What a year the last 2 weeks have been. At several points in this monumentally long November I’ve meant to sit down and write a post, but really, where to even start? The good news is that Biden won. The bad news is that damn near 50% of Americans were ready to sign up for 4 more years of tangerine hate. It’s all uphill from here, and there is an immeasurable amount of work to do. But I think we all deserve to take a beat and feel some joy. Trump’s bid to destroy democracy through legal proceedings post election is being laughed out of court around the country, and in the wise words of a member of the Biden campaign team,

The US government is perfectly capable of removing a trespasser from the White House.

So this weekend, let’s all breath a little easier and relish in some Schadenfreude joy.

I have never been prouder to live in the fine city of Philadelphia. I am waiting with bated breath for a 10 part Ken Burns documentary on the 4 Seasons Total Landscaping. Lou Dobbs tried to mobilize Republicans to “surround Philadelphia“.

Philadelphia responded the way only Philly can. This is the town that decapitated the Love robot because we didn’t like the cut of it’s gibb. Our city planners grease the lamp posts when the Eagles win to deter fans from climbing them when overcome with the sort of fervor that only a Philly sports fan can muster (it doesn’t work. We are very good at climbing poles). In this town, saying “the guy that punched a police horse that one time” doesn’t actually narrow it down that much.

Guys, this is the town that brought Gritty into the world. If you’re not from here, chances are you hadn’t heard of Gritty before the election. Gritty is one of the old gods. While renovating the Flyer’s stadium they found him beneath the ground. Gritty had always been there; Gritty is the Eldritch Spirit of Chaos that lives inside us all.

In tribute to Gritty’s tireless efforts to promote equality and to promote his shaggy agenda of the rebuttal of social norms I have decided that this year I will be celebrating Grittmas. I’ve given him a place of honor in my nativity. We don’t usually go in for religion, but I’m giving serious consideration to raising Mabel the Merciless as an acolyte of the great lord Gritty.

This week I’ve been reading…

The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson

I polished off the Well of Ascension before the election, but it felt weird to write about it until after the results were settled. The moral of this book can be best described as “everyone has to acknowledge that 1000 years of systemic racism and inequity cannot be solved in a day”. The boss fight is epic — and heartbreaking. Vin comes to terms with the need to sometimes use violence to protect others, but also has a moment of self-discovery where she sees that as a Mistborn, and someone in a position of power within the government and socioeconomic structure, she can use her privilege to either promote herself or protect/promote others. She chooses the latter. 

I don’t know that it’s possible to really summarize everything that happens in the last 100 pages of this book succinctly, because while it’s non-stop action, it’s also non-stop character growth and discovery. The Kollass massacre on the city leaves thousands dead and injured, including core members of Kelsier’s original crew. Tindwell and Sazed acknowledge their feelings for each other, but just as Sazed is beginning to trust in his own strength and power – and at the same time questioning what it means to be a man – Tindwell falls in battle. Vin returns to the city just after the nick of time, and while she is able to stop the Kollass, she couldn’t stop the massacre.

Vin and Elend make good on the title of the book and discover the Well of Ascension, which had been hidden in the city all along, and Vin releases the power from the well. In the final moments as Ellend lays critically injured she gives up the power, and his life, in order to save the world. Of course, things aren’t that simple, and in releasing the power Vin actually unleashed a great evil – The Deepness – into the world.

At the same time, Sazed has travelled back to the temple of the Iron Ministry where he and Marsh (Kelsier’s brother who joined the Ministry as a spy in book 1) first found the prophecy that ultimately led Vin to release the Deepness. Sazed discovers that the copy of the prophecy he took from the dungeon of the temple had been altered from the one inscribed on the wall there. Crushed by the knowledge that the Terrisman religion he had devoted his life trying to recover had been perverted by evil, he begins to leave, dejected and defeated. Marsh turns on him, and while Sazed prevails and lives to fight another day, he may never be the same. He leaves knowing that the evil Vin released is able to change writing unless it is written in metal, and that none of his lifetime of study can be trusted. 

Currently on my needles…

I’m very close to done with my iKnitiative cardigan, and I’ll be opening up a test knit for it in the next few weeks!

Mabel the Merciless’ Grittmas gift is coming along nicely, despite a small setback where I only ordered half as much yarn as I would need. You would think at this point in my life I’d be better at that. XD

I’ve never been good a project monogamy, so I’ve also started working on the pattern for my next knit after iKnitiative! I’m working on a fabulous cardigan take on my Beating Tee. I’m all about cardigans and social change for 2021.

~Megan-Anne

“Fuck around and find out.” – Philadelphia District Attourney Larry Krasner

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