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bjornwilde ([personal profile] bjornwilde) wrote in [community profile] ways_back_room2025-12-18 08:10 am
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Thursday DE

And I missed Tuesday didn’t I?

Anyway, how does your pup feel about death? 
camwyn: Me in a bomber jacket and jeans standing next to a green two-man North Andover Flight Academy helicopter. (Default)
camwyn ([personal profile] camwyn) wrote2025-12-17 11:49 am
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(no subject)

Canceled my Duolingo subscription today. I've been using Babbel for Italian and I think it works better in terms of getting concepts across; Duo's basically vocab practice and trying to use it to start learning Dutch is kinda slow going for everything except pronunciation. Gonna start working on the copy of Dutch for Dummies I bought from Thriftbooks a while ago.

Meanwhile, on a different linguistic front, I am perfectly happy to allow older, sexist language to persist in the lyrics of one specific Christmas song. I've said it before, elsewhere, but it's Hark The Herald Angels Sing. This is because when I was a wee little sprog of about eight, I read C. S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia. All of them, all the way through, in the original order (as written, not as events chronologically happened). And that same year, we sang all the verses* of Hark The Herald Angels Sing at church. And we got to the third verse, and I hit these lyrics:

Mild he lays his glory by
Born that Man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of Earth
Born to something something something


I stopped listening at that point because I had just had the sudden experience of being informed, in church, that Jesus was born for both humans and dwarves. Given that Lewis had casually informed the reader in The Horse And His Boy that they could look up certain facts in 'any good history of Calormen at your library', this was kind of an odd moment.

My mom explained it to me later that Lewis was the only one who meant dwarves when he said 'sons of Earth', and also pointed out that 'veiled in flesh the Godhead see' did not mean the equivalent to those Jesus statues with the Sacred Heart on his chest, but... for a while there, dwarves were a thing.

So Hark The Herald Angels Sing gets to keep the male-oriented lyrics in my book. Because dwarves.




*A bit on the unusual side even at Christmas for Catholics; most Masses I've been to have generally done one or two verses of any given song or hymn, versus the handful of Protestant services I've been to where they sang every single verse of every single song
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ceitfianna ([personal profile] ceitfianna) wrote2025-12-15 06:33 pm

Breaking a cycle

I've been stuck in my head lately and this Saturday I went to see the filmed version of Merrily We Roll Along and I lost myself for over two hours in wonderful music. If you enjoy musicals and especially Sondheim, then this is worth a watch, the music is glorious, and the story is good and painful. Its not the classic pro-shot filming, they've tried to make it more film like, which kind of works. Merrily is an odd musical that I'd love other people to watch to talk with them about it.

My first introduction to it was when my high school's ambitious vocal director put it on. I auditioned for it and was terrified since the vocal director had us audition like they do for Broadway, so you stand up on the stage and sing. I didn't get cast as my singing isn't that strong but I first heard that great music. Then a few years ago, I watched that great documentary about Merrily that was on Netflix: The Best Worst Thing That Could Have Ever Happened, worth a watch. Into the Woods is still my favorite Sondheim but Merrily is fascinating and makes me want to read the play its based off of and also watch Company, they feel connected. I ended up having a longer walk than I'd originally planned since the green line was being annoying but the weather was nice.

My Yuletide is pretty much done, I need to give it a good hard edit then post it. I'm still waiting on my car, but the insurance is covering my rental. Today I talked to the repair place and the damage was worse than they thought, so they're hoping by the end of the week. I stressed that at the beginning of next week, I hope to be driving off to see my family for the holidays. Other than one thing from the mail, my shopping is pretty much done. I will have to work next Monday and this Saturday before my long drive but then I'll have a nice chunk of time off.

The snow that fell yesterday has actually stayed, mainly because its far too cold, but getting warmer.
splash_of_blue: (Rainbows glitter like gold)
Bethan ([personal profile] splash_of_blue) wrote in [community profile] ways_back_room2025-12-15 04:47 pm
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Monday DE: Fiiiiiiiiiiiive gooooooooooold riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiings!

Oooooops, I keep forgetting about these, I'm so sorry!

How good is your character at giving presents?
misslucyjane: (sandwich made of sweden)
It's raining somewhere else ([personal profile] misslucyjane) wrote2025-12-13 12:53 pm
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bjornwilde: (Default)
bjornwilde ([personal profile] bjornwilde) wrote in [community profile] ways_back_room2025-12-09 08:05 am
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Tuesday DE: It’s bebop time

How does your character feel about music? Is it just something to fill the silence? DO they even care about it? Or is it something very important to them? Do they have a favorite style of music and stay in their comfort zone or are they hungry for any new music they can find? 
camwyn: Me in a bomber jacket and jeans standing next to a green two-man North Andover Flight Academy helicopter. (Default)
camwyn ([personal profile] camwyn) wrote2025-12-08 01:40 pm
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Just read a NYT headline about how it looks like the Supreme Court is prepared to hand Donald Trump more power to fire whoever he wants.

Also just accidentally knocked over a box of satin pins, did not realize what I had knocked over, and stepped down. Barefoot.

Guess which I'd rather repeat.