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Jan. 26th, 2016 04:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwydion* "It's that time of the year for Iowa to get weird:"
* Damnit, Ted Cruise stole my "Two Corinthians walk into a bar" line!
* "EPA cracks whip on Michigan, Snyder cagey on aid money for Flint:"
* I'm still too angry about the gratuitous extreme transphobia to watch the X-Files. That doesn't mean y'all can't enjoy it, but my bile rises every time I think of what they did and that means I'm not planning to pick it up.
* "Iron Man: The Jerk Redemption Arc:" http://www.fandomfollowing.com/ironman-the-jerk-redemption-arc/
* Black Sails XIX:
* Overall first impression: My suspicion is they are trying to throw us off balance while catching us up with the characters, but I am struggling a bit with what was left out, particularly the meeting setting up the current arrangement. I was also wondering about the Galleon. Where is it? I kept trying to figure out if one of the other ships was it, but suck at identifying ships. I was okay with missing the Flint raids, as for me the one stands perfectly well for all. I loved the bit with Charles and the slave ship and the bit where Max is starting to realize how much bigger the politics are. There is a lot there that works, but I'm having trouble filling gaps.
For all Eleanor's faults, she is very good at long term planning and politics. What she was doing in trying to run Nassau is incredibly hard as pirates are fundamentally anarchic. Max and Rackham are both short term thinkers and while I maintain Max can think rings around Jack, neither of them are ready for the degree of big picture required. It speaks well of Max that she is figuring out how out of her current depth she is and her trying to stretch her skills in hopes of developing what she needs. Anne has the sense to see how fucked up things are, but not the quite the people skills to captain a whole town. Jack isn't even close to having the command skills to make people do the hard work they don't want to do. Nassau has a free rider problem. It needs a real captain like Vane or Flint or Silver to put right. I add in Silver, because it is in his best interest Nassau not be taken, so he could likely be trusted to use his powers to help instead of harm here, and telling the story that gets men doing what you want is his special gift.
The specifics:
* The episode opens with Teach and ends with Teach, dramatic and a good set up for what I expect to be a major through line. I love the skill with which they structure the episodes. Here is a bookend that raises a fundamental question about identity and who a person is on land vs. on sea, which is also a theme for Flint, Vane, Jack, in this episode and to a lesser extent Anne, Max, and Silver, though those last three are more in kernel for future pondering. There was also the list of lies and fundamental miscalculation and biting off more than one can chew, which I think will be major themes all season.
* The raid was beautifully lit and shot. Seriously, there were so many frames that could be paintings. The use of negative space and light and shadow is so richly beautiful it's almost distracting.
* Re: the doubling of Miranda and the woman Flint just murdered. I am thinking he is thinking he is doing it for her, but that he is utterly wrong. That's just my opinion and likely off.
* This probably was the magistrate he should have tried to negotiate with instead of Ashe. Too bad that ship is burnt to cinders now.
* Billy is lying to himself. Flint is getting worse. So much worse. Silver is clear eyed, but still trying to argue him back from the brink.
* I wonder if Silver's taken and hidden his share or if he didn't claim it, what with the situation with him and the Walrus crew, or if they cut him out. Those are three very different things. I want a better idea of what Silver's plans and goals are now. Is he still just wanting the gold or does he want the power now too, and what will he do with both or either? He's such a plausible liar I can't tell.
* I have so many questions about what Vane is up to and what Jack thinks Jack is up to.
* So... Jack has tricked the vehemently anti-slavery Vane into taking a slave ship, so they will have men to fix the fort. I am not okay with any part of this.
* The Nassau Politics plot proper starts with the mocking of Eleanor and Mr. Scott's completely rational worry for Eleanor and for the fate of the fort and the Urca Gold. The macro politics and the local politics all twine together here. It is Mr. Scott who sets things in motion ("You wanted to replace Eleanor. She was the one Nassau relied upon to solve those problems no one could or would. I hope for our sakes you are up to the task.") He transfers his worry to Max and eventually Anne, even as she tries to defend Jack and remain neutral between her lovers. I think Anne is going to be a fulcrum in the near future and that we're going to get more of her voice and opinions. I think we have to, narratively. Anne carries Mr. Scott's complaint (Two Weeks!) to Jack, not Max. Jack and Max are ensconced in their separate seats of power. Anne goes back and forth between them like a diplomat between two powers which... *facepalm* Mr. Scott is quarter mastering for the ship that is Nassau, the way Hornigold used to for Eleanor, but here there are two captains who can't even talk to each other, and the third member of the triumvirate being torn between them. I suspect Mr. Scott would like to thwap some sense into them. I know I do.
* WTF is meant by the naked Death with the peculiar imagery? I can't parse what I am looking at at all, let alone what they are trying to say with her?
* It was beautiful seeing Anne call Jack on his shit, but Jack, being an idiot, blows her off. All of Anne's complaints are sensible, and Jack's solution which I'm assuming he is too ashamed to tell her of is a crappy one. Him dismissing her words as coming from Max is a particularly shitty way to try to silence her. No, Anne is not brilliant, but she thinks things through a long time before she talks. She listened to what Mr. Scott and Max had to say, but she's also seen him pissing away their money downstairs and his dismissiveness and apparent lack of grasp of the urgency of the Fort repairs are understandably freaking her out. He owes her the explanation she is demanding. Seriously, in her place I'd be tempted to thump him. I think this is also another instance of Jack's unexamined sexism. For all his relaxed idea of gender roles and comparative progressiveness, he doesn't see her as a fully adult person able to form her own opinion and assumes her thinking is inferior to his. He doesn't take her concerns seriously or try to explain his thinking. It's the "Benign Paternalism" sexist trope. I love that they are willing to do that with Jack, show his less obvious flaws.
* So Jack blows off Anne's sensible complaints, immediately followed by Flint blowing off Silver's sensible complaints. John Silver also brings back the long running theme of the power of Story. Reputation and the stories they tell about pirates gives those same pirates power. It is interesting that Silver really is advocating for the crew here and also looking at the larger picture of how people respond to the raids. That looks like growth. Silver calls Flint's reputation a "joint asset." It's like the Urca gold that way, which is fascinating. And now I am playing with the idea of people owning shares in the Flint persona the way they hold shares in physical booty.
* Is James McGraw completely dead or is he still lurking in there somewhere? All I see is Flint any more.
* Seriously, the fuck happened in the meeting between Vane, Jack, and Flint about the Urca Gold? The ground is shifting so much and we don't know the terms under which they are currently operating at all. Who exactly owns what? Are they allied? What are the long term goals? How does Silver fit in? What specifically is Mr. Scott's status now he's not Quartermaster for Flint's crew? What is the status of the slaves Charles snatched from the water? Are they fixing the fort or what?
* It is at this point I discovered I lost two scenes in the first watch through. My best bet is that Hector hit a button on the remote exactly at the scene cut between Silver/Flint in the cabin, jumping ahead to Silver on deck with the ropes without me noticing. Which helps.
* The scene about Silver's leg and his fear of looking less able in front of the crew is useful for his character, but the argument between Charles and Jack about the Fort and Slaves is fucking crucial. It does partially fill in some of the holes left by the jump forward between seasons.
* I really appreciate them not downplaying Silver's disability or making it pretty and negligible. It is a big deal and is getting worse specifically because he won't accommodate his new limits.
* So Jack is still beached instead of out pirating after all he went through to be Captain again to fix the fort which he can't fix because he's Jack and not a real captain, and Charles Vane put him there. This... actually makes a kind of sense. The Jack/Anne combination worked really well for Vane back before Silver tossed the golden apple like the Goddess Eris, upending Nassau. His political skills and her sudden violence added up to a solid Quartermaster, but what is missing with Jack in charge of the Fort is a proper Authority. On the Ranger, Jack had the Command skills of Vane backing him up. Here, he barely has Anne as he's shut her out of his plans and ignoring her advice and generally too busy sulking in his party palace to treat her as a full partner. As a result, he lacks the backing she always provided him. All he has is his gold and his non-existent authority. Suddenly too clever by half and short term out of the frying pan thinking aren't enough. You can see his panic in the scene with Charles. He does have the self awareness to realize he is drowning. He looks like a teenager allowed to have the house to himself for the weekend who fucked up royally and is trying to convince dad to let him have the keys to the car too.
* Max and Jack are parallel here. Both thought they were ready to step into Eleanor and Hornigold's shoes and discovering for the first time how hard those jobs are, how fast the duck legs were paddling under the surface of the water, and when they need each other most, they aren't even talking to each other and are making Anne carry messages instead of seeing her as an asset to the endeavor. The three of them do have the skills to pull this all off, possibly, but it's a close thing and would require a unified front, which they haven't got. The difference between them is Jack's response is to try to dance faster and Max's is to start trying to think bigger and further ahead.
* I think the fate of the ghost ship Captain is a warning to Flint, even though it is a trap. The image is so powerful. The thing Flint is becoming is terrifying and how long before he dies alone with only a drink that would drive him mad before killing him? That Ghost Ship Captain is chained to his vessel, never to sail home.... Flint. Flint is trapped in the persona he built and can't go home again.
* I think Max's question about Jack being able to get men to fight for the fort is a good one.
* I think it is interesting that Billy is the one who understands in technical terms exactly how fucked they are and Silver, for all his larger doubts about Flint, is the one who has absolute faith in Flint's ability to sail them out of the trap.
* It is so Hornigold to know exactly how pirates think and set a trap both clever and horrific. Old pirates get that way by being very, very clever.
* Flint's "I will do great violence" speech gave me shivers. The man who wanted to "civilize" Nassau now wants to burn down civilization.
* The offer is not in good faith, exactly like the truce with Ashe. Flint's first passage in this episode ends in the Miranda doubling. Flint's last involves him rejecting a false truce and vowing to burn it all down.
* Billy Bones spots the bigger political picture in the promise of 80 pardons. He's grown so much since the naive young boatswain of season one.
* I was half expecting Thomas in that Eleanor scene even though I knew it couldn't be logically.
* The lighting in the Eleanor scene and a lot of the camera angles and painterly shot design was very like the bedroom sequence in the raid scene. I think this is deliberate. The magistrate who thought his honesty would save him trying to appeal to Flint vs. a magistrate trying to enlist Eleanor to help him bring Nassau in line. "There is a funny thing about notoriety, and I have a little experience with this. The more people know of you, the more of you those people feel belongs to them." So here it is again, a more aggressive, less consensual owning of a piece of someone's reputation. Shares in Flint, shares in Eleanor; reputation, notoriety.
* Eleanor really will turn on anyone, won't she?
* Apparently, whatever happened earlier to cut two scenes happened again at this point, since it cut from Eleanor's cell to her in the carriage first time I watched it. O.o No wonder the episode seemed a bit disjointed first time through!
* Another moment of Jack/Max parallel. They first saw the gold as an answer and now they see all the attendant problems it represents. It's nice to see Jack Rackham actually did have a vision, even if it was made of clouds.
* So Charles Vane has sold out his most fundamental principle in hopes of saving Nassau and I feel dirty now on the inside. Charles makes it clear there is no such thing as a good slave master, cutting through Jack's self justifications for this unconscionable and unforgivable thing he is doing. Charles can not lie to himself that way, and yet he does it anyway.
* It is good we at least get to see the reason for it: that Charles feels helpless before what he sees as a return to slavery for himself and all of them. He does it out of fear, knowing damned well that it is at the cost of other men's freedom and what that really means, something that Jack with all his privilege can not. Charles is frightened, so frightened he can bring himself to go along with this.
* Having the blow from nowhere speech over the image of Eleanor on her way? *wince*
* Ebays, 2 days left:
TOTENTANZ 2013 (LE, Yule, Miskatonic Valley Philharmonic): (Company says: Shadow musk and blood musk with opoponax, aged patchouli, leather accord, black pepper, and bitter clove.) Below top of label. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850893336?
BLOOD MOON 2011 (LE, Lunacy) : (Company says: A Lunacy inspired by the magnificently morbid fantasies of Edgar Allan Poe: laudanum-stained linen scented by an ink-smeared tobacco musk and phantom bloodstains illuminated by monstrous moonlight.) 1/2 Full.
DRUID 2013 (RPG) : (Company says: A woolen robe infused with the scent of a vast, primordial forest: ancient trees, fertile soil, wild herbs, spring grasses, and burgundy pitch incense.) 3/4 Full. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850896426?
WOMB FURIE 2010 (LE, Lupercalia) : (Company says: Snake Oil and three types of honey.) More than Half.
AGED SNAKE OIL 2011 (Ars Amatoria) : (Company says: By far, our most popular scent! Magnetic, mysterious, and exceedingly sexual in nature. A blend of exotic Indonesian oils sugared with vanilla.) Top of Label. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850898728?
POST-MORTEM LAUREATUS 2011 (LE, Pickman Gallery) : (Company says: White sandalwood and twining ivy.) 1/3 Full
MISS FORCIBLE 2013 (Neil Gaimen, Coraline) : (Company says: A classic vintage musk.) 3/4 Full.
CHANUKKIYAH 2007 (LE, Yule): (Company says: Olive oil, beeswax, glowing amber, sweet sufganiyot, pomegranate, and fig.) 1/2 imp or so in bottle. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850900950?
TEMPLE VIPER 2008 (LE, Carnaval Diabolique, Snake Pit): (Company says: Snake Oil with sugar cane, frankincense, champaca, opoponax, labdanum, and hyssop.) 1/4 Full.
CROWLEY 2011 (Neil Gaiman, Good Omens): (Company says: Infernal musk, red patchouli, lilac cologne, mahogany, lemon rind, oakmoss, leather, and vanilla husk.) 2/3 Full.
LOVED TO DEATH 2015 (Retail Exclusive Oils): (Company says: A scent of dark corners and forgotten mysteries, secrets unearthed in dark attics, and cobwebbed, timeworn artifacts: vanilla bean, blackened and smoked, with husky clove, cinnamon bark, and a touch of beeswax.) 3/4 Full http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850902992?
* Help the poisoned children of Flint Michigan. "Water Crisis:" https://www.cfgf.org/cfgf/GoodWork/FlintArea/WaterCrisis/tabid/855/Default.aspx
* "How to help Flint, Michigan:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/how-help-flint-michigan
* Want to help finance Hector's cat food and my meds/medical co pays? Paypal Lethran@gmail.com
* Donate to help refugees "UN Refugee Agency:" http://donate.unhcr.org/international/general
* Organizations helping with the refugee crisis: http://captainofalltheships.tumblr.com/post/128790538169/an-updated-list-of-organizations-to-donate-to-help
* Want Game of Thrones without the creepy? We desperately need new players. We are very inclusive. "Game of Bones MUSH:" gobmush.wikidot.com
* Damnit, Ted Cruise stole my "Two Corinthians walk into a bar" line!
* "EPA cracks whip on Michigan, Snyder cagey on aid money for Flint:"
* I'm still too angry about the gratuitous extreme transphobia to watch the X-Files. That doesn't mean y'all can't enjoy it, but my bile rises every time I think of what they did and that means I'm not planning to pick it up.
* "Iron Man: The Jerk Redemption Arc:" http://www.fandomfollowing.com/ironman-the-jerk-redemption-arc/
* Black Sails XIX:
* Overall first impression: My suspicion is they are trying to throw us off balance while catching us up with the characters, but I am struggling a bit with what was left out, particularly the meeting setting up the current arrangement. I was also wondering about the Galleon. Where is it? I kept trying to figure out if one of the other ships was it, but suck at identifying ships. I was okay with missing the Flint raids, as for me the one stands perfectly well for all. I loved the bit with Charles and the slave ship and the bit where Max is starting to realize how much bigger the politics are. There is a lot there that works, but I'm having trouble filling gaps.
For all Eleanor's faults, she is very good at long term planning and politics. What she was doing in trying to run Nassau is incredibly hard as pirates are fundamentally anarchic. Max and Rackham are both short term thinkers and while I maintain Max can think rings around Jack, neither of them are ready for the degree of big picture required. It speaks well of Max that she is figuring out how out of her current depth she is and her trying to stretch her skills in hopes of developing what she needs. Anne has the sense to see how fucked up things are, but not the quite the people skills to captain a whole town. Jack isn't even close to having the command skills to make people do the hard work they don't want to do. Nassau has a free rider problem. It needs a real captain like Vane or Flint or Silver to put right. I add in Silver, because it is in his best interest Nassau not be taken, so he could likely be trusted to use his powers to help instead of harm here, and telling the story that gets men doing what you want is his special gift.
The specifics:
* The episode opens with Teach and ends with Teach, dramatic and a good set up for what I expect to be a major through line. I love the skill with which they structure the episodes. Here is a bookend that raises a fundamental question about identity and who a person is on land vs. on sea, which is also a theme for Flint, Vane, Jack, in this episode and to a lesser extent Anne, Max, and Silver, though those last three are more in kernel for future pondering. There was also the list of lies and fundamental miscalculation and biting off more than one can chew, which I think will be major themes all season.
* The raid was beautifully lit and shot. Seriously, there were so many frames that could be paintings. The use of negative space and light and shadow is so richly beautiful it's almost distracting.
* Re: the doubling of Miranda and the woman Flint just murdered. I am thinking he is thinking he is doing it for her, but that he is utterly wrong. That's just my opinion and likely off.
* This probably was the magistrate he should have tried to negotiate with instead of Ashe. Too bad that ship is burnt to cinders now.
* Billy is lying to himself. Flint is getting worse. So much worse. Silver is clear eyed, but still trying to argue him back from the brink.
* I wonder if Silver's taken and hidden his share or if he didn't claim it, what with the situation with him and the Walrus crew, or if they cut him out. Those are three very different things. I want a better idea of what Silver's plans and goals are now. Is he still just wanting the gold or does he want the power now too, and what will he do with both or either? He's such a plausible liar I can't tell.
* I have so many questions about what Vane is up to and what Jack thinks Jack is up to.
* So... Jack has tricked the vehemently anti-slavery Vane into taking a slave ship, so they will have men to fix the fort. I am not okay with any part of this.
* The Nassau Politics plot proper starts with the mocking of Eleanor and Mr. Scott's completely rational worry for Eleanor and for the fate of the fort and the Urca Gold. The macro politics and the local politics all twine together here. It is Mr. Scott who sets things in motion ("You wanted to replace Eleanor. She was the one Nassau relied upon to solve those problems no one could or would. I hope for our sakes you are up to the task.") He transfers his worry to Max and eventually Anne, even as she tries to defend Jack and remain neutral between her lovers. I think Anne is going to be a fulcrum in the near future and that we're going to get more of her voice and opinions. I think we have to, narratively. Anne carries Mr. Scott's complaint (Two Weeks!) to Jack, not Max. Jack and Max are ensconced in their separate seats of power. Anne goes back and forth between them like a diplomat between two powers which... *facepalm* Mr. Scott is quarter mastering for the ship that is Nassau, the way Hornigold used to for Eleanor, but here there are two captains who can't even talk to each other, and the third member of the triumvirate being torn between them. I suspect Mr. Scott would like to thwap some sense into them. I know I do.
* WTF is meant by the naked Death with the peculiar imagery? I can't parse what I am looking at at all, let alone what they are trying to say with her?
* It was beautiful seeing Anne call Jack on his shit, but Jack, being an idiot, blows her off. All of Anne's complaints are sensible, and Jack's solution which I'm assuming he is too ashamed to tell her of is a crappy one. Him dismissing her words as coming from Max is a particularly shitty way to try to silence her. No, Anne is not brilliant, but she thinks things through a long time before she talks. She listened to what Mr. Scott and Max had to say, but she's also seen him pissing away their money downstairs and his dismissiveness and apparent lack of grasp of the urgency of the Fort repairs are understandably freaking her out. He owes her the explanation she is demanding. Seriously, in her place I'd be tempted to thump him. I think this is also another instance of Jack's unexamined sexism. For all his relaxed idea of gender roles and comparative progressiveness, he doesn't see her as a fully adult person able to form her own opinion and assumes her thinking is inferior to his. He doesn't take her concerns seriously or try to explain his thinking. It's the "Benign Paternalism" sexist trope. I love that they are willing to do that with Jack, show his less obvious flaws.
* So Jack blows off Anne's sensible complaints, immediately followed by Flint blowing off Silver's sensible complaints. John Silver also brings back the long running theme of the power of Story. Reputation and the stories they tell about pirates gives those same pirates power. It is interesting that Silver really is advocating for the crew here and also looking at the larger picture of how people respond to the raids. That looks like growth. Silver calls Flint's reputation a "joint asset." It's like the Urca gold that way, which is fascinating. And now I am playing with the idea of people owning shares in the Flint persona the way they hold shares in physical booty.
* Is James McGraw completely dead or is he still lurking in there somewhere? All I see is Flint any more.
* Seriously, the fuck happened in the meeting between Vane, Jack, and Flint about the Urca Gold? The ground is shifting so much and we don't know the terms under which they are currently operating at all. Who exactly owns what? Are they allied? What are the long term goals? How does Silver fit in? What specifically is Mr. Scott's status now he's not Quartermaster for Flint's crew? What is the status of the slaves Charles snatched from the water? Are they fixing the fort or what?
* It is at this point I discovered I lost two scenes in the first watch through. My best bet is that Hector hit a button on the remote exactly at the scene cut between Silver/Flint in the cabin, jumping ahead to Silver on deck with the ropes without me noticing. Which helps.
* The scene about Silver's leg and his fear of looking less able in front of the crew is useful for his character, but the argument between Charles and Jack about the Fort and Slaves is fucking crucial. It does partially fill in some of the holes left by the jump forward between seasons.
* I really appreciate them not downplaying Silver's disability or making it pretty and negligible. It is a big deal and is getting worse specifically because he won't accommodate his new limits.
* So Jack is still beached instead of out pirating after all he went through to be Captain again to fix the fort which he can't fix because he's Jack and not a real captain, and Charles Vane put him there. This... actually makes a kind of sense. The Jack/Anne combination worked really well for Vane back before Silver tossed the golden apple like the Goddess Eris, upending Nassau. His political skills and her sudden violence added up to a solid Quartermaster, but what is missing with Jack in charge of the Fort is a proper Authority. On the Ranger, Jack had the Command skills of Vane backing him up. Here, he barely has Anne as he's shut her out of his plans and ignoring her advice and generally too busy sulking in his party palace to treat her as a full partner. As a result, he lacks the backing she always provided him. All he has is his gold and his non-existent authority. Suddenly too clever by half and short term out of the frying pan thinking aren't enough. You can see his panic in the scene with Charles. He does have the self awareness to realize he is drowning. He looks like a teenager allowed to have the house to himself for the weekend who fucked up royally and is trying to convince dad to let him have the keys to the car too.
* Max and Jack are parallel here. Both thought they were ready to step into Eleanor and Hornigold's shoes and discovering for the first time how hard those jobs are, how fast the duck legs were paddling under the surface of the water, and when they need each other most, they aren't even talking to each other and are making Anne carry messages instead of seeing her as an asset to the endeavor. The three of them do have the skills to pull this all off, possibly, but it's a close thing and would require a unified front, which they haven't got. The difference between them is Jack's response is to try to dance faster and Max's is to start trying to think bigger and further ahead.
* I think the fate of the ghost ship Captain is a warning to Flint, even though it is a trap. The image is so powerful. The thing Flint is becoming is terrifying and how long before he dies alone with only a drink that would drive him mad before killing him? That Ghost Ship Captain is chained to his vessel, never to sail home.... Flint. Flint is trapped in the persona he built and can't go home again.
* I think Max's question about Jack being able to get men to fight for the fort is a good one.
* I think it is interesting that Billy is the one who understands in technical terms exactly how fucked they are and Silver, for all his larger doubts about Flint, is the one who has absolute faith in Flint's ability to sail them out of the trap.
* It is so Hornigold to know exactly how pirates think and set a trap both clever and horrific. Old pirates get that way by being very, very clever.
* Flint's "I will do great violence" speech gave me shivers. The man who wanted to "civilize" Nassau now wants to burn down civilization.
* The offer is not in good faith, exactly like the truce with Ashe. Flint's first passage in this episode ends in the Miranda doubling. Flint's last involves him rejecting a false truce and vowing to burn it all down.
* Billy Bones spots the bigger political picture in the promise of 80 pardons. He's grown so much since the naive young boatswain of season one.
* I was half expecting Thomas in that Eleanor scene even though I knew it couldn't be logically.
* The lighting in the Eleanor scene and a lot of the camera angles and painterly shot design was very like the bedroom sequence in the raid scene. I think this is deliberate. The magistrate who thought his honesty would save him trying to appeal to Flint vs. a magistrate trying to enlist Eleanor to help him bring Nassau in line. "There is a funny thing about notoriety, and I have a little experience with this. The more people know of you, the more of you those people feel belongs to them." So here it is again, a more aggressive, less consensual owning of a piece of someone's reputation. Shares in Flint, shares in Eleanor; reputation, notoriety.
* Eleanor really will turn on anyone, won't she?
* Apparently, whatever happened earlier to cut two scenes happened again at this point, since it cut from Eleanor's cell to her in the carriage first time I watched it. O.o No wonder the episode seemed a bit disjointed first time through!
* Another moment of Jack/Max parallel. They first saw the gold as an answer and now they see all the attendant problems it represents. It's nice to see Jack Rackham actually did have a vision, even if it was made of clouds.
* So Charles Vane has sold out his most fundamental principle in hopes of saving Nassau and I feel dirty now on the inside. Charles makes it clear there is no such thing as a good slave master, cutting through Jack's self justifications for this unconscionable and unforgivable thing he is doing. Charles can not lie to himself that way, and yet he does it anyway.
* It is good we at least get to see the reason for it: that Charles feels helpless before what he sees as a return to slavery for himself and all of them. He does it out of fear, knowing damned well that it is at the cost of other men's freedom and what that really means, something that Jack with all his privilege can not. Charles is frightened, so frightened he can bring himself to go along with this.
* Having the blow from nowhere speech over the image of Eleanor on her way? *wince*
* Ebays, 2 days left:
TOTENTANZ 2013 (LE, Yule, Miskatonic Valley Philharmonic): (Company says: Shadow musk and blood musk with opoponax, aged patchouli, leather accord, black pepper, and bitter clove.) Below top of label. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850893336?
BLOOD MOON 2011 (LE, Lunacy) : (Company says: A Lunacy inspired by the magnificently morbid fantasies of Edgar Allan Poe: laudanum-stained linen scented by an ink-smeared tobacco musk and phantom bloodstains illuminated by monstrous moonlight.) 1/2 Full.
DRUID 2013 (RPG) : (Company says: A woolen robe infused with the scent of a vast, primordial forest: ancient trees, fertile soil, wild herbs, spring grasses, and burgundy pitch incense.) 3/4 Full. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850896426?
WOMB FURIE 2010 (LE, Lupercalia) : (Company says: Snake Oil and three types of honey.) More than Half.
AGED SNAKE OIL 2011 (Ars Amatoria) : (Company says: By far, our most popular scent! Magnetic, mysterious, and exceedingly sexual in nature. A blend of exotic Indonesian oils sugared with vanilla.) Top of Label. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850898728?
POST-MORTEM LAUREATUS 2011 (LE, Pickman Gallery) : (Company says: White sandalwood and twining ivy.) 1/3 Full
MISS FORCIBLE 2013 (Neil Gaimen, Coraline) : (Company says: A classic vintage musk.) 3/4 Full.
CHANUKKIYAH 2007 (LE, Yule): (Company says: Olive oil, beeswax, glowing amber, sweet sufganiyot, pomegranate, and fig.) 1/2 imp or so in bottle. http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850900950?
TEMPLE VIPER 2008 (LE, Carnaval Diabolique, Snake Pit): (Company says: Snake Oil with sugar cane, frankincense, champaca, opoponax, labdanum, and hyssop.) 1/4 Full.
CROWLEY 2011 (Neil Gaiman, Good Omens): (Company says: Infernal musk, red patchouli, lilac cologne, mahogany, lemon rind, oakmoss, leather, and vanilla husk.) 2/3 Full.
LOVED TO DEATH 2015 (Retail Exclusive Oils): (Company says: A scent of dark corners and forgotten mysteries, secrets unearthed in dark attics, and cobwebbed, timeworn artifacts: vanilla bean, blackened and smoked, with husky clove, cinnamon bark, and a touch of beeswax.) 3/4 Full http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/301850902992?
* Help the poisoned children of Flint Michigan. "Water Crisis:" https://www.cfgf.org/cfgf/GoodWork/FlintArea/WaterCrisis/tabid/855/Default.aspx
* "How to help Flint, Michigan:" http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/how-help-flint-michigan
* Want to help finance Hector's cat food and my meds/medical co pays? Paypal Lethran@gmail.com
* Donate to help refugees "UN Refugee Agency:" http://donate.unhcr.org/international/general
* Organizations helping with the refugee crisis: http://captainofalltheships.tumblr.com/post/128790538169/an-updated-list-of-organizations-to-donate-to-help
* Want Game of Thrones without the creepy? We desperately need new players. We are very inclusive. "Game of Bones MUSH:" gobmush.wikidot.com