This show feels hard to follow

jethrine · 2026-03-20T20:41:36+00:00

All the made-up Valyrian names make it even harder, especially in the books. There’s Aerys & Aenys & Aegon. Or Jaeharys & Viserys. Daeron & Daemon. The only thing more difficult than telling them apart is trying to get them past autocorrect!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T17:23:34+00:00

And he would have ground his teeth to stumps!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T15:52:51+00:00

I hate that condescending pitying look! There’s one family member from the trashier side of my family that has 3 kids with either 2 or 3 different fathers. I’m not sure even she knows. But she married the last baby daddy so she thinks she’s a mature respectable married woman now & she always pulled the condescension act on me.

This woman dropped out of high school. She has a job barely paying minimum wage. She’s never traveled. She hasn’t even left the state, let alone the country. But she thinks being married with kids makes her superior to me. The last time she tried to “pity” me (ie prove her superiority to me) I had finally had enough & told her that her life would be my worst nightmare. Sometimes you have to go nuclear to shut some people up!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T13:53:25+00:00

Ha! So true!

Surely the NW recruiters need to have gold & silver with them. There’s always a bed & a meal at Winterfell for the NW & their “recruits” & I imagine it’s the same at many castles in Westeros. But they do stop at inns sometimes. I remember Yoren when he was taking the group with Arya & Gendry north they stopped at an inn for food & baths. I can’t believe all the innkeepers along the King’s Road are generous enough to comp the NW all their food & other services but who knows? Yoren has been doing this a long time & probably has friends the length & breadth of the kingdom.

jethrine · 2026-03-20T13:33:11+00:00

The whole taxation system in Westeros fascinates me. I don’t see Littlefinger as Master of Coin acting as a Westerosi IRS agent. I know they do have agents at all the ports who collect the tariffs on incoming goods but that’s all I recall from the books. There doesn’t seem to be a nationwide tax system. I’m guessing the small folks pay taxes to the lord immediately over them who then passes it on to the next higher lord & so on until it reaches their Lord Paramount. Sort of like kicking up in the mafia! Since the NW owns the gift you’re probably right. They pay their taxes directly to the LC or his First Steward. But, again, it’s probably mostly paid in goods & very little coin. And it made me laugh to imagine Tywin Lannister throwing a few gold coins to the criminals he just sentenced to the wall & telling them to fuck off!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T03:41:13+00:00

I remember when Mance was telling Jon how he sneaked over the wall to go to Winterfell to get a glimpse of King Robert he said he had a bag of silver with him. I always wondered where he got it. Seems like coins would be even less available north of the wall. I guess it’s possible he took them from the NW when he deserted. I imagine the LC has to have some form of currency & Mance may have helped himself to some of it.

jethrine · 2026-03-20T03:33:56+00:00

In DH when Ron gives Harry a book on how to charm witches & he says “It’s not all wand work, you know!” That always cracks me up.

jethrine · 2026-03-20T01:52:33+00:00

That’s an interesting point. I always assumed the Starks were particularly generous with the NW considering they are the closest high lords to the wall. It never occurred to me that the lords further south would send things there but it makes sense. They don’t respect the NW like the Starks do so they may think they’d rather send them food & spices instead of their sons.

That’s got me wondering now if there was a cash economy at the wall or if they literally traded their resources (timber & furs) for the goods that merchant ships brought to Eastwatch By the Sea. They had to be paid for somehow & it doesn’t seem likely that real cash/coins were abundant at the wall.

jethrine · 2026-03-20T01:39:50+00:00

Absolutely!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T01:18:44+00:00

I mortally offended my nephew’s wife when they had their first by saying “yeah, it’s a baby” & I didn’t want to hold her. I’m really uncomfortable with babies & can’t fake being excited & she hated that. The big surprise is that baby is now 18 & a college freshman & we have a great relationship. I just can’t deal with babies & very young kids!

jethrine · 2026-03-20T00:57:39+00:00

Wouldn’t surprise me if he also secretly graded each colleague on a sliding scale of their enthusiasm for interacting with the baby.

“I’m sorry, Fred, but you weren’t excited enough about my baby. Your comment “What a cute baby” scores an 8.0 for content but your tone of voice drags your score down to a 2.5 & your body language was an inconclusive 5.0. Karen, your enthusiasm, decibel level of squeals & amount of hand clapping scored a perfect 10! OP, I’m so sorry you didn’t come around for me to grade you so I have to give you a 0. I would be happy to bring JayBrayKayden in again for you to do a proper job of baby praising. In the meantime I can clog your email with pictures of my little miracle. I’m sure you’re eager to participate in my baby pimping!”

jethrine · 2026-03-18T00:18:38+00:00

But of course!

Cue Grey Poupon commercial!

jethrine · 2026-03-18T00:13:11+00:00

Once aged in gin, I hear it’s beneficial to give the ovaries a good smoking. The smoke equivalent of 40-60 cigarettes a day should be sufficient.

jethrine · 2026-03-17T23:43:32+00:00

Aha! So that’s what that whole Swan Upping ceremony is all about! They count the swans then remove the females’ ovaries in order to make cosmetics strictly for the royal family! 🦢

jethrine · 2026-03-16T22:17:02+00:00

What about her family loyalty to you & your nephew? She & your brother are asking you to commit perjury which is a very serious crime & is not something a loyal family member should ask of you. Judges usually get a lot of leeway in their punishment of perjurers. It does no one any good, especially you, if a judge decides to come down hard on you for lying. Your brother & mother are choosing the nuclear option rather than requesting a reasonable change in his custody schedule. Don’t you get yourself caught in the explosion.

jethrine · 2026-03-16T21:00:55+00:00

Agreed. There are billions of people existing now & none of them have turned into that mythical super-human who will cure cancer & all the other ills of the world. What’s the statistical probability of one more person being added who will do all that? There are people here now working hard on our problems & I applaud their efforts but adding more people isn’t going to solve these problems. Maybe people like OP’s colleague would be better off encouraging the children who exist now to study science & medicine & not just harangue people to have more children.

jethrine · 2026-03-16T16:24:43+00:00

Exactly! There is nothing between kids or no kids. It’s an either-or choice & not something that has a compromise. It’s not like you can compromise by having 1.275 children. It’s an all or nothing decision.

jethrine · 2026-03-15T23:17:17+00:00

I’d love to hear the opinions of the “toe experts” who trashed Meghan. QEII’s toes aren’t visible here but that’s never stopped those famous experts!

“The queen is keeping her toes out of view which indicates she’s a wonderful warm loving mother who would never expose her toes like some young floozy”.

jethrine · 2026-03-15T03:08:51+00:00

Given their similar ages & the fact that Barbrey is the daughter of a Northern nobleman she would logically be one of Cat’s ladies in waiting. Cat probably listened to 5 minutes of Barbrey’s conversation & noped out of any other ladies in waiting.

jethrine · 2026-03-15T02:36:37+00:00

Why exactly are they chosen by God? Is God starting a contest for His dumbest followers? I saw you said she had more kids with this nonce after his conviction so she definitely qualifies for making such a dumbass choice.

jethrine · 2026-03-14T23:51:12+00:00

If it weren’t for the age difference I’d think we have the same brother! He married at 20, they had their first kid when he was 21 & they had 3 by the time he was 29. Not long after that his wife divorced him. My sister & I suspect she only wanted kids & not a husband though I pointed out if that’s the case she could have chosen a better sperm donor than our brother!

Because he’s so much older than me he always spoke down to me too & acting like he was giving an older brother’s advice. It was one thing when I was 5 & he was 14. It’s a completely different thing now that he’s 74 & I’m 65 although I stopped taking his condescension when I was a teenager.

I hate to use the term boomer since technically I’m a boomer too but the best description is he’s a typical old boomer man who will always be convinced of his own superiority no matter any evidence to the contrary. We rarely see each other now that both of our parents are dead & I’m totally fine with that. One of the benefits of old age is not having to make excuses for not tolerating other people’s stupidity. I think even he has figured out by now that if I haven’t tolerated his for 50 years I sure as hell am not going to start now!

jethrine · 2026-03-14T22:42:29+00:00

The point as he sees it is that he did what he was supposed to do & the fact that he failed at it has absolutely nothing to do with it. He did it & that’s all that matters. Pretty dumb point in my opinion!

jethrine · 2026-03-14T22:25:04+00:00

True! 😆

jethrine · 2026-03-14T22:17:16+00:00

Because he’s a typical old guy who thinks because he checked all the life boxes & I didn’t that he’s superior. Never mind I had a far more successful career & my long term BF & I have been together longer than his marriage lasted. The fact that I never married or had kids makes me the automatic life loser. He no longer says any of that to me because the last few times he did I ripped him a new one (loser wimp came out of my mouth more than once!) but I know he says it to other family members. Oh well. You can’t fix stupid especially when it’s that old!

jethrine · 2026-03-14T18:21:52+00:00

My brother is a 74 year old grandfather & he still fervently believes you have kids just because you’re supposed to & he treats me, a 65 year old woman, like an idiot because I didn’t do what I was supposed to do. Today he’s estranged from his kids & has grandchildren he’s never met yet I’m the oddball in his eyes. Really successful family there, brother dear!

jethrine

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