elisi's humble abode

Accurate:

February is the worst month of the year and this man is wonderful pic.twitter.com/vV73ZF2Qn4

— Alexis Benveniste (@apbenven) February 4, 2022

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In UK politics news, Jonathan Pie is back! :D

“Seriously I can just come out and say it? Call him a liar?” asks @JonathanPieNews, a fictional broadcast reporter created and performed by comedian Tom Walker, in a satirical video about Britain’s Prime Minister.
“God bless America.” https://t.co/Hu6Q6q8TBp pic.twitter.com/ojr8Pb1d0S

— New York Times Opinion (@nytopinion) February 4, 2022

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I keep meaning to post and then... not. So have some petitions:

Save my foster son Samet - he is family!

World Leaders: End Plastic Pollution

Everyone Should Have a Safe Place to Call Home. Agree? Add Your Name to Say There Should Be a Home for All of Us in the UK – No Exceptions

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And the Olympics are here (again). There is always this difficult contrast between what the Olympics stand for - striving for the best, harmony between countries, incredible feats - and the reality underpinning the whole thing... not just China's genocide of the Uyghurs, but how the whole history is pretty terrible. (Twitter thread here.)

And yet we watched the Opening Ceremony and enjoyed it... And I love figure skating!

I guess it's a bit like trying to separate a 'problematic' creator and their work. I still love Buffy, even if Joss turned out to be a terrible person.

Speaking of China, then this is a very interesting article:

The misunderstood—and misrepresented—Zero COVID policy in China
This analysis of China’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been submitted as a contribution to the WSWS Global Workers’ Inquest into the COVID-19 Pandemic.

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Daily Dimash: Swan Goose

Let's end with something beautiful. Dimash Kudaibergen & Tengri performing 'Swan Goose' at the Spring Festival Gala 2019. (Or: Kazakhstan + Mongolia + China in musical format.)



Dimash Masterpost

Holidays are nice, even if we are just stuck at home. Darcy is getting on with building his workshop - or rather he has been, the last few days it's been raining. But yay, there's Olympics to watch! (Yes yes I know all the problematic stuff. But it's amazing to watch what humans are capable of.)

This afternoon we (Darcy, 15 y.o. & me) went for a walk and ended up at a pub and just went in and had a meal. Like everything was normal? We hadn't brought masks because we were just going for a walk and the pub meal was spontaneous (and like, we're OK cause of just having had covid otherwise I wouldn't have set foot inside), but literally no one was wearing masks and I think people just think 'Fuck it, why care, the government certainly aren't...'

Anyway, since I didn't stop collecting links and since Kerk missed my posts I figured I'd do a sort of... catch-up? ;)

( Day 130 )

( Day 131 )

( Day 132 )

( Day 133 )

( Day 134 )

( Day 135 )

( Day 136 )

And today, Double-Oh-Dimash! *g*

( Daily Dimash: Battle of Memories )

Watching the opening ceremony...

ETA: I'm presuming there'll be more ceremony once the athletes have finished marching in. So far there's been 5 minutes? *tries very hard not to mention the technical problems*

Everything is very ~Russian. Stopped watching due to tea. But I'm glad Johnny Weir is there - I hope he's the sparkliest happiest thing in the village! :)

Am also v. pleased with Google (yay LGBT rights!) but by far the most entertaining thing so far has been Sochi Problems:

https://twitter.com/SochiProblems

ETA2: Via beer_good_foamy



ETA3: OMG. Classic Winter Olympics moments - recreated with LEGO! Thank you BBC! (*goes to watch Torvill and Dean's Bolero once more*)

Went to the Paralympics yesterday.

Had a fabulous time.

More later.

(Haven't seen DW yet.)

ETA: Just watched David Weir win the Marathon (and his fourth gold medal) with cheering crowds all the way down The Mall. What the TV presenter said really struck me:

"If you're watching this, and you've just started Secondary school and you're in a wheelchair - get down to your nearest athletics centre. They will find you a chair, and maybe one day this could be you."

It is just... astonishing the way these games have changed attitudes and perceptions. The Paralympians are sporting heroes, plain and simple.

(I bought a small commemorative athletics figurine of a wheelchair racer yesterday - they had 30 different ones, both Olympic and Paralympic - but this one was the obvious choice. We saw 2 of the heats for the relay (4x400) and they're just damn impressive!)

The Tempest. Stephen Hawking. Umbrellas. The pursuit of knowledge and the celebration of science and learning and books and huamn beings in all their different shapes and the Higgs Boson and beautiful music and apples and the cauldron and... everything.

::profound love::

Opening Ceremony at 8pm on Channel 4!

Am Quite Excited, especially since we actually have tickets - we're going to see the athletics next Saturday! :D

(Also loved Pond Life 2, and will do my best to get to comments as soon as I can - this week is ZOMG BUSY, however, so please bear with me. ♥)

Although really, the best word is magical.

♥

(We were at my in-law's last night, and put up a big screen, and ended up staying the night due to lateness. Hence the lateness of this post.)

ETA: I think The New York Times might have said it best: "With its hilariously quirky Olympic opening ceremony, a wild jumble of the celebratory and the fanciful; the conventional and the eccentric; and the frankly off-the-wall, Britain presented itself to the world Friday night as something it has often struggled to express even to itself: a nation secure in its own post-empire identity, whatever that actually is."

(And Kenneth Branagh as Isambard Kingdom Brunel was just... *hands* And Jerusalem! So much there. A million brilliant little touches. Really, in a nutshell, this show was like Doctor Who: Madman with a box Stadium.)

(Also mentally add the drunk giraffe Dancing Eleven - can't find the gif and am not on my own computer! *runs off to the telly again*)