#tenlittlebullets

that was one of the bits i was SPECIFICALLY thinking of lmao

i mean, i’m not as familiar with the mid atlantic states as i am of other places in the country, never having lived there myself, so i’m going to defer on this like... i’m pretty sure wolf trap, virginia doesn’t look like that? but what do i know, i’ve only been to virginia half a dozen times in my life. but i am VERY sure where the fucking STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA IS, despite only having been there twice in my life, because i don’t have to ACTUALLY GO TO A STATE to know where the fucking STATE IS ON A MAP

AND THE MAP SAYS THERE IS NO OCEAN IN WEST VIRGINIA

also like basic knowledge of american history will tell you what west virginia is, it’s the part of virginia that decided to side with the union during the civil war, it did so because it was too mountainous to have plantations and that gave it different economic incentives, and THAT means that IT’S NOT FUCKING COASTAL DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHERE THE APPALACHIANS ARE

i have spent my entire time in the u.s. either on the west coast or in the upper midwest and i know where the fucking appalachians are

what

I mean, it seems to me like any universe that has the KGB (or Hydra-in-the-KGB) take out a well-organized, successful hit on Howard Stark in *December 1991* either has nothing whatsoever to say about Russian history, or has something ballsy to say about the continuity of the Russian security services but never actually comes out and *says* it

So, this is an interesting wrench in the plan!

Cap2 talked about unmarked Russian slugs but otherwise so strongly avoided associating the Soldier with Russia I interpreted it as, by 1991, the KGB had transferred full use of the Soldier to Hydra. But your way makes it way more interesting.

And problematic. Super, super problematic.

replied to your

post

:

ever wonder where you would be without hbo’s rome?...

this is UNCANNY i just started watching it for the first time

oh my g o d you are in for a treat bc hbo’s rome is the finest show on television in any age! tobias menzies’s extremely 2004 swatch tan, the fact that atia is basically an ancient roman au role for julie cooper from the OC, and another ancient roman character i can’t remember who literally has a new jersey accent, only make it better and more perfect. 

I saw the sign in the photo and before I even scrolled down my first thought was "I'm so sorry"

archifist replied to your photo “Moving along toward a couple of days of museums and such, out of the...”

Also I highly suggest not driving in DC proper-all these one way roads that don't have corresponding one way roads in the opposite direction, people making right turns from the left lane, etc

archifist reblogged your photo and added:

It’s because the DC area has a large itinerant...

Ha ha the driving hasn’t been too horribly bad, though we did cross the potomac, immediately get flown over by a helicopter, then wind up stuck in three lanes merging to a stop sign, where a flock of geese shit upon us. It was kind of amazing. Then we went to the wrong address and had to turn around and drive MORE through MORE of people-are-double-parked-in-the-left-lane, can’t-turn-right-from-the-right-lane-because-of-pedestrians, nobody ever signals, etc.

BUT we dropped the car off to get valet parked at the hotel, and we’re not gonna see that thing for three days. Forget it. 

(We did get to see a lot of neat stuff though, while sitting in traffic, so.

I had been wondering-- around Albany, you see a green VT license plate and figure that person’s going to drive like a maniac, or an MA license plate and figure that asshole’s never going to signal, so I was watching MD and VA and DC license plates whip by (and we got cut off by a NJ one!) and trying to guess who the assholes were. Spoiler alert: everyone.

But, it wasn’t bad; traffic is crazy because of holidays, but less heavy than normal, I think.

I guess my poor sister has to contend with metro Baltimore traffic on her commute, but she’s a big girl. It’s not quite as Legendarily Bad as DC itself, at least. 

In suburban MD they don’t believe in having shoulders on their roads. It’s just, white lineMAILBOX all the way down. I can’t believe anyone has any wing mirrors left. 

I have driven exactly 0 on this trip, which suits me JUST FINE. I drive plenty in my daily life, and we’re in Dude’s car, which is a recent Mazda with beeps and lights and choosing how fast you ought to go and such, and seems precisely calculated to infuriate the FUCK out of me, so I’m happy to be a passenger/backup navigator.

The Google Maps lady has a higher and faster voice than the car’s built-in GPS. I like her better for in-city driving.

Oh my god I haven’t written up onto Tumblr yet how the fucking in-car navigation system routed us through A MALL PARKING LOT in PA rather than taking the highway around a bend. It was unreal and hilarious. Maybe I did. Still.

We previewed how it wants us to go home and it is telling us that the easiest way to get back to Buffalo from DC is to go through the back roads in ski country where they just shattered records for snowfall in a 30-hour period with over 5 feet. (that link is for Erie PA but they got it all the way up the Tug Hill Plateau so...)

  Beware the Anti-Cult: the dangers of leaving one...

sometimes I suspect SJ is the way it is because (among other reasons) it serves as an anti-cult for kids lashing out against a fundamentalist Christian upbringing–reinforcing the exact same shit, but with the angels and devils swapped

I feel that is exactly true. I certainly got as deep into SJ as I did due to the genuine mistreatment I experienced in my life for things outside of my control. And it’s another reason why I press this blog to be politically neutral. While I think anti-SJ blogs do have their place and purpose for existing, they tend to be run by people who often either overlook or are completely unaware of the fine details of these communities, and importantly, why they exist at all, often blaming SJWs for simply being stupid for falling prey to these communities at all.

As mentioned in the cult masterpost linked in the sidebar, people who are the most susceptible to cultic communities tend to be people who genuinely mean well and want to make or see a difference in the world. Many of these people having been wronged by the world that claims to be looking out for them.

tenlittlebullets replied to your post “Transformative fandom vs. that other type”

(I've grown to loathe the terms, actually, and the way they conflate the groups themselves with some supposedly defining trait of the *activities* that predominate in each. It leads to horrible, reductive Gender Discourse and fanworks-fandom propping up its self-worth by sneering at any way of liking things that sounds too "curative" (read: autistic). As though the wiki-editors and resource-hoarders haven't been part of our infrastructural backbone all along!)

Yeah... IME, the breakdown is usually a lot messier than this kind of terminology implies. In practice, the more fanfic end of things mostly also engages in the other set of activities. The non-fanfic end of things likes professional-looking cosplay, well-made fan trailers, and probably cooking all the food from canon and having a dinner party.

There are lots of “fanworks” that are sufficiently canon-ish that many, many people who like a thing will at least casually engage with them. There are many things like compiling a timeline of canon events that fic writers also care a lot about in almost every case.

The really big divide often seems to be between more and less socially acceptable fan activities, not really between more and less original or creative ones.