The Semi-Regular Tumblr Roundup

[sophus]

[cw: puns, breast mention, child suffering in the Omelas link]

The purpose of posts in this series will be to crosspost tumblr content that I wrote, but that isn't significant enough for a post of it's own. It will also serve as a linkdump for tumblr reblogs that I felt were worth sharing here, as well.

With that explained, let's get to the post proper!


My Content

I posted some informative and not at all fake tea facts. [Wayback]
Did you know: Chai tea is the moon moon of teas.


In the context of a discussion on fermi estimates of worldwide breast size:

femmenietzsche:

sophus-b:

femmenietzsche:

I’m always on the lookout for more conteat.

Ah, keeping abreast of the latest jokes?

Though the odds may be stacked against you, don’t let me implant the idea that you’ll make a boob of yourself. Let’s nip that idea in the bud. You wouldn’t tell any old chestnut. You wouldn’t restrict yourself to juvenile knock-knockers. You wouldn’t merely milk a single joke for all it’s worth.

For you, it’s the perfect pun or bust.

No doubt you’ll find one that leaves them in stitches– one that really makes them titter. You’re surely going to tell some real hooters, leave them jiggling with laughter. Everyone around the globe, from the anons to your dearest bosom buddy will be bubbling with laughter.

Undoubtedly, it will all be udderly funny; your humor is one of your greatest assets.

Though I suppose I’ve gone on for far too long– I should can it. I’ll cleave.

Ta ta for now.

Oh the humammary

Context: Some tumblrites were weirded out by the use of "fauntlings" in Tolkien fanfiction, I did a research and found that:

Actually, apparently Tolkien did use the term “faunt” to refer to hobbit toddlers in his Letters:

From The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 214 To A. C. Nunn (draft):
“It may be noted that Hobbits, as soon as they became ‘faunts’ (that is talkers and walkers: formally taken to be on their third birthday-anniversary)”

Though I can’t exactly ask him, I’m guessing he got this term from the Old English “faunt”, meaning “A young child of either sex, an infant, babe,” (from the same root as “infant”.) Furthermore, I’ve found a few sources that attest to diminutives such as “fauntkin” and “fauntlet” being used in the 1300s.

Thus, while “fauntling” itself is a fan-coined word, they didn’t make it up entirely out of whole cloth; there’s both Doylean and linguistic precedent for the construct.

Not Mine

Short story rec: this The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas fanfic by Moriwen. [Wayback]

Fanlore is an excellent wiki, and an invaluable resource for fandom history. Furthermore, it’s really fun to wikiwalk at three in the morning.

Comments

[anthropicprincipal]

Thank you for the Omelas link.

[sophus]

Welcome!

[jesse_the_k]

All A++++ links.

The tea one in particular, which I need to transcribe, and may in fact do some day (but not today because I've been Laid Lo! by a virus).

[sophus]

Why thank you!

I've still got the three that I made in my text buffer, so here's the textdump to save you a bit of time:

GREEN TEA
LIKE BLACK TEA BUT HASN'T YET BEEN CRUSHED BY THE HORRORS OF THE WORLD
CURES DEATH ITSELF JUDGING BY ALL THOSE SALESPEOPLE
ISN'T EVEN REALLY GREEN

CHAI TEA
VERY SPICE, MUCH CREAMY, VERY TASTE, WOW
"CHAI" JUST MEANS TEA
IS THE MOON MOON OF TEAS
CAUSES MANY LINGUISTIC PROTESTS

CHAMOMILE TEA
HELPS INFLAMMATION
HELPS YOU SLEEP
YOU FORCE YOURSELF TO SLEEP TO ESCAPE DRINKING MORE CHAMOMILE

May your virus quickly find itself defenestrated by your immune system!

The virus is on the way out

[jesse_the_k]

...and I'm delighted to learn that you just happen to have a text buffer's worth of goodness for me.

(Are you a programmer? Or did your first computer use floppy disks? I haven't hear "text buffer" in a long time, but then I'm not au courant with the digital-native generation.)

Re: The virus is on the way out

[sophus]

^_^

Not a programmer by profession, but 100% of my parental figures are, or were at some point. And also most of my social sphere. And also my first computer did use floppy discs.

I'm programming-adjacent, at least!

[flaksesomlys]

Re: words for tea, did you know that in almost every language on Earth, tea is called either a variation on "cha" or a variation on "te"? And furthermore, that these are concentrated geographically, so that Eastern Europe, Eastern Africa, and most of Asia say "cha", while Western and Central Europe, Western and Southern Africa, and parts of Southeast Asia say "te"? It's all based on whether the country got their tea from the Silk Road or from ocean traders — most of China calls it "cha", but the coastal region most of the ships were trading with calls it "te". And everyone else just imported whichever one of those two words they were first exposed to.

(full article: Tea if by sea, cha if by land: Why the world only has two words for tea)

[sophus]

Tea etymology is the best etymology. :D

[jesse_the_k]

I learned re: the two words in my high school Russian class, but didn't know the cultural geographic link. THANK YOU!