éowyn pretended to be dernhelm, a man. to fit in, she must have worn men’s armor. so the armor in the illustrations is normal for rohirrim.

therefore, all the rohirrim rode to war just like that:

male or female

hero or villain

sea or land

even in the snow

The Artemis II crew captured an impressive image of the Earth from 41,000 miles away this morning.

And Gandalf just blinks and is like, “You what now?”

“Yeah, killed it. Had to save Frodo”

In lord of the rings lore, there are three tiers of deities. The highest tier and most dangerous includes Morgoth - Sauron’s master, and Ungoliant, Shelob’s master. The middle tier includes Shelob, Sauron. Then there’s the lowest tier, which includes the wizards Gandalf and Saruman as well as the Balrog (this is why Gandalf couldn’t 1v1 the Balrog). It also explains why Gandalf doesn’t take the ring, the magic of a tier 2 deity would absolutely corrupt him. We even see that happen with Saruman and the Palantir.

This leads to the start of the answer to some interesting questions. Why does Sauron tolerate Shelob being in his territory, and why does Sauron tolerate there being a secret back door into Mordor?

On the surface, he does it because he might not be able to beat Shelob in a fight, after all they’re the same tier of deity. And since Shelob’s domain is the secret way into Mordor, he can’t close it off, and he seriously doubts anyone can use it to get in. He doesn’t monitor the path with guards either - Shelob would eat them.

It gets more detailed than that though. Sauron’s boss, Morgoth, and Shelob’s boss, Ungoliant, made a deal. They’d attack the tree of life together. Morgoth would drink the nectar, and Ungoliant would keep all of the jewels and magic they earned along the way. Morgoth broke this deal because there was a particularly powerful gem he wanted (the gem in Sauron’s helmet), and as a result Ungoliant went to war with Morgoth.

Ungoliant won, Morgoth barely escaped with his life.

So not only does Sauron maybe lose if he attacks Shelob. Even if he were to win, it might provoke Ungoliant into attacking Morgoth again, and Ungoliant wins that fight, she’s already done it once.

With all of that established, how the hell does Sam hurt a deity that powerful?

Well, to start, it’s impossible. Shelob’s hide is so tough Sam could never pierce it with all his might. However, Shelob had grown old and arrogant. During the fight, Sam winds up directly underneath Shelob, and Shelob decides to crush Sam with all her strength.

Unfortunately, Sam is pointing sting straight up.

While Sam lacks the strength to hurt Shelob, Shelob herself is plenty strong. She accidentally impales herself on sting, finding herself injured for the first time in thousands of years. Which is the sort of poetry I really appreciate about Tolkien’s writing.

No matter how powerful or evil or ancient or indestructible your foe, if you stand for what is right and hold your sword out, they will impale themselves upon it.

No worries: He's a local pet, he's friendly, he didn't interfere with any athletes' results, and he was returned to his owners. Videos at the link. [X]

Nazgul, YOU are an Olympian!

Still collecting the full alphabet of the “live, laugh, love” variants if anyone has some good examples.

You experiment. Sticking items under your pillow is better than the hassle of Facebook marketplace.

She doesn’t take the plastic plate set you’ve tried to sell for weeks, but she takes a gold rimmed china saucer from your Grandma’s old set. You get brand new market value for it - from 1946 when it had been bought.

She ignores jeans and books, but trades for spoons and costume jewelry. The tooth fairy, you realize, is a bit of a magpie. If it’s a little bit shiny, she’ll give you cash.

You clear out the jewelry table at a garage sale, place them one by one under your pillow. The amount you get varies, but still is brand new market value of when the item was originally bought. Nothing more than $50, but that’s better than the $8 you bought it for.

After a few weeks, something changes. Your bank account isn’t as empty, your pillow is thicker. You take a nap, because sleeping on items isn’t the most comfortable. You wake up to a crinkle, a note next to your nose.

The writing is tiny, you need your phone’s magnifier to read it, but it turns out just as you’ve been using the tooth fairy, she wants to use you. She’s dropped off a list of wants; hints at a finder fee in cash or precious metals.

It’s specific, odd stuff. A clean dollar coin. A chandelier crystal. A reversible sequin pillow. Antique holiday ornaments. Photo hooks. All, you think, easy to get.