Made Fancy Tea For My Mom For Mother's Day. Mom Served As The Model For Mrs. Whitaker In My Adaptation

I'm sure he meant this as a compliment but it could just as easily be a grievous insult.

(from "The Dialogue of Myrddin and Taliesin" in The Black Book of Carmarthen)

I once saw a crossover between BBC Merlin and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, presumably based around the fact that both have characters named Arthur. It worked well—there are more overlaps—but in general it seems like bad policy. If we keep on mashing up television shows with classic literature based on names, sooner or later, the world will end up with Gilligan’s Wake, and what will we all do then?

The back of my Siege Perilous

Going from left to right and down, the symbols stand for Galahad, Percival, Ragnell, Blanchefleur, the Grail Heroine, the Lady of the Lake who gives Arthur Excalibur, Guinier, Gawain, Dinadan, Ector de Maris, Morgan le Fay, Caradoc Briefbras, Griflet, Isolde, Vivian, Taliesin, Tristan, Brunnisend, the Nine Witches, Laudine, the Three Queens or Morgause, Kay, Dagonet, Merlin, Palamedes, Sebile, Guinevere, Igraine, Melora, Yvain, Mordred, and Arthur.

If you’re confused about some or all of them, here’s my rationale/what the symbols are: 

Galahad and Percival have slightly different Grails. I think Ragnell is found sitting under a tree, and another story has Gawain in a relationship with the queen of Avalon, isle of the apples. Blanchefleur means “white flower”. The square with the spiral in it is the Grail Heroine’s box of hair. The sword under the wave is fairly obvious. That is the drinking horn from Guinier’s chastity test. Gawain’s is a SGatGK reference. Dinadan’s is an aro ring. Ector de Maris, Griflet, Kay, and Palamedes all have symbols or patterns from their attributed arms. Morgan le Fay takes Arthur to Avalon on a boat. Caradoc has to be saved from a serpent which is wound around his arm. The torch is a Wagner reference. Nimue traps Merlin, whose symbol is the bird who shares his name, so she is represented by a birdcage. Taliesin got his wisdom from a cauldron, and there’s a cauldron in the Preideu Annwfn. Tristan plays a harp. The formation of the relationship between Brunnisend and her eventual husband is defined by their dire yet mutually exclusive needs for a good night’s sleep. The Nine Witches’ symbol seemed cool and has a threefold element. Laudine has a magic fountain. The evolution of the nature and deeds of Anna/Morcades/Morgause/etc. seemed to sort of go with the Maiden, Matron, Crone archetype and I really couldn’t think of anything else. Dagonet eventually became a jester. Yblis, who has a magic mantle, is Sybil scrambled, and there is a strong modern association between magic and capes. Guinevere is sometimes given authority over the knights of the vergescu. My justification for Igraine’s is particularly weak and would take too long to explain. Melora wields the Lance of Longinus. Yvain befriends a lion. Mordred has a broken table because he helped break the Round Table. Arthur is King.

…as he should be.

I forgot the name of Maimonides-

So I searched up "Jewish philosopher with opinions" and he was the first result.

“The Elder Knight” by Dorothy L. Sayers

Note: the speaker is Galahad; the elder knight is Lancelot. This poem is one of my favorites. It’s unusual in that its version of Galahad is really, really spiteful, and the ending is unforgettable.   I.

I have met you foot to foot, I have fought you face to face,

I have held my own against you and lost no inch of place,

    And you shall never see

    How you have broken me.

You sheathed your sword in the dawn, and you smiled with careless eyes,

Saying "Merrily struck, my son, I think you may have your prize."

    Nor saw how each hard breath

    Was painfully snatched from death.

I held my head like a rock; I offered to joust again,

Though I shook, and my palsied hand could hardly cling to the rein;

    Did you curse my insolence

    And over-confidence?

You have ridden, lusty and fresh, to the morrow's tournament;

I am buffeted, beaten, sick at the heart and spent.—

    Yet, as God my speed be

    I will fight you again if need be.

               II.

A white cloud running under the moon

   And three stars over the poplar-trees,

Night deepens into her lambent noon;

   God holds the world between His knees;

Yesterday it was washed with the rain,

But now it is clean and clear again.

Your hands were strong to buffet me,

   But, when my plume was in the dust,

Most kind for comfort verily;

   Success rides blown with restless lust;

Herein is all the peace of heaven:

To know we have failed and are forgiven.

The brown, rain-scented garden beds

   Are waiting for the next year's roses;

The poplars wag mysterious heads,

   For the pleasant secret each discloses

To his neighbour, makes them nod, and nod—

So safe is the world on the knees of God.

             III.

I have the road before me; never again

   Will I be angry at the practised thrust

That flicked my fingers from the lordly rein

   To scratch and scrabble among the rolling dust.

I never will be angry — though your spear

   Bit through the pauldron, shattered the camail,

Before I crossed a steed, through many a year

   Battle on battle taught you how to fail.

Can you remember how the morning star

   Winked through the chapel window, when the day

Called you from vigil to delights of war

   With such loud jollity, you could not pray?

Pray now, Lord Lancelot; your hands are hard

   With the rough hilts; great power is in your eyes,

Great confidence; you are not newly scarred,

   And conquer gravely now without surprise.

Pray now, my master; you have still the joy

   Of work done perfectly; remember not

The dizzying bliss that smote you when, a boy,

   You faced some better man, Lord Lancelot.

Pray now — and look not on my radiant face,

   Breaking victorious from the bloody grips—

Too young to speak in quiet prayer or praise

   For the strong laughter bubbling to my lips.

Angry? because I scarce know how to stand,

   Gasping and reeling against the gates of death,

While, with the shaft yet whole within your hand,

   You smile at me with undisordered breath?

Not I — not I that have the dawn and dew,

   Wind, and the golden shore, and silver foam —

I that here pass and bid good-bye to you —

   For I ride forward — you are going home.

Truly I am your debtor for this hour

   Of rough and tumble — debtor for some good tricks

Of tourney-craft; — yet see how, flower on flower,

   The hedgerows blossom! How the perfumes mix

Of field and forest! — I must hasten on —

   The clover scent blows like a flag unfurled;

When you are dead, or aged and alone,

   I shall be foremost knight in all the world —

My world, not yours, beneath the morning's gold,

   My hazardous world, where skies and seas are blue;

Here is my hand. Maybe, when I am old,

   I shall remember you, and pray for you.

I had a realization the other day:

Gawain was supposed to be the narrator of the Grail Quest.

Before Vulgate cycle and Sir Bors, the only other participant of the Grail Quest was Gawain. Gawain was used as a foil for Percival's story - a counterpart for Percival's character arc.

When reading Chretien's (unfinished) Grail story, it was always funny how Gawain takes up a significant chunk of the tale, but looking back at every version of the Grail cycle, there's this general trend that Percival was never going to return to Camelot to report the entire adventure to Arthur.

Percival's story is meant to end with him staying in the Grail Kingdom. So, someone else had to tell the story so it could be "passed down" and preserved as "history".

And that someone, had to be Gawain, the then-premier hero of the romances and Chretien's favorite.

Gawain isn't just the deuteragonist in Percival's story, he's also the one lives to tell the tale of Sir Percival.

Of Course, Robert de Boron comes along, and suddenly, the Grail Quest is everyone's adventure, but that's a different story...

I would, too.

Movie/Tv Show/Anime idea: An Action Adventure where Aliens invade Earth but it’s way back in the past, Specifically Camelot during the height of Arthur’s Reign. Now instead of eliminating or toning down the more mystical aspects of Arthurian Legend we lean into them.

Sir Kay grabs his sword and starts heating it up to make a makeshift lightsaber before growing to his giant size and slicing through alien ground troops like they’re paper.

Gawain and Ironside (the Red Knight) are just tossing aliens around like nothing with their superhuman strength. Then when the sun sets and the aliens think they have the upper hand over Gawain who loses his incredible strength at night, they hear a wolf’s howl before being attacked by Sir Marrok the werewolf.

Sir Bedwyr piercing the Aliens’ superior technology with his magic lance before darting away like the Flash, Sir Ywain using his battle lion to defend the court, etc.

Even Merlin gets in on the action, using his extensive magic to create illusions and fireballs. Morgan Le Fay even comes out of the woodwork to help, summoning lightning to attack the aliens’ ships.

Arthur, still in possession of Excalibur’s scabbard, tries to initially greet the invaders, only for them to blast him with a plasma cannon. As the smoke clears, Arthur is unharmed but his horse is a pile of ash. Arthur just looks at the alien spaceship and says, “that was my favorite horse.”

In the final battle, right when it seems like the aliens have the upper hand, one of their spaceships crashes to the ground unexpectedly. Out of the crashed spaceship comes Sir Galahad wielding a sword clearly made out of alien technology. Turns out what Sirs Percival and Bors thought was Galahad ascending to Heaven was actually him being abducted by aliens, and he stowed away when he found out they were coming back to destroy Camelot. The Knights, now emboldened by Galahad’s return start pushing the invading forces back. Galahad actually goes to the Round Table at some point, finds the Siege Perilous, and breaks the back of it off to make a makeshift shield/vaporizing weapon.

Anyway the Knights win, Galahad decides he needs to go back to free all the Aliens’ captives and lead a rebellion against their oppressive empire. He also says he’ll tell all the stars what awaits them should anyone try to invade the Earth.

I’d watch that.

Since I posted this, another of my closest friends came out as aroace.

I’m quickly running out of allo people I know more than tangentially.

I‘ve been wondering about something. Last year, I found out that being asexual was a thing, not just a quirk of mine… then realized that five of my friends already privately or publicly identified as such. Consider that: asexuals are estimated to make up about 1% of the population yet account for about 40% of my friends. Is that just a weird coincidence, are ace people more likely to gravitate toward each other (due to their likely disinterest in certain topics of conversation or general vibes or goodness knows what), did the experts significantly underestimate how many asexuals there are, or some combination of the three? I suspect it’s the third but I’m not sure to what extent each thing is a factor. Any thoughts?

You mean to tell me that you don't?

A lot of the time when I see people talk about aromanticism they bring up the way a lot of us tend to think that romance is just exaggerated in fiction and are surprised that people feel that way in real life and not just in the movies and that's honestly kind of funny, imagine just going about your life and one day finding out that most people's high school years were actually like disney channel and you're the exception

(Source: Ridder Metter Mouwen)

Oh, come on! Really?!! Guinevere is Kay's niece in this story?!!