Legenda 53: Stuff worth reading

[Legenda offers a brief, non-inclusive index of stuff I noticed and enjoyed since the last episode. It doesn’t usually include materials presented on the major fansites, which I love dearly, but which are linked in the sidebar. Because I always forget or just miss stuff, please add additional pieces of interest via link in the comments.]

• Please don’t just hit these blogs, but leave comments there as well!

• This was a personally overwhelming week for me — so I am sure I’ve missed or forgotten something. Looking at this bumper crop of links — it was also a very overwhelming week for Armitage readers! I reblogged a lot of the Hobbit news this week — so that stuff is not linked below; please page down to find it all. Please help out with links, suggestions.

Reader mail:

Someone — who asks not to be identified because her inner perfectionist is offended by the quality of the snap — just sent me this picture:

Chicago, November 17, 2012.

In case you didn’t know, there are an Armitage Avenue and an Armitage CTA stop in Chicago, and in case you didn’t know, I spend a lot of my writing time in the stores of a particular Seattle coffee chain in a different city. I’ve never been in this store but now I am sorely tempted to move to Chicago and open up shop there.

Thanks, o perfectionist reader, for sending this photo. I will treasure it.

Help out a fellow blogger!

Obviously this is a repeat of a request I made earlier this week, but you can click once per day, so even if you already did it, please do it again:

Click for “Melanie Foust” to help Melanie of Melanie’s Musings win a $10,000 scholarship.

She’s moved up from 0% to 2% so it’s obviously helping. Ask your friends and family as well.

Struck me as funny:

Richard Armitage really likes food, but apparently Thorin does not.

RArchive:

• ItsJSforMe’s first blogiversary and she’s been crafting again! Give her some love.
• And speaking of anniversaries: CDoart’s second blogiversary! She needs some love, too.
• IngeD3 is starting a series, Thirty Days to Thorin! Day one is here.
• More on Mana Davis, Mr. Armitage’s stunt double in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Now we know where Armitage got the inspiration to find those boots he wore in the Black Sky candids.
• (h/t RAFrenzy): An injustice corrected in the name of Armitage’s small-scale double, Mark Atkin. I suspect we’re going to experience a series revival of pen / sword jokes in the next few months.
• Jonia describes how she finally started feeling the Thorin love.
• Credible, sexy Armitage manip. Love the smile.
• A wintry Thorin graphic that I really love.
• Advance notice of sebabybaby’s design project — he’s going to sell some of those wonderful cartoons. Stay tuned!
• Are you feeling like you’re on Thorin overdose?
• On enjoying these moments of Armitage triumph.
• What would happen if Richard Armitage were the Chanel No. 5 pitchman?
• GB draws Thorin with Gandalf.
• FL gets her Hobbit tickets. Also: Thoughts on the Dwarf and the Wizard.
• Heirs of Durin likes another Hobbit song. Further comments on it at Princesa de Ithilien (Spanish).
• Suggest shots for an Armitage “review view” video project.
• Triski continues with the 30 Day Richard Armitage challenge. Here’s day 5 — Armitage with a cheesy grin.
• Lotsa cool stuff on deviant art, for example Thorin as Uncle Thorin; on Mr. Thornton as “overbearing master”; and what happens when the dwarves sing the wrong tune.

Fanfic:

• Trudy, I miss you and I’ve started rereading parts of “A Heart for Milton” obsessively.
• Khandy’s “Absolution” goes to ch. 19 (Strike Back / JP + OC / explicit at times). If you thought Khandy was going to make the end of this story easy to bear, you were really wrong!
• GB’s “One Last Try” goes to ch. 14 (Robin Hood / Guy + Marian / not explicit in this chapter). A chapter with everything — a goofy plot, some sadness, and plenty of tension.
• Grati’s “Sir Guy’s Dilemma” (Robin Hood / Guy + OC / see disclaimers there) has a baptism on the cards this week.

Tumblr:

• For an Armitage Army manifesto, here’s one by AgzyM. I like the provisions about friendship and bullying a lot, although I foresee difficulty around defining what qualifies “disrespect” for a comrade and figuring out which activities are “supporting RA.”
• Beautiful Guy + Marian GIFset by mabelalexa.
• Another sort of Warholesque edit of Armitage.
• At Richard Armitage Confessions: someone would like him to go back to tv; and a guy gets into the discussion!
• Someone actually got the U.S. postage stamps from zazzle. Cool.
• “We are the Armakitty” — for some reason this just killed me, and I am not a cat lover.

OT, collateral attractions, and stuff I think about:

• Mr. Armitage, I hope you already have your suit(s) for the premieres. In case you don’t, though, here are some up to the minute men’s eveningwear trends. I admit I’m nervous, having seen the extremely sophisticated and extremely well-tailored clothes at the Skyfall premiere. But I know you can do it, Mr. Armitage!
• Gone but not forgotten — Phylly posts bccmee’s pictures of the Sandy aftermath. It’s going to take a long time and energy to clean this all up. Here’s last week’s set of links to some ways to help out Sandy survivors.
• Don’t forget to enjoy where you are.
• Agzy celebrates her birthday with a Twilight marathon.
• Via Ian McKellen’s FB page — his assertion that the age of great British acting is over. I love most of what McKellen writes on his blog, and especially the support he gives LGBT youth by speaking in schools about his own experiences, but I can’t agree with what he’s quoted as saying here, and want to urge him to consider how he can continue to encourage young artists.
• Brian Sibley (author of that Hobbit film guide we all love so much) has his own blog.
• On the gender wars in nerdy fandoms.
• You probably read that Prince Charles visited New Zealand and the Hobbit set this week, but it wasn’t all sugar. Although even terrorism is more civilized in Middle Earth.
• Hashtag fights during a local disaster in Indianapolis. Interesting in light of the twitter war currently going on over Gaza.
• Christmas in one adoptive family — a thoughtful post for anyone who, like me, experiences Christmas as a multiple traumaversary. It’s getting to be that time of year again.

~ by Servetus on November 18, 2012.