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I Will Break My Chains and Eat My Enemies

@fenrir-kin / fenrir-kin.tumblr.com

Writer and streamer | Fae oddity | they/them (except when it's funny) Miscellaneous Queer Currently doing free tarot reads for practice - DM me!

Introducing Fen!

Hi there! I just realised I don't currently have a pinned post so I'm changing that.

This is my face:

(The cat is called Loki, he's an old man)

I'm Fen, and my writeblr sideblog is @wintersstreams. On here you'll find absolutely anything that catches my attention, takes my fancy, or makes me laugh.

Have you come across a piece about Old Gods Vs Aliens? It gets shared to reddit/imgur/ifunny/etc every so often. That was me! Hi! I really appreciate the love for that piece, but I've written a lot since then that I'd love for you to check out - visit my writeblr, @wintersstreams, or check out my writing tag.

I'm currently writing a novel full of fae, cryptids, and gay. I'm sure you know how it is. You can see the novel as it currently stands on Wattpad.

I have long since given up trying to tag stuff because you know what tumblr's tagging system is like, so instead, here are a few links if you'd like to read my work or support me in any way:

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your stay and please, please remember:

If you like what I write, please REBLOG IT.

You don't need to add a comment! Reblogs will share the work with anyone following you - liking my work keeps it just for you and doesn't help it go any further.

Thank you!

oh gee discord should I try adding numbers? should I try that???? should I try adding numbers to the end of my username so that it's individualized and only mine???? should I try adding numbers??????????

Of all the redemption arcs in popular fantasy media, I feel like Theoden's in The Lord of the Rings is the most overlooked.

The movies emphasize the magical control that the evil powers exercise over Theoden, but in the books, it's more obviously a depiction of bad kingship, in the British medieval sense. Theoden takes bad advice; he neglects his family; he fails to reward his knights; and he leaves his people vulnerable to attack. He also does not honor his kingdom's promises to help nearby kingdoms, as we can tell from Boromir's account of what Gondor has been going through.

Gandalf doesn't just cast out the curse and magically fix everything. He encourages Theoden to free himself from his bad advisor, but Theoden has to take all the subsequent steps. And those choices are not easy; after so much neglect, his knights are scattered, and his only option for defending his people is to gather them at Helm's Deep. The siege does not go well. His people are afraid and despairing. But nevertheless, he holds firm and charges out to meet the enemy -- and Gandalf literally meets him halfway, bringing with him the lost knights, whom Theoden welcomes and rewards after the battle.

Theoden could have just gone home after that. But when Gondor calls for aid, Theoden proves his worth by honoring his promises. He keeps his oaths not only to his people but to his allies.

And the climax of his redemption in the book is not his death, but his leadership. The ride of the Rohirrim against Sauron's armies is described in lavish detail, with an uncharacteristically heated pace: Theoden leads the entire line of Rohan, his banner streaming behind him in the wind as they race toward their foe. And that's the end of the chapter.

I love Theoden's arc so much, and especially that moment so much, because the message is not that he has to win battles or seek power. He just has to keep fighting. Theoden's greatest enemy isn't really Sauron: it's despair. And over the course of the book, he keeps choosing hope and action over despair and hesitation, until finally he can lead his people with courage.

As someone who struggles a lot with despair, I really needed to hear that story.

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and it’s contrasted against Denethor’s arc; who also struggles against despair, and doesn’t overcome it.

yooooo. so I literally wrote a 20 page english paper about the Hope/Despair theme in Tolkien’s work once. It was like ten years ago and I don’t think I have it anymore, but oh boy do I have feeeeeeelings about this topic. And I have drunk a little bit of wine tonight! So here are my unasked for thoughts:

Yes, Theoden’s greatest enemy is despair! Everyone’s greatest enemy is despair. It’s the biggest fucking theme of the series IMO and it makes me crazy how often it gets overlooked.

lord of the rings is a story written by a man whose experience of war was crouching in the bottom of a trench. People like to make a lot of hay about the charge of the light brigade and it’s similarity to the ride of the rohirrim, but no. Tolkien’s experience of war was getting fucking trench fever, not watching cavalry charges. Tolkien’s experience of war was listening to the shells fall around him, knowing that death could come at any moment. He experienced war in a way where the soldiers on the other side of the line were a faceless threat, and the closest and most present enemy was his own fear.

this is the hill I will die on. This is why I hate it when people talk about LotR as a morally cowardly story about fighting mindless orcs that exist to be cannon fodder. No. Lord of the Rings is about seeing the dark coming on the horizon, and fighting yourself. Fighting the fear and despair that rise up inside you. Struggling with your own terror and powerlessness, knowing that you are small, and nothing you do will matter in the face of this massive conflict—  you’re just here, one more meaningless soul to feed into the machine guns. Lord of the Rings is about taking a deep breath, and bracing yourself, and deciding that if nothing you do matters, all that matters is how you do it. The ring can’t possibly be destroyed— we choose to form a fellowship anyway. Helms deep will surely fall by morning— we still choose to fight. The quest can’t possibly succeed— and yet we choose to march into the teeth of mordor to distract the enemy. It’s not hope, exactly? But’s it’s not not hope.

I did at one point have twenty pages written about this. Tolkien was a deeply christian man— he believed in eucatastrophe. Salvation. A better world to come, after suffering, if you bore your suffering well. But he was also a world-class Beowulf scholar with a kinda viking-warrior-type view of the world. And do you know what the vikings believed? (Pls don’t anybody @ me for saying viking, I know it’s a verb and not a culture). The vikings believed that the time of your death was preordained, and that all you had control over was how you met it.

And that is some seriously Rohirric shit!! Like, we’re all mortals doomed to die, Ragnarok is coming, and this whole world is an inevitable grind down into oblivion… but if we’re fighting a long defeat, all the more reason to fight it gloriously!! That’s epic. Eomer approves the hell out of that message.

I’m gonna be a real nerd now, and quote from a poem called the Battle of Maldon.

Courage shall grow keener, clearer our will,
More valiant our spirits, as our strength grows less.
Here lies our good lord, all leveled in dust
The man all marred. True kinsman will mourn
Who thinks to wend off from battle play now?
Though whitened by winters I will not away,
But lodge by my liege lord that favorite of men;
By my dear one and ring giver intend I to lie.”

That’s a translation from an Old English poem that’s literally a thousand years old, but it always gets me how much it sounds like something Tolkien would write. Theoden and Eowyn are practically leaping out of that poem: We’re all going to die, I choose to meet my end fiercely. We’re all going to die, so I want to die beside my king.

It’s an acceptance of death, and even of failure, but not of defeat. Because— to get back to what I was talking about earlier— Lord of the Rings isn’t actually a story about battlefields. It’s a story about being at war with your own heart. Despair or faith? Hope or defeat? Tolkien wants you to know that even if your city is overrun by orcs, or you’re killed in a meaningless push for another 50 feet of french mud, you can still hold on to your courage with both hands and not cede up your soul to despair-- and that’s the battle Tolkien thinks is really worth writing about.

It’s a battle that every major character in the story fights. Frodo, Sam, Gandalf, Theoden, Denethor, Merry, Pippin, Boromir, Galadriel, Eowyn, Faramir, Eomer, Saruman, Gollum, Aragorn. Some of them hold onto hope through everything. Some of them break utterly. Some of them are defeated, and then with help find their footing again, and make a redeeming last stand.  

But the point that Tolkien hammers home again and again is: Death and failure are natural parts of life, and should be accepted. Despair shouldn’t be.

Tolkien says: hope is hard, actually. Fuck that Game of Thrones grimdark bullshit. Hope is hard fucking work. And even if you don’t have hope? Fight like you do. Because the world needs people working to make it better. Do the best you can with what you have, and whether you can see the mark you’re making on the world or not, the simple fact that you’re trying means the world is a better place.

Anyway, I fucking love these books. I am going to stop drinking wine, and go to bed now. :)

The way I've already seen uncountable "Netflix is hiring!" Ads. They're really just gonna hire scabs and pretend the WGA strike isn't happening....

This is a reminder to anyone who wants to go into screenwriting. This is not an opportunity to get your foot in the door. Do not take any writing jobs during the strike. This includes freelance or “script editing” jobs.

You will be a scab. Scabs are barred from union membership. By crossing the picket line to get your foot in the door you’ll be burning one of the most important bridges in your life. You will actively be harming your future job prospects.

This strike will end one day. Those writers who are out picketing will reenter the writers room and start producing work with the legal and financial protections and guarantees they’re fighting for, and you will not be among their ranks. You will be a scab. A traitor.

A lack of union membership will harm your prospects job wise. Do not scab. Knowledge of your scabbing, traitorous ways will cost you your ability to make friends in the industry. Do not scab. Support the WGA as they fight for your rights. Do. Not. Scab.

For anyone who's into LOTR I am rereading (again) and took notes on the weirdest/most interesting bits this time:

  • There are/were other magic rings beside the main ones, which is part of what makes it so hard for other characters to believe that Bilbo's ring is actually The ring
  • At one point Tolkien jumps into the POV of a random fox walking by our protagonists' camp and then never brings it up again, no big deal
  • The ever-controversial Tom Bombadil has several other names we just never talk about? And the elves (at least in Rivendell) know about him and have known about him for many years now
  • They also consider giving him the ring but ultimately decide it would be a bad idea because "he'd probably just lose it"
  • A lot of what happens to Frodo after he's been stabbed by the Nazgul is less symptomatic of dark magic and more of just...having a severe shoulder injury?? Like "oh no my hand is numb and I'm weak and can't move it, must be the evils of Mordor" bro you probably just have nerve damage and blood loss
  • Bilbo straight up writes and sings a song about Elrond's dad in front of him and a bunch of other elves in Rivendell like. The audacity.
  • There's a river called "Wetwang" (yes it's called Nindalf in Elvish, but that's not important here)
  • Aragorn never tells anyone else that Boromir admitted to trying to take the ring, it's implied he even keeps it secret from Gandalf once he reappears
  • The "Two Towers" actually refers to Orthanc and Minas Morgal, not Orthanc and Barad-Dur as the films suggest
  • Eomer has met and possibly was friendly with Boromir
  • Also Aragorn, who doesn't look that old, straight up tells Eomer he'd met both his father and Theoden when they were younger and he just...has zero reaction?? Like if a guy who looked not much older than me wisely said "ah yes, I met your father and uncle long ago" in a way that implied they'd worked together as somewhat equals I'd be. A little uncertain to say the least.
  • Oh and he also hung out with Denethor back in the day
  • Eomer and Gimli have a running disagreement on whether or not Galadriel is real, and if so, how hot she is
  • This is common ish knowledge but there are elements of actual Old English embedded into Rohan's worldbuilding (esp. the names/ "Rohrric" language) and the whole location is genuinely just Tolkien's fantasy version of Anglo-Saxon Britain. He is very not subtle about it.
  • Saruman was FULLY RUNNING DRUGS BACK AND FORTH BETWEEN THE SHIRE AND ISENGARD
  • And this actually ends up contributing to a main plot in the third book
  • Instead of the Palantir falling out of Saruman's pocket when he dies like in the movie, Gandalf shoots a spell at Saruman and makes him run back inside Orthanc and Wormtongue chucks the Palantir down at him from the window in retaliation
  • I know the potato scene is *iconic* but let's be real the fact that Sam risks a fire and takes the time to make a full rabbit stew plus seasoning while they're on a dangerous secret mission to sneak into the Darkest Of Dark Lords' fortress is kind of hilarious
  • Minas Morgul is some serious eldritch horror cryptid shit
  • Denethor is honestly such drama queen. Like I know he's supposed to be a threatening and tragic character but holy shit.
  • Also the entire houses of healing segment is unintentionally comedic
  • Like between the old lady who runs the house giving absolutely zero fucks, and the herb master and Aragorn having a mini nerd off about what Athelas/Kingsfoil is called in different languages, and also Aragorn and Pippin roasting Merry - who has JUST woken up from an Evil Coma by the way - about not being able to find his weed
  • "This weed is better than I thought" -- actual quote by Ioreth re: kingsfoil
  • This is something I noticed that a lot of people don't mention - the "Evenstar" that Arwen gives Aragorn in the movies that's tied to her lifeforce/immortality isn't really a thing in the books. The closest to it is this green brooch that she gives him via Galadriel in FOTR - but the only necklace she gives to anyone is actually to Frodo, as a token that basically means if he ever wants to go to the Grey Havens (as he ultimately does) he'd essentially be taking her place because she isn't going
  • Ok the scouring of the Shire is pretty common knowledge but are we going to talk about Lotho Sackville-Baggins became Saruman's dealer and helped smuggle drugs pipeweed into Isengard (see I told you it would come back)
  • Also!! Lotho was possibly EATEN by Grima Wormtongue, or at the very least Saruman believes he was, yes this is an actual canon thing
  • Legit quote from ROTK: "Worm killed your Chief, poor little fellow, your nice little Boss. Didn't you, Worm? Stabbed him in his sleep, I believe. Buried him, I hope; though Worm has been very hungry lately[]"
  • Seriously what the fuck
  • Saruman is killed by Wormtongue (who is then shot by a bunch of Hobbit archers) and promptly....disintegrates?

Anyway if you're a casual fan who's only seen the movies, or if you haven't read the books in a while, I'd highly recommend.

I mentioned it before but it is very striking to me that as of the last tumblr update, there are now no (0) ways to open someone's desktop blog from a dashboard post. like you can't access the url dot tumblr dot com page at all now unless you already know it exists. imo this seems like a canary that personal blog pages will be gone very shortly, which would suck, since to me that is one of the only good things this site has going for it

Correction: you can still open the top-level URL.tumblr.com link from someone's avatar on the dashboard (so, someone you follow). Actually, I should specify. Here's a post on the dashboard with seven ways to access a post:

  1. Followed blog avatar: Hyperlink, opens in new tab, to URL1.tumblr.com.
  2. Reblogger URL: Hyperlink, opens in new tab, to tumblr.com/URL1.
  3. Reblogged-from URL: Same as #2, but to tumblr.com/URL2.
  4. Uhh... hitbox?: Whatever this is can't be opened in a new tab and doesn't even look like a link, but clicking on it opens the dashboard view of tumblr.com/URL1/post.
  5. Copy link under meatball menu: Not a hyperlink, but copies to the clipboard tumblr.com/URL1/post?trackinginfo.
  6. OP URL: Same as #2 and #3, but to tumblr.com/URL3.
  7. Other... hitbox... thing: Same as #4, but to tumblr.com/URL3/post.

So you can access the custom blog, but not a post on a custom blog, despite the plethora of links. Very annoying.

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No, here’s the worst part: you can indeed get the link of the post you are clicking on and view it on the person’s custom blog!

IT’S JUST ON THE FUCKING MEATBALL MENU TIMESTAMP INSTEAD FOR SOME REASON I DON’T UNDERSTAND THIS SITE

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oh my god

To the migrants from r/196, here is how tumblr works.

Firt off, reblog, don't like. This can help the tumblr community know that you aren't a bot.

Second, make a profile picture. Once again, so we know you aren't a bot.

Third, there is no algorithm. Do not attempt to appease a god that doesn't exist.

Fourth, swear. There is no censorship, so cuss like a sailor.

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every time i see those posts like ‘what food from a show did YOU always wanna try’ i go lol none? but i just remembered im a liar

i always wanted the fucking soup brock made in the pokemon anime

Hello OP, i don’t have anyway to prove this is the same recipe they make in the shows but i make this to calm my inner kid from wanting the fictional soup:

  • 300gr bacon, beef or chicken. A meat of your choice. These go specially well. I prefer chicken tights. Diced
  • 1 medium onion, diced.
  • Garlic minced (i used 2-4 pieces depending on size)
  • 300gr carrot, cleaned, peeled and diced.
  • 3 sticks of celery, washed and diced.
  • 800gr potato. Washed, peeled diced in quarters.
  • 1 head of broccoli.
  • 8 cups of stock of your preference. I recommend using the bones of the beef or chicken, but veggies stock works too for a vegetarian or vegan version.
  • 3 tablespoons all purpose flour.
  • 1 cup whole milk. (Almond or rice milk work fine for a vegan option)
  • ½ cup heavy cream. (Skip it for a vegan option)
  • Salt and black pepper to taste.
  • ½ teaspoon paprika, use the spicy one to get the warmth up a notch in winter.
  • 1 tablespoon fresh chopped coriander. Optional.
  • 1 cup diced gouda or manchego cheese. Optional but really ties all together.

Make sure you have all your ingredients ready and at hand for this one to make sure it comes out nice and tasty!!!

  1. In a pot put water and the bones to prepare your stock (chicken, beef, veggie) You can use premade or bouillon cubes, just make sure its 8 cups worth of broth. In a different pot boil the potatoes until soft.
  2. In a big pot put some butter or olive oil to fry the onion, when it turns a little transparent add the garlic, move constantly.
  3. Add the celery and diced carrots, moving constantly.
  4. The carrot will get a little brighter in color, add the diced meat. Salt and pepper to your taste.
  5. Meanwhile, blend the potatoes with enough stock so your blender wont have trouble blending. If you have a food processor, it’ll be easier.
  6. Ad the remaining stock to you big pot with the veggies and meat, add the broccoli chopped in bite size pieces. Add the paprika and taste for salt and pepper. Let over a medium fire for 10 min.
  7. Separate 3 tbsp of the stock to mix with the flour, set aside. This will be a thickening agent.
  8. Pour the potato mix on the big pot, move to integrate and taste for salt and pepper.
  9. Add the milk and heavy cream. Move with a laddle. Have a final taste and let over low fire for 5 min.
  10. Serve hot and decorate with a pinch of coriander and some cubes of cheese.
  11. ENJOY!

Notes:

I personally prefer to use chicken, love how it goes with potatoes and veggies. Also the tight is very tender and flavorful. With beef you have to be careful not to overcook it or it’ll get gummy and hard to bite, so make adjustments.

VEGAN: could also skip the meat, cheese and heavy cream for a vegan option.

I make it for my younger sister and she loves it. Instead of meat i add some diced, toasted nuts when served. Cashew, pecan and pistachios work nicely.

You’ll have to use 5 tbsp of flour to thicken up the broth a tid bit more without the heavy cream but you can still use a vegan milk.

You can totally skip the coriander, but it adds another dept of flavor.

Do try it with the cheese tho, i promise it’s GODLY. Gouda and manchego are my fave, the melt nicely and have a strong after taste, but i guess any cheese that melts could work.

Finally, if you are like me and like spicy food you can add chopped chili. Serrano and arbol chiles are my go to’s, freshly chopped sprinkled just after serving my bowl.

Hope y'all give it a try and if you have any doubts do ask!

Provecho!

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this is literally the best addition i’ve ever gotten to any of my posts thank you so much

Hey I tried this recipe out and I can confirm that it tastes heavenly!!

Can confirm this soup is absolutely divine!

Substituted spinach for broccoli because my partner is not a fan of the latter and used chicken and bacon. Gonna try it again with a nice Italian sausage in place of the chicken next time.

Anonymous asked:

Do you have any favorite examples of bizarre sexual dimorphism in nature?

sure do!

the blanket octopus is a wonderous creature. reaching about two meters in length, the females glide majestically through the tropical south seas, trailing two huge vibrant coattail cloaks of fused tentacle webbing behind them!

they use their brightly-colored cloak as an intimidation factor, tricking predator and prey alike into thinking that they're MUCH bigger than they actually are! look at this, would you mess with this?? I would not mess with this.

the males, on the other tentacle arm, are about an inch long.

*squeaky toy noise*

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This site toppling the competition by opting to sell shoelaces instead of monetising their users must be one of the greatest examples of failing upwards in history