pirating movies by seeing them in tumblr gifs and basing my own story around them
that's how medieval peasants were supposed to use the stained glass windows to teach themselves bible stories when church was exclusively in latin
Blorbaux from my tapestries
NASA just dropped the closest image ever taken of Jupiter.
I went to rpf island and could not help but notice some interesting dynamics between its inhabitants
Waiting for the kind of love they sing about in tad songs
so hard not to become the most annoying person on earth if you're a little excitable and just learned a little about a topic literally no one around you has any interest in
they should invent a me that can do things
me when i find a new fandom to obsess over vs me when the characters start tormenting my mind
i have crazy garlic fingers from peeling and chopping garlic cloves yesterday this phenomenon is always fascinating to me because it reminds me that i, too, am made of meat, and therefore i am also susceptible to being seasoned
I hate when people ask me about my preference but I don’t understand their preference level. Like yes I kinda want Chinese food 10% more than I want a sandwich but if you want a sandwich like 40% more than Chinese food then I would say it’s totally reasonable we get sandwiches.
*wakes up in a cold sweat* I have GOT to start writing weirder and more aromantic
Anyway the thought about Christianity was a tangent, I was actually thinking about ranking Fall Out Boy songs by how far back in time you could go before the lyrics were completely unintelligible due to untranslatable cultural differences.
"Uma Thurman" is partially unintelligible even to me (I have next to no idea who Uma Thurman is) but I feel like it would be a good example to help explain what cultural Christianity is, because the amount of song lyrics that would make zero sense if you didn't know what Christianity was is always way higher than you think it is
This is also a good exercise in estimating just how much we, as modern readers, are missing in ancient texts
Imagine explaining this to an ancient Sumerian. They don't have July, let alone the Fourth of it, and the significance of that date and the connection to fireworks requires you to explain everything from gunpowder to the concept of a nation.
I like "This is a black, black ski mask song" from Novocaine because even a historian that knew what skiing was might not necessarily know what the significance of a ski mask is here.
"I Don't Care" is almost timeless though. I'm pretty sure an ancient Roman would "get" most of it.
Same with "Alone Together." "My heart is like a stallion, they love it more when it's broke in?" Perfectly understandable for someone a couple thousand years ago.
"The Mighty Fall" is an interesting case because you could envision trying to explain "Your crooked love is just a pyramid scheme" to an ancient Egyptian
Trying to do this with Owl City makes you appreciate just how MUCH clever wordplay is in Owl City lyrics, because you're like "SO MUCH would definitely get completely lost in any attempt to translate, but I can't even break it all down"
owl city lyrics have a habit of punning on idioms, which probably is the worst for historical longevity. In "Plant Life" there's the lyric "new leaf turns over, unwilling to fall" which is referring to the speaker's reluctance to let go of the past and move on. this is both playing with the idiom "turn over a new leaf" meaning to start something new, and creating the image of a literal leaf reluctant to fall from the tree (as leaves do in fall, as part of the natural progression of seasons).
Also from the song Plant Life
so, there's "spirit" and "ghost," but neither actually mean in context the same thing that they mean when they do mean they same thing, and "pull off your sheet," which is a reference to sheets being used as a ghost costume. then there is the concept of a "teddy [bear]" and "grin and bear it" which is punning on "teddy" referencing a bear. this is kind of brilliant but incomprehensible
Would the wordplay in "Get me out of this cavern or I'll cave in" in "Cave In" necessarily be intelligible when translated for a future historian or person from the distant past
By the way, Cave In is at the top of my minecraft themed playlist because it mentions the largest number of things that are in Minecraft that I have found in a song
You'll have the most fun if you assume that what technology is and does can be explained to your listener, and focus purely on cultural and linguistic barriers
In the song "Paparazzi" by Lady Gaga, knowing what a garage is and is for does not help you understand what it means to be "garage glamorous" at all.
Sometimes the barrier isn't not knowing what something is, it's knowing what something is like.
Speaking of Lady Gaga, Poker Face is great for this
Listen, *I* barely know how poker is played. But I still know that the first line references a variant (?) of poker called Texas hold 'em. There are so many double meanings here. "After he's been hooked" probably references gambling, and "I'll play the one that's on his heart" references the fact that "hearts" are one of the four suits in traditional playing cards.
Imagine not knowing any of this. Now imagine knowing all of this—does that actually let you understand what a "poker face" is?
I go back in time, I try to show an ancient Sumerian some bangers from the future, I end up stuck explaining the complex legal and cultural status of gambling in the United States, fuck time travel honestly
Songs that make roughly the same amount of sense to nearly everyone regardless of their position in history
It helps that most songs throughout history are about roughly the same things:
See this is fascinating because we're already leaving the time in history where people understand things like "meaner than a junkyard dog" but the Archetype still works
"You Shook Me All Night Long" by AC/DC has some specific cultural references, but people throughout history would Get It okay
what's being highlighted here I think is "technical meaning is understandable, but emotional/thematic meaning is completely obscure" untranslatable things vs. "technical meaning is obscure but the song still Hits" untranslatable
I think "fast car" by tracy chapman could make sense to someone who doesn't actually know what a car is. Like, it's clear from context regardless that the car is a symbol for the opportunity to escape the circumstances you were born into and feel trapped in
Oh yeah i could write an essay about how Adam Young has a specifically autistic way of writing lyrics
“Babel” by Cildo Meireles (2001)
Tags courtesy of @a-kind-of-merry-war that really explain this artwork!
fonts hanging out by elle cordova
The Blue Spirit putting out firebending with a bucket of water is the absolute funniest thing ever done in avatar combat. It just is.
oh my god @murple
i will never stop reblogging this how the fuck did she slide against the wall so perfectly
My fic for the Joker Out Big Bang 2025 is available on AO3 here!
The room slows down, though barely. The tap carries on roaring. Water keeps dribbling down his arm. But Jan himself feels like his heart has stopped, dread trickling through his veins like ice. - As bad as things seem when Martin decides to leave Ljubljana – and the band – for his romantic soulmate, they promptly take a turn for the worse for Jan, who manages to beat the odds and run into his own. In a world where your romantic soulmate's thoughts about you are broadcast loud and clear on your wrist, there's no denying that he's run into a situation he's never been interested in in the slightest. Especially when that stranger's thoughts about him are… less than complimentary. Of course, Fate has a way of forcing romantic soulmates back into each other's paths whether they want that or not, and Jan is about to find out that his plans for the future might be more tied to his soulmate than he'd like.
Or: Jan Peteh's continued attempt to dodge the Red String of Fate while Nace Jordan has the absolute audacity to exist. Chapter 1 is currently up, with chapter 2 to follow tomorrow. @chaosofsmarty has produced some fantastic artwork for my fic based on chapters 1 and 2! These will be embedded, but you can also find it here (contains spoilers for both chapters!). Massive thanks also to the mods for running this, to @xianvar for beta-ing, and everyone who encouraged me in our discord sprints ❤️
