When I’m sick I find there are fewer happier places to hang out than in rhi’s uncharted tag.
So I’m probably going to send out Holiday Cards soon. So far on my address list I’ve got:
- rhiannon42
- basiacat
- kazstiel
- runawaydragons
- ravenno
- spicyshimmy (from last year, though I haven’t confirmed you want anything this year, so I guess consider this me asking :D)
- missl0nelyhearts (same deal bb, but basically even if you say no i’m sending you elephants anyway so DEAL)
- wantthepharoahs (same deal but with ALL THE PRALINES)
- myjusticecake (but: DUH)
- sherlockscarf (again: DUH)
I also remember sending out cards to warsongraven, ouyangdan, tanglebones and several others last year; if y’all are still game, I’d love to exchange cards again, but I’ll need your addresses again.
I’d love to add people to my list! My only caveat is that if I send you a card, please send me something in return, because it just makes my day so much to get things in the mail. I go totally NUTS for it. :)
So if you’d like to exchange holiday cards, drop me an ask or a fanmail.
- Me: Still feeling kinda sick. I could go for something sweet. Hmm. Might as well try this brownie in a mug flutie keeps going on about.
- Me: ::pulls up recipe on tablet, gathers ingredients::
- Me: ::puts ingredients in a mug, puts mug in microwave::
- Me: ::tidies up kitchen::
- Me: Oh, hey, I've got ice cream. That'd be tasty with this.
- Microwave: Ding!
- Mug of Brownie: ::smells heavenly::
- Me: ::scoops ice cream into mug::
- Me: ::takes a bite::
- Me: ::has rapturous revelation::
- Me: ...oh. Oh, I see.
- ***
- AND SO IT BEGINS
There’s this guy in my neighborhood. He’s in his 60s, 70s, maybe? Retired. Obviously bored. He spends the first several hours of his day walking his tribe of little sausage dogs, one by one.
Every day when I walk my own dogs, without fail we run into each other. And every day, pretty much without…
I understand not wanting to piss off the people you have to live by (as someone who never intended to and yet already did within the first month of living somewhere) but if all the subtle clues aren’t working, maybe it’s time to be direct. That’s not to say you have to be rude about it, of course, but there’s no telling what some people will or won’t take offense to. Maybe just a simple. ‘I appreciate the thought, but your comments make me uncomfortable.’
…..yes I realize how not great this advice is I’m sorry. 8(
No, your advice is absolutely valid, and many of you jumped into offer me similar advice. The problem is, I’m not sure he’d get it. The thing is, he thinks he’s a charmer. And if you say to a man who thinks he’s a charmer that you’re uninterested or made uncomfortable by his bullshit, then he just thinks you’re playing hard to get. So he tries even harder.
And yet, I feel hamstrung because I can’t be directly rude. Like, if this were just some guy I passed on the way to work, I’d have no problem giving him a piece of my mind. But he’s a neighbor, and more than that, he knows EVERYONE around us. I don’t want him turning the entire neighborhood (which is predominately retired guys like him) against us. We’re already not particularly well-liked because we don’t have kids, we don’t landscape obsessively like our neighbors, and we mostly keep to ourselves. If someone like him goes around telling everyone how bitchy I am, I fear that we’d start getting a much harder time from our neighbors about our weeded-over flower beds, for example.
Houses, man. Ugh.
…Flutie. Flutie, are you starting a cult?
… starting?
I already run enough cults as is. Jeez, I’m not Superwoman, you know.
You convinced me.
Writer’s Block
A picture says a thousand words. Write them.
Mission: Write a story, a description, a poem, a metaphor, a commentary, or a critique about this picture. Write something about this picture.
Be sure to tag writeworld in your block!
“Wow,” Nate says, a faint smile on his face as he gazes at the ruined castle rising up above the treeline. Rolling green hills stretch out as far as the eye can see, and a warm breeze ruffles through his hair as he looks out over what can really only be called a magnificent vista. No wonder the original builders had chosen this spot.
“Yep, impressive,” Sully agrees. “Now let’s go rob it.”
Nate sighs. “You have no respect for history, Sully.”
“I have lots of respect for history, kid,” Sully replies, heading for the path down the hill. Nate sighs and trails after him. “I respect it. I value it. I especially respect how much other people value it, and how much cash they’re willing to part with as a display of that value.”
Nate rolls his eyes. “The village is already practically a museum,” he says. “You really think there’s anything left for us to steal?”
“My source seems to think so.”
“Uh-huh. This ‘source’ wouldn’t happen to be a pretty bartender twenty years younger than you, would it? Because last time you took a tip from the girl serving you drinks, we ended up stranded in a cave in Bolivia.”
Sully scoffs. “It wasn’t that bad—”
“For three days.”
“Better than ending up in prison!”
“There were bats, Sully.” Nate heaves a sigh and shoves his hands in his pockets. “I don’t like bats.”
“There really aren’t any caves around here,” Sully points out.
“Well, yeah, but there’s probably dungeons or cellars— and you’re avoiding the question!” Nate takes a couple steps forward and pokes Sully in the shoulder. “Who’s your source?”
Sully glances at him sideways but doesn’t answer. Nate comes to a stop in the middle of the narrow dirt path. “Oh, god,” he says. “It is some barely legal bartender, isn’t it.”
“She’s the hotel receptionist, and she’s older than you,” Sully replies.
“Okay, great, so she’s twenty-two and a half,” Nate says. “That is not a reliable source!”
Sully half-turns and gestures for Nate to keep walking. “We’ll just have a look around, kid. It’ll be fine.”
Nate groans and hurries after him. “If I end up in a Hungarian prison, I’m blaming you!”
Sully, you dog.
YOU KNOW WHY:
And one more for good measure:
Still slowly working my way through my backlog of rhiannon42’s Uncharted fics (alas, AO3 has been kinda touchy lately) but this one… AUGH.
Several moments here that made me sit back in my chair, boneless and heart achey, and think to myself, “Damn, girl, that’s really, really good.”
I was re-watching some cutscenes from Uncharted 3 (for fic research, obviously), and I noticed that Young!Nate has a man’s watch hooked on his belt. It looks pretty high-quality, which makes me wonder why he hasn’t sold it for some probably much-needed coin. Why is it so important that he’ll keep it but not wear it? Did he steal it and decide he liked it? Did it belong to a family member? Why doesn’t he have it as an adult (I checked through many screenshots to verify that the wristband/watch thing he has is different)? SO MANY QUESTIONS.
And so now I will be mildly obsessed with this tiny detail. Because I am a huge nerd.
My first thought: It was his father’s.
My second thought: It wasn’t his father’s.
My third thought: Not only was the watch not his father’s, it didn’t even look like something his father once owned, or might’ve owned, or would’ve wanted to own. But Nate stole it anyway, because it looked like something he wished his father would’ve owned. It was the kind of object his ideal father would’ve kept on his wrist: someone rich, or smart, or sophisticated; someone who could give him the world; someone who always had the time (for him).
My fourth thought: Young!Nate’s watch is his first attempt to build a fantasy identity for himself, to use talismans to recreate himself in the image of who he wanted to be, rather than what he was handed. It’s, of course, the same thing he does with Francis Drake’s ring later on; he builds up this elaborate lie about his secret ancestry that was so much better than the rotten, broken bloodline he was originally given, a lie so elaborate he eventually begins to believe it. In the case of the watch, young!Nate wanted the worldly, sophisticated father he didn’t get lucky enough to have, so instead he invented him.
My fifth thought: It’s the same watch that shows up on Victor Sullivan’s wrist.
My sixth thought: ITS THE SAME WATCH THAT SHOWS UP ON VICTOR SULLIVAN’S WRIST.
YES IT FUCKING IS
Which is why I wrote a scene on this very subject— I’m trying to post it to AO3, we’ll see how that goes. My thought process on the subject was similar to yours, that it was his father’s, but of course it couldn’t be. I also gave some though to the idea that maybe he stole it because it did look like a watch his father owned, and I haven’t entirely ruled out that piece of headcanon. Nor have I ruled out your version of it, that it’s another piece of the story Nate tells himself about who he is and where he’s from.
And then he totally gives it to Sully and Sully’s still wearing it and dshfkshjsdf FEELS
(I think I may have to replay the whole trilogy once I finish with New Vegas. Just saying.)
All your posts on it over the past few weeks have put me in a serious Drake frame of mind. I couldn’t wait any longer. Now that I’m back in town, the hubs and I are replaying it tag-team style, right now, as I type.
In fact, this just in from his corner of the couch: “Fucking pirates. Always all up in my sunken cities. You’d think they’d learn by now.”
I was re-watching some cutscenes from Uncharted 3 (for fic research, obviously), and I noticed that Young!Nate has a man’s watch hooked on his belt. It looks pretty high-quality, which makes me wonder why he hasn’t sold it for some probably much-needed coin. Why is it so important that he’ll keep it but not wear it? Did he steal it and decide he liked it? Did it belong to a family member? Why doesn’t he have it as an adult (I checked through many screenshots to verify that the wristband/watch thing he has is different)? SO MANY QUESTIONS.
And so now I will be mildly obsessed with this tiny detail. Because I am a huge nerd.
My first thought: It was his father’s.
My second thought: It wasn’t his father’s.
My third thought: Not only was the watch not his father’s, it didn’t even look like something his father once owned, or might’ve owned, or would’ve wanted to own. But Nate stole it anyway, because it looked like something he wished his father would’ve owned. It was the kind of object his ideal father would’ve kept on his wrist: someone rich, or smart, or sophisticated; someone who could give him the world; someone who always had the time (for him).
My fourth thought: Young!Nate’s watch is his first attempt to build a fantasy identity for himself, to use talismans to recreate himself in the image of who he wanted to be, rather than what he was handed. It’s, of course, the same thing he does with Francis Drake’s ring later on; he builds up this elaborate lie about his secret ancestry that was so much better than the rotten, broken bloodline he was originally given, a lie so elaborate he eventually begins to believe it. In the case of the watch, young!Nate wanted the worldly, sophisticated father he didn’t get lucky enough to have, so instead he invented him.
My fifth thought: It’s the same watch that shows up on Victor Sullivan’s wrist.
My sixth thought: ITS THE SAME WATCH THAT SHOWS UP ON VICTOR SULLIVAN’S WRIST.
I have this dream of someday finding a suitable guy and cosplaying Natalie Drake and Ethan Fisher. SOMEDAY.
baby
say you’ll be the victoria sullivan
to my natasha drake
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS I GOT SO MANY HOLIDAY CARDS AAHHHHHH
The first from Rhiannon, who sent me an awesomely adorable handmade card, and even awesomer and more adorable snowflake, and THE MOST ADORABLE AND AWESOME FIC of Carver and Merrill having a snowdate (which I’d love to upload, if you’re okay with it, rhi)!
