Dancong Oolong Delights

if I were an illiterate peasant getting kicked out of his home because a bunch of blue bloods showed up waving a scrap of paper saying I could no longer farm the land I had been farming for generations then I would probably also think the devil was obsessed with contracts and legal procedure.

an interesting thing about clothing in late medieval and early modern europe is that, while lower class people generally did wear brightly colored clothing instead of muddy brown clothes, there were very distinct differences in the color of clothing people of different classes wore. clothing was done with all natural dyes, of course, but they were either dyed locally with cheap and easily accessible ingredients, or they were dyed in holland, italy, the ottoman empire, or even further afield using a jealously guarded secret combination of difficult-to-access ingredients, including (crucially) better-quality fixatives. this means that not only did expensive imported fabrics maintain a dark, rich tone much longer than a locally dyed one, which would get a washed out look after a couple of years, but there were also certain colors that a working class farmer literally couldn’t afford to wear, and even though the difference between a cheap local lincoln green and an expensive imported popingay green might seem subtle to us people then seem to have been very sensitive to those differences. that’s also why the colors puritans tended to wear seem uncharacteristically bright to our modern eye—black was such a rich and expensive color that it would be inappropriate to wear to anything other than a portrait sitting, but the colors orange and kendall green were deeply humble in their origins

can you put that thing on a leash?

rummaging for an earl grey teabag like its a cigarette

the draw of arranged marriage AUs to me is really the way the dubcon of it all binds them together. neither of them have a choice in being here, something else is foisting this upon them whether that’s their parents or the political situation around them or expectation or something else, but the point is that they don’t get that one choice. so they have to make a choice somewhere else, that now that they’re here, they’re going to make it work. they’re each other’s only allies, in this cage built around them. they may have been coerced into swearing to stand by each other through anything, but they did swear.

it’s not love at first, or second, or third sight. it’s not love in the wedding bed the first time, whether they grit their teeth through it or decide together to forgo that binding step and try to get around it as long as they can. it’s about sharing a bed with a stranger while you learn their nightmares and how they hog the covers. it’s about sharing a name before you even know each other’s hobbies. the appearances you have to keep up, and the connection you find in both being exhausted by them, laughing together because isn’t it ridiculous how you not only have to be married but you have to act like it’s perfect and lovely for everyone else watching. it’s love that creeps up quiet and slow, between shared secrets that make your wedding bands mean something for the first time, and trying to protect each other from the trap you’re both in. and it’s about having the mortifying thought of “oh my god, i have a crush on my wife.”

nice medievalism you’ve got there. why is it entirely in shades of grey and brown

someone remind these guys that the concept of color existed prior to the 17th century

i'm rereading the murderbot diaries and murderbot's utter conviction that it and gurathin are bitter enemies is still so funny. buddy. gurathin got over this months ago. he's just a quiet guy.

one-sided antagonism is so delicious.  murderbot diaries i also very much enjoy how surreal it must be for gurathin /   to know that the heavily armed rogue secunit holds a grudge against him /  and also know that all it will ever choose to do about this is make frowny faces and flip him the bird. / (tags via space-mouse)

with the nice kitchen and insane budget his channel could really take off, yuan-gege, so you're doing this Binghe a favor really