"Howl Jenkins Is Swarming In Girls Falling Head Over Heels For Him" Factoid Is Actually A Statistical

Reblog if you've found friendship because of your fandoms.

John's Passion narrative has a never-ending fascination for me, because it's where you get Jesus at his most divine--knowing everything that was going to happen, making the guards fall to their faces when he speaks the name of God--while the people around him are at their most human.

There's an entire political drama going on. Pilate the Roman pagan getting dragged into this provincial Jewish religious dispute. These Jewish leaders and Jesus providing different visions of truth to a politician who doesn't care what the truth is. There's extremely sharp political back-and-forth between the Roman and the Jewish authorities--the Pharisees trying to force Pilate's hand by saying that everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar, then Pilate backing them into proclaiming Caesar as their king and twisting the knife of pettiness by labeling Jesus as the Jewish king in four different languages while He hangs on the cross.

Petty, personal, political human drama taking up all their attention.

And meanwhile, God is dying.

Happy National Otter Day!

We've been cooking this up for quite a while >:) I've been given the go-ahead to share some art for our card game that's in development- "Otter Nonsense"!

Play as multiple factions of Otters to defeat the army of Geese who are trying to take over the river.

You can follow the instagram (still in the works) for updates! I'll also be sharing whatever I can on here, as well.

This is just a lil sneak peek, but there's more art on it's way!

In the spirit of the “picnic of hobbits” post—and with the help of the genius mind of @redbootsindoriath—I give you MORE funny group names for the various races in Middle Earth:

A stone of dwarves

A dirt of Rangers

A yeehaw of Rohirrim

A keg of Breelanders

A gumption of Gondorians

A desolation of Laketowners

A murder of elves (Silmarillion)

A song of elves (The Hobbit)

A contemplation of elves (LotR)

A troll of goblins

A gobblin’ of trolls

A staff meeting of wizards

And you might think that a group of ents is called a “moot”, but there’s actually a different term that I would tell you if it wasn’t incredibly long and impossible to pronounce

nothing will ever live up to the moment when after devouring over 250 pages deeply immersed in the characters and story and after the emotions of the proposal I reached the very end of the letter that turns everything on its head only to find out that Mr Darcy's name is Fitzwilliam

Hamiathes's Gift Exchange 2025: Schedule Announcement!

The schedule is here, and well ahead of time this year! We're kicking off in about three months, and the schedule will be relatively close to last year's. This exchange is open to anyone with an AO3 account who wants to write a fic or make a piece of QT art. For more details on length, size, and logistics of the exchange, check out the FAQ linked at the bottom of this post.

2025 Schedule

Character/relationship/worldbuilding nominations: Thursday, July 17 - Thursday, July 24

Signups: Friday, July 25 - Sunday, August 3

Assignments sent out: Tuesday, August 5

Fanworks due: Friday, September 12

Fanworks revealed: Friday, September 18

Artists/authors revealed: Friday, September 26

All deadlines are at 8pm EDT

Note: If you don't have an AO3 account, you can request an invite here. There is currently a 3 week waiting list to get an invite, so please make sure you request one soon if you're considering participating!

If you have any questions about how the exchange works you can find last year's FAQ here. Check out past HGE works here! If you want a reminder when signups open, dm me!

Good Friday

The more you think about it, the worse it gets.

No part of the Passion Gospel, the Gospel for Good Friday, has any hope.

Even the tender moments – Jesus asking John to take care of his mother, Joseph and Nicodemus making sure that Jesus has a proper burial – they’re just people dealing with the fallout from death.

You know what Joseph and Nicodemus are thinking about while they’re wrapping Jesus’ body up for burial? How much this sucks.

And whether the Romans will stop at killing Jesus. Or will they, and other followers of Jesus, be next?

The more you think about it, the worse it gets.

You know what Joseph and Nicodemus aren’t thinking about? How anything good can come from this.

Much less how God is already using all of it to do more good than either of them, or anyone on Good Friday, could ever imagine.

And yet, you and I know, that’s exactly what’s happening. Because you and I know something that Joseph and Nicodemus don’t know. Not on that worst of Friday’s.

They don’t know that Sunday is coming.

But that’s how it is, when you’re where they are. When you are right in the middle of the very worst.

When you and I are right in the middle of the very worst, there is nothing that human eyes can see to tell us that it’s ever going to get any better.

When that’s where you are, the only open question is whether it’s going to get worse.

In the middle of everything that you are dealing with right now – whether it’s death or illness, divorce or the end of a friendship, job loss or financial problems – while you’re waiting to see whether you’ve hit bottom or if it’s going to get worse. You get Joseph and Nicodemus. You are right there with them.

The more you think about what you’re dealing with, the worse it gets.

There’s nothing that our human eyes can see to tell us that anything good can come from what you’re going through.

And yet, you and I know, that’s not true.

Because you and I know something. Something that’s easy to lose sight of when you’re in the middle. Something that’s hard to hold onto when you’re scared.

But it doesn’t matter. It’s okay if we lose sight of it. Because it’s still true. Even if we’re scared. 

Today is Good Friday. And Good Friday shows us that none of it, not even the very worst, can hold down our God.

Because Sunday is coming.

Today’s Readings

send me a fandom and i’ll tell you…

the first character i ever fell in love with:

a character that i used to love/like, but now do not:

a ship that i used to love/like, but now do not:

my ultimate favorite character™:

prettiest character:

my most hated character:

my OTP:

my NOTP:

favorite episode:

saddest death:

favorite season:

least favorite season:

character that everyone else in the fandom loves, but i hate:

my ‘you’re piece of trash, but you’re still a fave’ fave:

my ‘beautiful cinnamon roll who deserves better than this’ fave:

my ‘this ship is wrong, nasty, and makes me want to cleanse my soul, but i still love it’ ship:

my ‘they’re kind of cute, and i lowkey ship them, but i’m not too invested’ ship:

This is an interesting thing I'm noticing as I'm reading but it kinda seems to me like a lot of the Tolkien characters all seem to have elemental symbolism that seems to follow their characterization.

Like Gandalf and Bilbo both seem to have a lot of fire symbolism that follows them around. Gandalf uses light and fire as kind of his two go to weapons and he's the keeper of the ring of Narya which is the fire one. And of course Gandalf the White is forged out of flame. And then Bilbo's introduced in the middle of smoking, and he spends a lot of time hanging around campfires and hearths, like the campfire storyteller he is. He seems to like hanging out in the Hall of Fire at Rivendell, and his conflict with Smaug obviously also involves a lot of fire. He's also arguably the character who is closest to Gandalf.

Frodo on the other hand is like all water imagery. One of the first things we learn about Frodo is his parents were weirdos who hung out in boats and then drowned, and he's introduced filling drinks at Bilbo's party. He makes his stand against the Nazgul at the river. He himself nearly drowns like three times in the story, and spends a lot of time in boats, being haunted by dark waters, and the sound of the ocean (and of course ends the story going over the sea). Like the water symbolism with Frodo is nonstop and he shares that in common with Gollum, who specifically is characterized by pools, rivers, and lakes, as well as fish, worms, mud and roots and caves—very wet and slimy compared to Frodo's more mariner/wayfinder imagery. But they're still kind of two sides of the same coin.

Pippin and Merry get a lot of plant and tree symbolism. Besides hanging out with ents and drinking tree wine and that time they both got eaten by a tree, it's clear Merry grew up wandering forests and knows a lot about wild plants (and writes a book on it later) and Pippin gets a ton of association with Gondor, y'know, that place that is represented by a big ol' tree. Their tobacco leaves too actually kinda play a pivotal role, and are again, very plant focused.

You'd think Sam would also be more earth oriented, being he's a gardener, but not really? Unlike Merry who's out here spitting plant facts 24/7 and working on his plant book, Sam's interest in plants seems like to only be around when he's on the clock. His symbolism is all very celestial. He's the guy who ends up using the Star of Earendil. He sees Earendil while he and Frodo are walking through Mordor. He evokes Elbereth, the Star Goddess like multiple times. He names his daughter after the star-sun shaped flower Elanor which literally means "Sun and Stars." And if you think about it, Gardener is actually kind of a perfect role for a star-guy when you remember how dependent plants are on the sun. He also seems to share some kind of connection with Galadriel who is also caked in a lot of star imagery. It also tracks he'd be paired with Frodo thematically as he serves as a guiding light to a mariner, in contrast to how Gollum represents the depths.

IDK what all that means, I just think it's neat!