Keeping in Touch with the World

I had a very important call but my cat had to make himself Known

140 MILLION YEARS BACK.

If you don't know how far that is, that's basically the start of the cretaceous. Let me simplify that for you even further. Chimpanzees and humans seperated, what, 5 or 6 million years ago?

This is basically like if humans could hybridise with THESE THINGS.

This is the sort of thing that should be impossible. They used those eggs to be ABSOLUTELY 100% SURE NOTHING WOULD HAPPEN.

And then THEY GOT FISH OUT OF IT.

Like. You can quite clearly understand why they didn't think anything would happen. WE ARE MORE RELATED TO BLUE WHALES THAN THESE THINGS.

THE AMERICAN PADDLEFISH AND THE STURGEON ARE SO COMPLETELY UNRELATED THAT THIS IS NOT PLAYING GOD. IF ANYTHING THIS IS AN ACT OF GOD.

THE SCIENTISTS HAD NO BLAME IN THIS BECAUSE NOTHING LIKE THIS HAD EVER HAPPENED BEFORE

THESE THINGS, FOR HYBRIDS, HAD A REALLY HIGH SURVIVAL RATING. LIKE 70% OF THEM SURVIVED.

To put that into perspective, getting a blue whale and a squirrel and trying to hybridise them is more sensible, and that wouldn't produce anything but getting you banned from science. Most animals that aren't plants can barely hybridise two degrees away from each other.

BUT THESE TWO ENTIRELY UNRELATED FISH create PERFECTLY HEALTHY HYBRIDS.

And this is a Russian Sturgeon:

(glances at fish)

before the sturddlefish, a purple squale would have seemed more likely- and since that's ridiculous and obviously no one would think that's possible except as a joke, that should speak to HOW impossible this situation seemed, and why they thought obviously this will be perfectly fine. If you took squirrel eggs (the gamete) and tried to use whale sperm to fertilize them, you could reasonably expect that to not work. That should be a good control. The eggs would definitely not actually be fertilized, and even if sperm somehow made it into the egg and some kind of development started, you would expect them to not make it to term and definitely not make a whole ass new animal that's perfectly fine actually.

It also has a lot of different kinds of stitches you can do that make different densities of fabric.

I was surprised that I’d never heard of it though. It’s older than knitting and crocheting and even though it’s been done all over the world it’s super relevant to Nordic culture and my grandmother and I are both into keeping in touch with our roots a bit so I’m surprised I’ve never heard of it.

It’s also a lot easier to freehand and adjust as you go than crochet or knitting and you mostly go by inches instead of rows and number of stitches so a large number of accessories like stitch markers or whatever isn’t really necessary.

The downside as a beginner is that undoing mistakes is more time consuming than with knitting or crochet. You’ve gotta like sew your mistakes out backwards. Disadvantages of making a really sturdy fabric I guess.

I like the feel of this bone needle though and don’t think I’ll be trying the wooden or metal ones.

Also I think I’m gonna have to get good at doing Russian joining if I decide to get good at nalbinding because I don’t have wool yarn and the ends won’t felt together if it’s not at least 50% wool. A small price to pay for using big bone needle though.

no its one of my fancy pencils :)

Two people do not decide that they are "courting". One person decides to "court" someone else. It's an action, not a stage in the relationship. A man decides to court a woman because he wants to encourage her to have romantic interest in him. He's trying to win her favor. It's not an exclusive relationship--a woman could be courted by multiple men at once. She'll spend time getting to know the guy who's interested in her, but they won't officially define their relationship as one where they only show romantic interest in each other. If they reach a point where they want it to be exclusive, that's when you propose.

bizarrely, America has in many ways gotten more conservative about dating since World War II.

Also, following this, I asked my mom what her thoughts were on the matter, and she said that while she “wouldn’t put it in those terms” she broadly agreed, and thought that anyone expecting any sort of exclusivity when a marriage proposal wasn’t at least on the very immanent horizon was “nuts, honestly.” I hesitantly asked if she was including relationships with premarital sexual activity in that, and her response was “Of course. I mean, gosh, you know your Aunt Terri used to have a guy for every day of the week before she finally settled down.”

And this was when I learned, to my shock, that the oft-repeated story of how “Aunt Terri used to have a guy for every day of the week” didn’t just mean “Aunt Terri had a full dance card” but rather meant that Aunt Terri had a period of her life where she literally dated exactly seven guys at once, all of whom she was sleeping with (or, my mom was quick to disclaim, “well, fooling around with, I don’t know how far she actually went with any of them, but they were definitely all fooling around behind closed doors”), on a literal weekly rotation. Like, they had a schedule. A schedule that all seven of the guys knew.

How They Shaped Our World by

Jennifer Potter

“When he died the ravens sat in the trees outside for a week, watching. Taking turns. A horde of raccoons tried to break into the house every night, tearing at the siding. Eventually they gave up, but it was unsettling.”

"Horse but make it a lizard and give it bat wings and horns"

didnt know how to interpret "make it a lizard" so i wrote lizard and drew an arrow pointing to the horse so people know its a lizard. Also didn't know what bat horns were so I gave it a horned bat nose

"A body like a big cat but completely covered in scales, the head of a crocodile with the horns of an ibex, and the wings of a bat on its back"

On it boss o7, ive mashed all these animals together and threw scales all over it. This the dragon you saw?

"Take a lizard, extend the neck. Add a pair of bat wings to the back. Add horns and sharp teeth."

Seems like we're onto somethin' boss! Though idk how it'd be so fearsome bein such a small thing.

"Big-ass lizard with wings" "big lizard" "Giant lizard" "Big fucking lizard"

don't seem too special?

"Imagine a winged alligator that was 70 feet tall and aware of its existence"

i dont know if this is a dragon but it could definitely be some kind of god

"Dinosaur with wings and horns?"

Dunno which dino you were talkin about so i just picked a random one. Stegosauus :}

"Big snake with legs and horns that can breathe fire"

Ah. Hm.

These are all done with a longarm machine, with different different colors for the thread.

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

THERE’S A TIMESKIP

after losing control of the signal fire there’s a FUCKING TIMESKIP and when the next chapter starts everyone’s hair is several inches longer and their clothes have rotted to shreds and they’re still just kind of chilling!!!!

IT TAKES THE TERRIBLE IMPERIALISM MIND-POISONED EXCESSIVELY BRITISH BOYS IN THE ACTUAL BOOK SEVERAL MONTHS TO COMMIT A SINGLE ACT OF INTENTIONAL VIOLENCE, EVEN THE ONE (1) CHILD WRITTEN AS AN ACTUAL SOCIOPATH

AND then when they DO turn on each other it is because

THERE’S AN UNSPECIFIED WORLD WAR HAPPENING

AND A PILOT’S CORPSE CRASH LANDS ON THE ISLAND POST-DOGFIGHT AND THE CHILDREN MISTAKE THE PARACHUTE FOR A MONSTER AND SPIRAL INTO PARANOIA

BECAUSE CHILDREN INHERIT THE LEGACY AND TRAUMA OF VIOLENCE FROM THE ADULTS WAGING WAR AROUND THEM

HURR DURR IN THE REAL WORLD IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN LIKE IN LORD OF THE FLIES -

yes. yes he did. i’m also gonna direct you to the real life ‘lord of the flies’ which occured in the 1960s, when six tongan schoolboys got stranded on a desert island for over a year before being rescued by an australian fisherman (who, it should be noted, later took on all six as crewmembers because the reason they were out in the first place was because they wanted to see the world, and named his ship the Ata after the island they were stranded on). nobody died. the only injuries that occurred were accidental, and when one of the boys broke his leg falling down a cliff, the others braced it and looked after him so well that it healed perfectly. if they argued, then they would literally go to opposite sides of the island until they’d cooled off. after leaving the island, they remained friends for the rest of their lives. here’s a photo of them as adults, with their rescuer (who is third from the left) and other members of his crew.

the results are in

Okay so basically this all started in 10th grade when my English teacher (idk if this context is needed but she grew up in Yugoslavia in the ‘80s before moving to the US as a teen and she has a VERY thick accent. She’s about 6’4” and has huge black hair that sticks out all around her head. She’s the human embodiment of a corvid bird. Truly such a fascinating person) anyway she was talking about Lord of the Flies in class and mentioned that a few years ago some students of hers tried to convince her that the book couldn’t have taken place during WWII and that she didn’t believe them because “there have been no atomic bombs except during World War Two” and an atomic bomb is referenced as the inciting factor for why the boys were flying over a deserted island in the first place.

But the thing is, if you actually look at all the throwaway historical context details in the book, there is no logical way that it could have taken place in WWII. I realized that all clues point towards an alternate timeline where the Cold War turned hot. About halfway through the book I started bookmarking any scrap of information related the time period and it was getting to the point where each chapter took me twice as long to read because I would continually need to check various articles and Wikipedia pages to cross reference.

Eventually, I ended up writing a 5 -page paper picking the book apart for details which you can read here but I’ll also give you the individual points (a mixture of historical details and borderline headcanon):

Early on in the book, the boys mention that there are probably maps in “the Queen’s library” that show where they are—this was one of the first things that stuck out to me, as Elizabeth II didn’t become Queen until 1952, and WWII ended in 1945

Ralph mentions watching something on television at home. His dad, although a naval officer, would almost certainly not be able to afford a TV in 1945, BUT televisions were already popularized around the time of Lizzy 2’s coronation (or at the very earliest the 1948 London Olympics) and it’s believable that Ralph could have had one at home. There’s also some mentions around space travel/putting a man on Mars that would make more sense during the Cold War

I found Piggy’s character to be very interesting. For one thing, he’s introduced  as being fat due to his Aunt owning a candy store (his parents are both dead). If you know anything about the sugar ration during WWII, you’d know that candy stores would have been non-operational and Piggy would probably not have had access to an excess of sweets.

Continuing with Piggy, I’d place his distinctive accent as either London Cockney or London Estuary. If Piggy was from London, he would have been evacuated to the British countryside via train (the same evacuations in which the Pevensies stay with their uncle in Narnia) long before the dropping of the atomic bombs. Here’s where the headcanon comes in: I’d be willing to bet that Piggy was evacuated to the countryside as a baby during WWII and both his parents were among the 27,000 killed in the London Blitz, hence why he now lives with his aunt. By assuming the years leading up to the book are peacetime instead of wartime, there’s no issue around the candy store.

And finally, the most compelling argument imo…WHY WOULD BRITISH BOYS BE EVACUATED AFTER VE DAY??? In the book, it’s very clear that the LOTF boys are being evacuated from their boarding school after an atomic bomb was dropped. Victory in Europe was May 8th, 1945. The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in early August. In what world would British boys be evacuated by a plane traveling over tropical airspace (historically child evacuations in the UK were domestic and carried out by train) to protect them from a bomb dropped in Japan four months after the end of the war in Europe?? The only plausible explanation would be that the USSR dropped a bomb on an Allied power and the boys are being evacuated from Briton all together to avoid nuclear fallout and/or future bombings.

Final note, at one point the boys consider building a new plane and decide against the idea because they “might get shot down by the Reds” even though the soviets were literally allies with Britain during WWII. Do you know when they most certainly weren’t allies? The Cold War.

Anyway, I end up giving her this essay which she reads and then promptly says “these are all very interesting points, but there was STILL no nuclear bomb besides the ones dropped on Japan in World War 2” and I’m like “Yes!! I know this!! And I’m saying it’s an alternate future!!” But she never really seemed to understand what I was saying.

Anyway a few weeks ago I was at my job (I’ve been working IT some summers at my high school after I graduated) and I ran into her and she says “I was going through my desk and I found that essay you wrote on LOTF! I read it again and it was a really good argument piece, especially for a 10th grader.”

So of course I ask her “oh really? Well, were you finally convinced?”

And she basically says “it was good…but no :)  <3”

Most of these novels introduced the love interest not just in the first chapter, not just in the first scene, but on page one. And it's smart, because the point is that these two people fall in love, so you're jumping right into the thick of things.

The romcoms that made me laugh the hardest utilized physical comedy the best. I love banter. I love banter. But it can't carry a romcom on its own.

Publishing meta gets publishing money. Books about booksellers, editors, publicists, etc sure seem to get above-average in-house support. Which is not to imply that it's undeserved! Just that it's landing with its targeted readers.

The (usually) contemporary setting means the reader's holding less setting-specific info in their head. This frees up some RAM, as it were, for things I would have to approach very carefully in fantasy, such as dropping a flashback smack in the middle of a scene, or nonlinear storytelling.

Compelling chemistry involves the traits the love interests uniquely bring out in each other. E.g. a stoic person's hidden sense of humor, or a pushover's ability to stand up for something. It's also key that they like these traits on some level, and tied to the person they want to be.

Negative character traits can be greatly mitigated by self-awareness. E.g. It's one thing if someone is consistently and needlessly blunt to the point of rudeness, and acts like that's not a problem; it's another if, internally, they are unhappily aware they're driving people away but don't know how to be any other way.

Escalation. The obvious choice is predictable (some may say boring), but the unexpected choice can feel over-engineered and inorganic. I feel like the balance here is to take the obvious choice and push it further. E.g. Horrible ex shows up at the bakery the narrator just started! Obvious choice is to kick him out. Engineered choice would be having him slip on fresh-waxed floors and land in a vat of custard that just happened to be the right size and sitting in the middle of the bakery. Hm. The escalated version is to have the narrator tell him to get out, and when he balks, start throwing day-olds until he goes. Another example: Our two jerks are going on their first date. An obvious complication: Someone's ex is also on a date at the same place. An over-engineered complication: The ex insists they leave, and when they don't, they go to the manager and try to have our jerks kicked out because their daddy owns the restaurant, and also they have the jerks' car towed. An escalated complication: The ex insists on sharing a table with the jerks, and it's clear they still have feelings.

Related: There's a lot of mileage to be had from people/things progressing a funny and covert goal while the non-narrator scene partner is distracted. E.g. a dog slowly stealing off its owner's plate while the owner is flirting and/or arguing with the narrator.

A lot of books used interstitials for flavor, like emails, transcripts, etc. These can also be used to do some heavy expository lifting by letting you set expectations—think an open mic night flyer that can convey the venue's vibe, or directions to a corn maze that get increasingly sketchy.

We all love competence porn. If we can see what a character is good at, we'll want to see it again. If we can see them be very, very good at it, but thwarted at the last moment—by their own character flaw, for maximum impact—then we will be desperate to see them pull it off in the future. IMHO the more you, the author, want the reader to like a character, the sooner we should see their competence.

RELATED: If a love interest is meant to be a snob, it is non-negotiable that we have to see their competence, in action, on the page. There was one romcom I bounced off like a basketball, and this was a major part of why. I'm altering occupations here, but in a nutshell:

Narrator, a pastry chef with struggling career, idolizes a famous and award-winning baker

Turns out the baker can't make pastries worth a damn because he thinks sweets are frivolous, but the bakery needs to expand its offerings, so she gets brought in to help him

He tells her what she does is meaningless, and she doesn't know how to do real baking, and overall is wildly condescending, but the narrator puts up with it because she idolizes him

We see many awards he's won as a baker, and many high-level professional connections he has

We never see him bake. And we never see her eat something he baked. Our narrator tells us he's just that good and we have to accept it.

Y'all, I was so mad. Give us a crumb, please.

12. Most books tackled a sense of loneliness or isolation in at least the narrator, and sometimes the love interest as well. Even if they had active social lives, there was a gap that only the love interest sees, and only they can fill.

13. There were really interesting uses of sensory and signature details to make a character stand out and/or stand in for physical intimacy early on. E.g. a character slowly rubbing a thumb over the chip in a mug's rim—to me, that gesture is close enough to evoke running a thumb over someone's bottom lip, and the chip gives it sensory oomph. Other characters would have a recurring signature nickname, appearance detail, or gesture; bonus if it had actual character significance.

14. On a slightly more downer note... I found one thing a bit unsettling. I'm threading a needle here, because no, fiction is not supposed to be a moral lecture, yes, there is room for all types of fantasies and explorations in romance. But I found it a tad grim how many books were specifically fantasies of enormous men and itty bitty women. How most of the heroes are supposed to be flawed but romantic, attractive, respectful... and yet in the physical intimacy scenes, a lot of the language falls back on evoking domination, possession, and control by a man. He "claims" lips, he "brands" with his touch, he's "marking [narrator] as his own." And none of it is an actual D/s relationship, it's all quite vanilla. I may just be too ace for that to sound appealing?

It does go hand-in-hand with an interesting recurring bias against cities, where they're scary places that people leave after their dreams are crushed, and find real happiness in a "sweet, traditional life" in a small town. With 80% of the US population living in urban areas, the framing of small towns as keepers of tradition was similarly dissonant to me.