was fishing and thinks about how 'there hasn't been much food lately'. So it was already scarce before the place was destroyed. And then he's 10(?) and all alone in a world with no room for him.

As much as Twilight allows himself to love anything, he seems to love cooking. Preparing feasts that three people could never hope to finish for dinner. (leftovers!) I imagine if we looked in their pantry and fridge it is completely stocked in a well organized manner. Despite Yor's 'I don't know what most of this stuff is I'll just buy one of everything' approach to shopping. (Which honestly I think is enrichment for Loid. 'Why did she buy a star fruit? What can i make with a starfruit, the lettuce that's going to go bad soon and the turkey from the other night...? Oh!' The man needs his puzzles.)

But I do wonder. Is there some quiet part of Loid that gets uneasy after Yor tries cooking and the fridge goes empty. That urges him to make a late night grocery run.

Something in Yor that panics, when Loid is away for work and they use up the last of his leftover containers. That feels the same directionless fear that she did as a child when they finished the last of their mother's cooking and there would never be any more.

Do they both feel some compulsion to keep a stash of shelf stable food somewhere no one else can see it, just in case? Even if they Know that's not necessary. That it leads to ants.

Obviously Anya is adopted. We all know this. She knows this. She loves her family but knows it is incredibly fragile.

But unlike most adoption stories (say Natsume Yuujinchou) Anya is not adopted into a loving functional family who's main goal is to support and love her until she heals from all the hurt she has been through.

Because Everyone in their family is adopted.

Yor enters thinking she is entering an existing family dynamic of a man and his daughter. She is the step mother, eagerly wanted but a definite outsider. She does not know about how they lost Loid's first wife. They both Never mention her but Anya clearly has Huge feelings about her Mommy that she cannot touch. Because Loid refuses to acknowledge her. Which means she's not allowed to.

She's a wife brought in to solve a problem. The fact she adores Anya and loves Loid (eventually) doesn't make her any less of an outsider from her perspective. To Yor she's the adopted family member.

Meanwhile Loid, the one who brought them all together almost instantly finds himself on the outside of the family. He works too much and doesn't make it home for dinner frequently. He struggles to connect with his 'daughter' and wife. Can't understand either of them despite constant efforts. Something incredibly distressing for him.

Yor instantly connects with this child when he struggled to hold her hand in public. In his eyes Yor and Anya are a family and he is the outsider only there for the mission. The man who is destined to Not be there. He too often fills the role of the outside child brought into a happy family. One he constantly feels he is fumbling or failing. (If I'm not good, if i'm not perfect- my family will leave me. So I have to be. I have to figure out how to be better)

They are a family of adopted members all holding so tightly to each other. Each one of them chooses the others over and over again. Struggles against their own limitations and fears to be a part of a family they're all terrified to really call their own.

But it is that choice that makes them a family. Not blood or marriage or any certificate. That they all keep trying to be a family to the others. I'll be a good girl and study hard Papa. I'll be a good wife, I'll play my role well so don't abandon me. I'll be a good father and husband, I will try to be a good husband and father if you both will just stay with me. Please. I will figure out how.

Leaf-bladed swords are a very popular fantasy style and were real, though unlike modern hand-and-a-half longsword versions, the real things were mostly if not always shortswords.

Here are Celtic bronze swords…

…Ancient Greek Xiphoi…

… and a Roman “Mainz-pattern” gladius…

Saw or downright jagged edges, either full-length or as small sections (often where they serve no discernible purpose) are a frequent part of fantasy blades, especially at the more, er, imaginatively unrestrained end of the market.

Real swords also had saw edges, such as these two 19th century shortswords, but not to make them cool or interesting. They’re weapons if necessary…

…but since they were carried by Pioneer Corps who needed them for cutting branches and other construction-type tasks, their principal use was as brush cutters and saws.

This dussack (cutlass) in the Wallace Collection is also a fighting weapon, like the one beside it…

…but may also have had the secondary function of being a saw.

A couple of internet captions say it’s for “cutting ropes” which makes sense - heavy ropes and hawsers on board a ship were so soaked with tar that they were often more like lengths of wood, and a Hollywood-style slice from the Hero’s rapier (!!) wouldn’t be anything like enough to sever them. However swords like this are extremely rare, which suggests they didn’t work as well as intended for any purpose.

I photographed these in Basel, Switzerland, about 20 years ago. Look at the one on the bottom (I prefer the basket-hilt schiavona in the middle).

A lot of “flamberge” (wavy-edge) swords actually started out with conventional blades which then had the edges ground to shape - the dussack, that Basel broadsword and this Zweihander were all made that way.

The giveaway is the centreline: if it’s straight, the entire blade probably started out straight.

Increased use of water power for bellows, hammers and of course grinders made shaping blades easier than when it had to be done by hand. This flamberge Zweihander, however, was forged that way.

Again, the clue is the centre-line.

Incidentally those Parierhaken (parrying hooks - a secondary crossguard) are among the only real-life examples of another common fantasy feature - hooks and spikes sticking out from the blade.

Here are some rapiers and a couple of daggers showing the same difference between forged to shape and ground to shape. The top and bottom rapiers in the first picture started as straights, and only the middle rapier came from the forge with a flamberge blade.

There’s no doubt about this one either.

The reason - though that was a part of it - wasn’t just to look cool and show off what the owner could afford (any and all extra or unusual work added to the price) but may actually have had a function: a parry would have been juddery and unsettling for someone not used to it, and any advantage is worth having.

However, like the saw-edged dussack, flamberge blades are unusual - which suggests the advantage wasn’t that much of an advantage after all.

Here’s a Circassian kindjal, forged wiggly…

…and an Italian parrying dagger forged straight then ground wiggly…

There were also parrying daggers with another fantasy-blade feature, deep notches and serrations which in fantasy versions often resemble fangs or thorns.

These more practical historical versions are usually called “sword-breakers” but I prefer “sword-catcher”, since a steel blade isn’t that easy to break. Taking the opponent’s blade out of play for just long enough to nail him works fine.

NB - the curvature on the top one in this next image is AFAIK because of the book-page it was copied from, not the blade itself.

The missing tooth on that second dagger, and the crack halfway down this next one’s blade, shows what happens when design features cause weak spots.

So there you go: a quick overview of fantasy sword features in real life.

Here’s a real-life weapon that looks like it belongs in a fantasy story or film - and this doesn’t even have an odd-shaped blade…

Just a very flexible one…

If you want more odd blades, Moghul India is a good place to start…