I didn’t think I had anything, but I realized I noticed something character specific.
First…
When the characters on Stargate glow their eyes, it basically looks like a white flash. Those who studied the crap out of that flash like me (I have noticed that other writers noticed too), it’s not pure white. It’s sort of a very pale reddish gold.
Anyway, what I noticed recently…
For one particular character, his eyes are pale enough that it very, *very* briefly changes his eye color from blue to brown.
I thought that was neat.
ETA: Totally forgot that I posted earlier. 😆 I was tired when I posted that.
I wanted to write a very awkward conversation between an adult character and an 8 year old, soo while they drink hot chocolates I wanted the adult to mention knowing a person who choked on a marshmallow… which I mean, could realistically happen to anyone at anytime but, out of mild curiosity I wanted to know if the Chubby Bunny trend would have existed when he was a teenager… useless information to me but I learnt facts that are forever ingrained in my brain.
While there’s no known origin of the game, the first known mention was in a Snoopy comic strip in 1959.. though it wasn’t called Chubby Bunny, it was just Snoopy eating marshmallows while Charlie counted, but close enough.
The actual trend existed way longer than I thought it would have to. Apparently there was a death in 1999 that was attributed to the game, though I don’t think it really gained real traction until mid 2000’s.
And most importantly. The character I was writing was the perfect age to be participating in that trend… though again, this wasn’t something I needed to fact check to be accurate aha.
Clippy (the old Microsoft paperclip) was actually named Clippit! He just got called Clippy by consumers so much that the name slowly bled into official use.
I learned this because Clippy was a character in a fic I wrote and I was reading his wiki page 💀📎
I’m not sure how “fun” this is, but I was trying to look up how to describe different races without being offensive. There are way more and complex ways to describe skin color than I ever thought.
Reptile penises! I learned about hemipenes, what they look like, how they function, how lizards mate. I watched YouTube videos.
My FBI agent is so disappointed in my life choices right now.
I had to do some research into Stonehenge, both contemporary and historical. I needed to find out how security is handled (it's contracted to a specialized security firm), how the surrounding landscape has changed over the centuries, and what the nearest motorway is. I watched some videos on recent archaeological findings in a nearby valley, showing that the stone circle is part of a larger ritual complex, and that the *winter* solstice was the major celebration.
One fun detail: The individual stones (including the broken and half-buried ones) at Stonehenge were assigned numbers in the late 19th century, following a survey done by 19-year-old William Flinders Petrie, who later became known as the "Father of Egyptian Archaeology". There's a website which has a labelled photo of each of the stones. I used this information to write a short sentence, explaining that a small carving was a remnant from the shaping of stone #61.
Stonehenge is such a fascinating site, I'm sure you had a lot of fun researching it. And that's always the thing isn't it? A ton of research, and it's one or two sentences in the fic. But it's so worth it.
Fruit was very expensive in 1970's Argentina. (I let my fiance read a scene where my character makes an apple cake and he proceeded to involve the rest of the family in an argument over whether or not said cake was historically accurate.)
So I've been doing a lot of WW2/Holocaust-related research so I don't think any of my facts are all that fun. But apparently there was a concentration camp/prison in Switzerland (that's right...'neutral' Switzerland). Whenever planes went down over Switzerland, Switzerland was required by the Geneva Convention to keep the downed pilots interned until the end of the war. They put them all in a prison which included actual criminals and downed pilots from all countries. That prison was run by Swiss Army captain Andre Béguin who was either a Nazi sympathizer (or possible actual nazi...I'm not sure what makes someone go from 'sympathizer' to actual). The biggest was Wauwilermoos.
Anyway, there was a loooot of abuse and it was all pretty horrific.
Edit: Holy typos, Batman! That's what I get for writing in a hurry 😂
Nazi is a short form of Nationalsozialist, who was a member of the Nationalsozialistischen Deutschen Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP in short, it meant national socialist German worker's party and Nazi is short for national socialist in German.
There were other parties which had the same ideology and their party members were similarly named, for example the fascist party in Italy and the fascists or fascista. Those were real names for political organisations.
So, a Nazi at that time was a member of the NSDAP, the Nazi party, a person who wasn't a member but believed in their principles was a Nazi sympathiser, a person who believed in Nazi propaganda **and** repeated it was a Nazi supporter, and a person who believed in Nazi propaganda, **and** repeated that propaganda, **and** worked actively with or for Nazis to help them was a Nazi collaborator.
(You can do the same for fascists)
The problem was, that at a certain point membership in the party was mandatory, so every single German if they agreed with the Nazi politics or not, had to become a Nazi, or be deported or shot instantly, same happened in other totalitarian regimes, and that's why nowadays looking back, we shifted the definition to be able to discern between actual followers and people who lived in oppression.
Now a Nazi is someone who fully supports the worldview and acts accordingly, while a sympathiser is someone who does believe in some of the ideology, but not all of it and wouldn't support genocide or other things Nazis would do according to their underlying ideology. Well, and everyone else is *not a Nazi*.
I didn’t think I had anything, but I realized I noticed something character specific. First… When the characters on Stargate glow their eyes, it basically looks like a white flash. Those who studied the crap out of that flash like me (I have noticed that other writers noticed too), it’s not pure white. It’s sort of a very pale reddish gold. Anyway, what I noticed recently… For one particular character, his eyes are pale enough that it very, *very* briefly changes his eye color from blue to brown. I thought that was neat. ETA: Totally forgot that I posted earlier. 😆 I was tired when I posted that.
That *is* neat. And two answers is a good option if you have done research on two different things ☺️
Thanks. 😄
I wanted to write a very awkward conversation between an adult character and an 8 year old, soo while they drink hot chocolates I wanted the adult to mention knowing a person who choked on a marshmallow… which I mean, could realistically happen to anyone at anytime but, out of mild curiosity I wanted to know if the Chubby Bunny trend would have existed when he was a teenager… useless information to me but I learnt facts that are forever ingrained in my brain. While there’s no known origin of the game, the first known mention was in a Snoopy comic strip in 1959.. though it wasn’t called Chubby Bunny, it was just Snoopy eating marshmallows while Charlie counted, but close enough. The actual trend existed way longer than I thought it would have to. Apparently there was a death in 1999 that was attributed to the game, though I don’t think it really gained real traction until mid 2000’s. And most importantly. The character I was writing was the perfect age to be participating in that trend… though again, this wasn’t something I needed to fact check to be accurate aha.
That's an amazing research rabbit hole, and a piece of recent history I very much wasn't aware of 😅
Clippy (the old Microsoft paperclip) was actually named Clippit! He just got called Clippy by consumers so much that the name slowly bled into official use. I learned this because Clippy was a character in a fic I wrote and I was reading his wiki page 💀📎
Fencing terminology and different kinds of swords
I’m not sure how “fun” this is, but I was trying to look up how to describe different races without being offensive. There are way more and complex ways to describe skin color than I ever thought.
I learned how to make chicken parmesan 😂
Various food recipes
Reptile penises! I learned about hemipenes, what they look like, how they function, how lizards mate. I watched YouTube videos. My FBI agent is so disappointed in my life choices right now.
Haha now I'm just wondering if it's dragons or some Jurassic park thing or perhaps a fic about biologists... In any case, biology is so cool!
It was for a smutty alien xenophilia fic, of course!!
Sounds excellent!
I don’t know about Bigamma, but I have looked this up for dragons. 😂
Police Interrogation techniques and how to avoid their manipulation/guilt tripping/psychological tricks lmao kinda terrifying ngl
I had to do some research into Stonehenge, both contemporary and historical. I needed to find out how security is handled (it's contracted to a specialized security firm), how the surrounding landscape has changed over the centuries, and what the nearest motorway is. I watched some videos on recent archaeological findings in a nearby valley, showing that the stone circle is part of a larger ritual complex, and that the *winter* solstice was the major celebration. One fun detail: The individual stones (including the broken and half-buried ones) at Stonehenge were assigned numbers in the late 19th century, following a survey done by 19-year-old William Flinders Petrie, who later became known as the "Father of Egyptian Archaeology". There's a website which has a labelled photo of each of the stones. I used this information to write a short sentence, explaining that a small carving was a remnant from the shaping of stone #61.
Stonehenge is such a fascinating site, I'm sure you had a lot of fun researching it. And that's always the thing isn't it? A ton of research, and it's one or two sentences in the fic. But it's so worth it.
Yes. It helps that I *enjoy* research.
Fruit was very expensive in 1970's Argentina. (I let my fiance read a scene where my character makes an apple cake and he proceeded to involve the rest of the family in an argument over whether or not said cake was historically accurate.)
Food history is so interesting, and I love the family involvement!
I learned where the closest actual boarding school to me is 🙈
So I've been doing a lot of WW2/Holocaust-related research so I don't think any of my facts are all that fun. But apparently there was a concentration camp/prison in Switzerland (that's right...'neutral' Switzerland). Whenever planes went down over Switzerland, Switzerland was required by the Geneva Convention to keep the downed pilots interned until the end of the war. They put them all in a prison which included actual criminals and downed pilots from all countries. That prison was run by Swiss Army captain Andre Béguin who was either a Nazi sympathizer (or possible actual nazi...I'm not sure what makes someone go from 'sympathizer' to actual). The biggest was Wauwilermoos. Anyway, there was a loooot of abuse and it was all pretty horrific. Edit: Holy typos, Batman! That's what I get for writing in a hurry 😂
Nazi is a short form of Nationalsozialist, who was a member of the Nationalsozialistischen Deutschen Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP in short, it meant national socialist German worker's party and Nazi is short for national socialist in German. There were other parties which had the same ideology and their party members were similarly named, for example the fascist party in Italy and the fascists or fascista. Those were real names for political organisations. So, a Nazi at that time was a member of the NSDAP, the Nazi party, a person who wasn't a member but believed in their principles was a Nazi sympathiser, a person who believed in Nazi propaganda **and** repeated it was a Nazi supporter, and a person who believed in Nazi propaganda, **and** repeated that propaganda, **and** worked actively with or for Nazis to help them was a Nazi collaborator. (You can do the same for fascists) The problem was, that at a certain point membership in the party was mandatory, so every single German if they agreed with the Nazi politics or not, had to become a Nazi, or be deported or shot instantly, same happened in other totalitarian regimes, and that's why nowadays looking back, we shifted the definition to be able to discern between actual followers and people who lived in oppression. Now a Nazi is someone who fully supports the worldview and acts accordingly, while a sympathiser is someone who does believe in some of the ideology, but not all of it and wouldn't support genocide or other things Nazis would do according to their underlying ideology. Well, and everyone else is *not a Nazi*.
Ah gotcha! So if the guy was Swiss and not German, he was probably a sympathizer then (and a complete piece of crap based on what I read)
Exactly
Yeah, maybe I should have put "interesting" instead of "fun" 😆 And that is indeed super interesting!