Castellan

I don't envy Don Jr his new role on the world stage.

Considering he loves Putin I find it odd he says 'Russian and Chines ships are all around it". He says he'd put high tariffs on Denmark if the Greenlanders vote to join the US. I don't think they'd be exporting much to the US. Must look into that. It reminds me that in the 19th century there was a Danish adventurer inspired by the age of revolution who wanted to take over Iceland and establish a liberal republic there. I guess he'd be the benign King abiding by the liberal laws he instituted. One tends to assume he was cracked, but possibly just "eccentric". I only know about him because he ended up as a convict in Australia, his face was carved into a convict built sandstone bridge by an Irish convict. He managed to get a ticket of leave (like parole) and do other things, bounding about in Australia. Marcus Clark described him as "an accomplished fortune hunter .... a human comet" Trump is more just an ideas man.

Where did this idea about Greenland come from?

Sorry to keep returning to this but I got curious. Well, having lived through the times he did, he was an active proponent of free and open societies i.e opposed to totalitarianism whether fascist or communist. (Would be interested to know if he extended that to other various new types of post colonial states that emerged and if he was opposed to religious states e.g. Israel.) However, in 1977 he wrote an article saying he now saw pure capitalism as a threat to free and open societies (and to his credit this has come true big time with the tech companies) and was thus decried by those who formerly would have seen him as on side with the idea of unfettered capitalism itself delivering progress. So he was now speaking for both regulation of capitalism and a role for government in delivering things capitalism wouldn't.

I kind of dislike the latest changes which are towards mixes of 'small plates' or 'share plates' of all sorts of dishes and dropping the idea of courses. Designed for grazing groups of youngish people I feel. Basically I don't want to have to learn any new customs about anything before I die. I have to say I never found entree very confusing or irritating. I suppose the things on offer under each course clued me in.

He is a long term proponent of free and open societies combined with investment acumen and great wealth makes some people afraid not to mention paranoid. He has donated billion to Open Societies foundations, leaving him with 6.7 billion according to WIkipedia. Being Jewish seals the deal for others e.g. Malaysia's premier Mahathir Mohammed accused him of causing the South East Asian financial crisis in 1997-98. At the time I heard rumours that Soros had done it in retaliation for anti-semitic comments Mahathir had made, but apparently he did not in fact bring about this crisis. Anyway they subsequently met and made up and the reportage was Mahathir said Soros explained he didn't do it but other players did, which is interesting. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2006-12-15/malaysian-ex-premier-mahathir-and-billionaire/2154878

I've been back and re-read and I don't buy the hint about winged creatures. I think the vulture and the gargoyle are included to give a sinister, Halloween mood. I think this passage mostly conveys Theon's intuitive grasp of all the sickening, murderous overtones of the situation. Partly its his bleak perception that people can easily be, or revert to being, very animal-like, inhuman. Of those mentioned, three are reluctant allies of the Boltons, probably waiting in hope of being able to turn the tables. Faces that seem to slide into something else can suggest this two-facedness, the changing forces of war, and deception. The other two are cousins, Freys who count the number of heirs between them and a Lordship. The passage may be foreshadowing the murder of Little Walder. Of those mentioned: Stout is introduced as a character when Ramsay arrives at his castle, demands a feast, digs into his stores of food and created mayhem. Stout remains expressionlessly obedient and dog like, but would presumably be quite happy to see Ramsay die and a better dog at the top. Old Lord Locke has lost the younger members of his family. His resemblance to a vulture results from extreme old age - he has no teeth, and we can imagine an old narrow face. Its not stated, but I picture him hunched over is gruel like a vulture over carrion. There are a couple of hints elsewhere in the text that he loyal to Wyman Manderly, but this doesn't extent up the new hierarchy to Boltons or Freys. Whoresbane Umber - a gargoyle is another image of age, a grimacing, staring old face. He does sound like a hard and creepy old man, what with the story of how he got his byname killing a male prostitute who tried to rob him when he was studying at the Citadel. He is flint eyed and frightening and is another waiting for the tide to turn. We have seen quite a lot of the two Walders before this, and know that Little Walder is a large bully, and stupid, whereas Little Walder is foxy faced and cunning, and has said he thinks he could become Lord of the Crossing. I presume that killing Little Walder is his first step in eliminating the rival heirs. The red face on Walder could be suggesting a wash of blood. Perhaps he is a sacrificial bull.

when is Sansa described as a bat? I'm not challenging, just asking.

As usual I think this is loony and then start to have doubts. Then I have doubts again. Then I change my mind. Then I don't want to think about it. It is a bit weird that one character is a "red bull" - and with a ring in its nose! There are a couple of species of cattle called red - Red Angus - but its hardly a well known fact. It could just be a tribute to a drink that's kept a lot of nerds and writers buzzing - except you point out it does raise the 'gives you wings' notion .. and that it is possible to interpret the mastiff and the fox as winged animals as well ... Aaarrghh!

Ownership's a key point I suppose. if anyone is alive 1000 years from now It'll be some colony descended from an unpleasant elite.

No its not.

That's why i tend to think it wont play out straightforwardly. Jon is clearly a hero already and has the genetics as does Dany, strangely Stannis is in there too, aware of the wights and the Others and working with Jon However, Dany has dragons which seem like they'll be essential at least in fighting the army of wights. I can't see her as a mere red herring i think that would peeve me. I wonder how important Bran the new greenseer in place beyond the Wall will be,

hmm well follow up to my excited post somewhere above - my husbands COVID didn't seem that bad from the point of view someone who didn't catch it from him. He said he felt like shit and just collapsed in bed. He kept falling asleep. Aside from a small dry cough that was the first symptom and went away, he never got any cold or flu symptoms ie nose, throat or lungs. Just feeling awful and being exhausted. "Awful' was not futher defined. It took quite a while to go away and he felt quite normal and was doing normal life stuff for the last few days but the tests were still positive, just with an increasingly pale line till finally it was blank. I think by the time he'd got home he had passed the most infectious stage, also, he thinks he got a mild version because he has had so many vaccinations.

Then again, Aerys appointed an excellent Hand who ran the Seven Kingdoms very well for a long time. Even the succession of lickspittle hands Jaime remembers seem quite respectable, really. He didn't get into merchandising as far as I know. Did he? Its not a fact you think to check when reading the books.

I think its going to be sadly predictable one of mental illness and the strange attraction of being an assassin.

I just feel his actions this time round are so unreal its like a comic book or... a fantasy work's mad king.

quite a lot I suspect he also took the same means of transport away as to NY and, of course, went into McDonalds to eat. he has a masters degree, but I feel it has not been useful

I stand corrected. However, I could just as easily have said that The Prince that was promised was a prophecy and does not have to come out exactly as one person who saves the world, and that its possible we will be arguing about who they were years after publication. Prophecies are likely, even traditionally likely, to come out in unexpected ways. By the way, a legend is not something that happened in the past, it is a story set in the past.

I think I probably am

ahem. Vance is reason enough. and all those freaks around Trump who'd compete to be the candidate at the next election.

I'm glad its not NOW as I am seriously stumped.

I think he's young and poor, not a professional assassin as in movies! The Guardian quoted this book in an article about rage against the health insurers; https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691190785/deaths-of-despair-and-the-future-of-capitalism sounded pretty interesting. They included this quote: “The American healthcare system is a leading example of an institution that, under political protection, redistributes income upwards to hospitals, physicians, device-makers, and pharmaceutical companies while delivering among the worst health outcomes of any rich country,” the economists wrote.

They have a photo and DNA so I am not surprised. Someone must know him and its a good picture. They could always do genetic genealogy - he's bound to have some distant relative on a database. As I said, I think he looks like a teenager or early twenties (same thing, really). He hasn't thought it through and had a very low budget. You'd be better off sleeping in a bush or somewhere outside NY or just in the burbs than in a shared room in a hostel that has security cameras.

I'm not sure how you drew this conclusion! Any number of factors might influence why he publicly criticises one and not the other. He is not a programmed robot. One point is, if he criticised the content or plot of how agot ended, the question rebounds on him - HBO expected that the book series would be finished by the time they got through the dramatising the existing ones. He might not want to stir that issue up.

I think his comment was bleak for us but his mood wasn't bleak he was just passing over the question with a giggle, really 'how did i get 13 late'? or whatever he said. He seems to refuse to engage because apparently its not like he can actually respond to the issue by writing... why the hell not? some last changes?