I know many before me already talked about this, but to be clear.

In the year 1980, Fiat releases a car that will go down in history. It is legendary. Thousands of young Italians have learnt to drive on this car (brave people I respect), and I think every Italian knows what I’m talking about if I say “pandino”.

Look at this beauty

The fiat panda (I call it pandino, little panda, like many others because I developed an emotional attachment when I was young and my grandfather conquered the Alps by going around with this little sh—car) is clearly Nicky’s car:

•it is called “panda” holy trash panda Nicolò everyone?

•it is immortal. I am not joking. A car like this lasted my grandfather 20 years. We then sold the car, because it still worked perfectly, to another man in town and 9 years later that man still goes around with my grandfather’s panda. When I see it I salute it like an old brother in arms

•A panda is dangerous, but loyal. I drove under a snowstorm with a panda. Now, this tells much about my sanity more than the greatness of this vehicle, but I assure you, it’s great.

•it is a staple of Italian culture (yes, I am exaggerating, but not much). When they stopped producing this version (the true!) version of the panda, Italians did everything they could to buy the last ones. There are still conventions for lovers of the pandino

•it is fucking dangerous. My grandfather used to say that it was you know, “spartan” “only the essentials” or something, but this thing had no accessories, even the ones you HOPE a car would have. Airbag? Nah. Abs to save your life? Pffft. Air conditioning? AHAHAHA do you know how hot it is in a panda in summer? I hope not, for you.

•how did people survive in this car

•It was cheap when people really needed cheap cars. A car for the people

•”Simple, but strong.” “If we didn’t have one, we would have to invent it.”

All in all, we have an immortal, old, dangerous, loyal, honestly? Terrible I love it so much, car that managed to conquer the hearts of so many.

I have posted on tumblr exactly once, but after much debate with myself, I decided I just had to post this meta for the world.

It may seem a little random to some people, but this is a thing that has stuck in my mind since my reading for the one Neolithic seminar I had to present solo at uni. Lactose tolerance in humans and how unusual it is. So yes, I did actually think ‘huh Andy probably is Lactose intolerant’ while watching The Old Guard.

I have caught bits of discussions on whether Nile is lactose intolerant or not, and I was surprised not to see this mentioned, I’ve also seen the tomato discussions ;) so here I am. It’s not important meta, but it’s something I know people aren’t necessarily aware of so, meta.

Basically: Of the members of the Old Guard only one is 100% likely to be lactose tolerant.

Booker.

That’s it.

Nicky is maybe 90% likely to be lactose intolerant, Joe is about 75% likely to be lactose intolerant, which is actually lower than I thought (I was expecting 95% odds, with Nicky having higher odds, but turns out not).

Quynh and Andy are 100% lactose intolerant - east asia has an incredibly low rate of lactose tolerance, while Andy is heavily hinted at being from the area we consider to be North Asia/Euroasia (from given age, she was born during the pottery Neolithic though she is almost older than pottery o.o - if she was a thousand years younger, I might have placed her at 90% odds of lactose intolerance).

Lykon.....well, comic!Lykon is most likely lactose intolerant, but film canon allows for his genetics to give him some odds of being lactose tolerant.

Nile....well it’s up to you. Modern day western world, there’s higher odds of lactose tolerance than there was in times past.

Why lactose tolerance is a thing is a matter of debate, archaeology folks are pretty sure that the Northern European high lactose tolerance is a result of limited sunlight meaning we needed an alternate source of vitimin D, so lactose tolerance was important in the population (honestly, intitally my brain went with ‘wow what hard core folk in northern europe made themselves lactose tolerant in the Neolithic’ but then I recognised that it’s a genetic thing, though still a weird genetic thing, as pre-neolithic folk in northern europe were lactose intolerant.)

I went poking for sources, because uni was...over a decade ago and according to: 29 July 2017    Annual Review of Genomics and Human Genetics - On the Evolution of Lactase Persistence in Humans - Laure Segurel and Celine Bon -The why of lactose tolerance, and why it varies, is not really understood and not ‘logical’ (their example being central asian herders being lactose intolerant while hunter gatherers in Africa are tolerant - aka you have a herd of cows but you are intolerant to cows milk v no herds but can have cows milk if they want).

A 2019 article in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, (Vol 11, Issue 11) - suggests that lactose tolerance in Europe may not have evolved until 4,000 years ago (Sorry Andy, you really are too old). A lot of the others case studies are 6th mill BC, so Andy’s on the edge either way, and only if she was Northern European. There’s also a few articles around on low lactose tolerance in south east europe.

UCL has an actual database for this, with handy maps, which I used as my rating for folks odds of lactose intolerance: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/biosciences/departments/genetics-evolution-and-environment/research/molecular-and-cultural-evolution-lab/glad

Italy is just, not lactose tolerant, on any of those maps. This was a surprise to me.

(My favourite journal title for this goes to: Lactose intolerance: a condition as old as the Stone Age: processors of hard cheese and yogurt take note: Neolithic man figured out he could consume fermented milk without harm even if drinking milk caused him GI distress;  Dairy foods, 2013-09-01, Vol.114 (9), p.26  Tong, Phillip )

I even looked up cheese - because I love cheese, but also because I wondered, for the sake of this meta, about cheese. I found a GEM of an article, based on a site in Poland in the 6th mill BC, and cheese can be made in a way that reduces the levels of lactose. (Nature -  Vol. 493, Iss. 7433 (Jan 24, 2013) - Earliest evidence for cheese making in the sixth millennium BC in northern Europe )

It will of course depend on whether the cheese is made from cow’s milk or not.

In summary:

and the sleeping bags are a really small detail but it’s such a good one because i doubt they have a washing machine at the rectory, or at many other safehouses, which means they probably either hand wash their stuff or they use laundromats. and washing bedding is just. well, clothes, yeah, they need clothes, but if they can get by with sleeping bags and blankets that they probably don’t have to wash as often then sure, why not? who the fuck wants to wash sheets and duvet covers for a thousand years? plus i would think sleeping bags would last longer in storage while they’re not at a particular place.