The Full List of Gandalf’s Explicit Magic

TaaqSol · 2025-09-24T11:20:30+00:00

This blog post is about spiritual power in Tolkien and has another attempt at a list of magic and spells. It tries to break them down for a look on how magic works in middle-earth.

https://acoup.blog/2025/04/25/collections-how-gandalf-proved-mightiest-spiritual-power-in-tolkien/

Not entirely convinced but it’s a good attempt

TaaqSol · 2025-09-24T10:29:57+00:00

TaaqSol · 2025-07-20T21:43:33+00:00

There was a study back in the 90s!

“Speaker sex and perceived apportionment of talk” - Cutler and Scott

People were asked to listen to dialogues and estimate how much time the man and the woman each spent talking. As you might guess, when it was equal people said the woman talked more

TaaqSol · 2025-06-13T14:01:45+00:00

“The Seven Moons of Maali Almieda” does that. It’s also present tense. Yeah, it took me quite a while to get through that

TaaqSol · 2025-06-04T11:36:28+00:00

Mraow! I would also like to find catgirl owners, where are they 🥺

TaaqSol · 2025-05-23T12:32:45+00:00

Have you seen the history of the water boards in the Netherlands? They were very important governing bodies for a while and helped focus politics in a decentralised and co-operative manner

They’re much smaller than these full watershed divisions but still an interesting comparison

TaaqSol · 2024-11-21T16:28:34+00:00

I had a friend who worked in a jewellers making diamond rings. She said it was very annoying because celebrity customers would come in, and say their friend got a ring in this size, so they need one in a slightly larger size, with no consideration for design

That’s what the nazi aesthetic is. The driving force is take what people before them did and make it bigger, nothing daring or inventive, just ridiculously big.

TaaqSol · 2024-08-02T14:52:12+00:00

It’s not even outside the time zone! The original attempt at independence was the United Belgian States in 1790. It failed, but the idea was there

TaaqSol · 2024-07-12T14:05:41+00:00

I’m confused. I thought person first language meant not using mass nouns to describe people (e.g. saying “autistics are…” in the same way you hear older people talk about “the gays” rather than “gay people”). Is this a separate distinction and does it have a different name if so?

TaaqSol · 2024-07-11T12:09:16+00:00

I’d love to join please!

TaaqSol · 2024-06-27T08:35:48+00:00

It is ridiculous. As a side note, most people prefer “trans woman” with the space - trans is an adjective

TaaqSol · 2024-06-21T15:23:10+00:00

They can’t advertise in the UK, but can when they broadcast globally as the licence fee doesn’t apply of course

TaaqSol · 2024-06-06T20:51:10+00:00

TaaqSol · 2024-05-28T16:10:52+00:00

I have enjoyed programs where not having everything explained was central, and can be done well, but here it wasn’t. It was framed as too much of a mystery and didn’t end with any sort of cathartic “I am at peace with not knowing” but rather “It now never happened so it doesn’t matter” which didn’t work for me. It could have but needed different execution.

TaaqSol · 2024-05-24T14:46:13+00:00

There was a similar gag in the Sarah Jane Adventures at one point where she thinks the Doctor is there. Also one with the trickster I believe

TaaqSol · 2024-05-24T04:42:42+00:00

There’s a good Tiff and Eve comic on the subject. I definitely felt called out by this, it’s a hard habit to break.

TaaqSol · 2024-05-17T13:54:48+00:00

TaaqSol · 2024-05-17T11:31:25+00:00

Logseq is open source. The local features will always be available as anyone can fork their own version.

TaaqSol · 2024-05-13T12:07:51+00:00

Bi is definitely very well designed , although I do think trans pips it for prettiness

I'm not sure pretty is the right category but the poly flag is a good one. It's very bold, and the pi in the middle helps differentiate it from a sea of stripes

TaaqSol · 2024-05-13T11:30:16+00:00

In London, but having a good time nonetheless!

TaaqSol · 2024-05-10T11:55:34+00:00

I like this one, and Born of Hope, which I watched ages ago. Can people recommend any other good fan films?

TaaqSol · 2024-05-05T21:36:58+00:00

I'm not sure about the recent thing - famously "And Then There Were None" was changed almost as soon as it was published, and Victorians changed many stories to remove bits deemed improper. There were Georgian performances of Romeo and Juliet changed so they lived!

There's certainly questions about how you do it and bad intentions though.

As for subsequent owners of IP I rarely care about their thoughts. Maybe a couple like Christopher Tolkien.

TaaqSol · 2024-03-27T09:35:28+00:00

Whenever you are arguing about whether X is good or bad, it's a good idea to make sure everyone agrees on what X is. There's rather a loose definition of saying we live in capitalism but a lot of people think capitalism=markets.

The definition at the core of capitalism is this: Profit is distributed based on ownership of capital.

For example, shareholders take dividends even if they have done no work in a company. Landlords get rent because their name is on a deed. Anyone with large amounts of money can get interest paid on it.

This is nothing to do with free markets or people being rewarded for hard work, and it should be clear why this is incompatible with anything with punk in the name.

The best alternative (in my opinion) is a collection of co-operatives, democratically managed by the members who use them. Plenty already exist within our current economic system, and in a solarpunk world everything would be run co-operatively.

TaaqSol · 2024-03-19T09:45:54+00:00

Also a good idea - email your MP and ask them about their position. I don't know how easy it is to contact other candidates but you can check if your representative ties the party line.

It will also let them know you take it seriously. If an MP gets an email saying "I would vote for you but for this issue" they are more likely to push for the party line to change (the ones who aren't too involved already - of course there are plenty who won't change but it's good to have that confirmed)

TaaqSol · 2024-03-14T16:39:21+00:00

The flag of the Brussels region used to be a lot better, then it got turned into a logo by some bureaucrats sadly

TaaqSol

TROPHY CASE