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cey wrote:

and guthwulf's proximity to the centre of the chaos goes out the window when you think about the fact that rachel barely notices anything going on at all.

Right. She certainly notices the castle is shifting, but she isn't driven mad by unseen voices and singing swords.

oh and just to inform everyone for no reason whatsoever, i'm actually going to be reading along with the reread from now on, so there's a slight possibility that i'll actually have something original to say instead of just leeching off of all of you. possibly.

okay i'm done.

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Neemo wrote:

she didn't touch Sorrow

True, however:

Elias touched Sorrow, and wasn't driven mad. He also touched Minneyar, and wasn't driven mad.

Simon touched Thorn and wasn't driven mad.

Camaris, Josua, Sludig, and others also touched Thorn, and weren't driven mad.

Firsfron of Ronchester wrote:

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True, however:

Elias touched Sorrow, and wasn't driven mad. He also touched Minneyar, and wasn't driven mad.

Simon touched Thorn and wasn't driven mad.

Camaris, Josua, Sludig, and others also touched Thorn, and weren't driven mad.

Elias isn't mad? Pretty close me thinks, maybe the vile concotion he drinks helps him keep some semblance of sanity?

Also Guthwulf's world was turned ass over teakettle, so there is more than the swords driving him mad. But before he was blinded the sword was definately bothering him. I'm just saying the swords singing on top of everything else. Once the closest freind and most trusted knight of the king and now a starving begger walking aimlessly through the dark hounded by the tormented souls of the sithi as well as two singing swords. don't forget too that he can't even distinguish Brightnail from Sorrow. Or can he? I forget

As for Thorn, hmmm maybe Sorrow is like the "One Sword to rule them all"? Handling it gives you insight to other things? makes you more subseptable to the "singing"? whatever the case, each sword obviously has magical properties as different as the material each is made from. ie. there is no reason to suggest that Sorrow is like thorn, as far as the going where only it wants to go property.

or How about a body, mind and soul type of comparison to the swords?

Memory is soul, sorrow is mind and Thorn is body?

[ March 02, 2006: Message edited by: Neemo ]

Firsfron of Ronchester wrote:

How about this cat? Says there, this cat leads a blind dog to food every day.

This site also mentions a seeing-eye cat. And this one as well. This site mentions a cat that would lead a human in darkness to his front door.
Heres' a blog that features a seeing-eye cat. And one here, too.


More on your posts later, but I've got to get ready for work...

*mischevous grin*  I couldn't find any seeing-eye cats eitherwhen I looked on the 'net....

Ok, Ok!  So in part I'm being facetious, but I do wish to make the point that these sites are for the most part blogs and therefore very suspect in a number of ways when it comes to discussing animal behaviour.  There are a number of background things that make me question whether these animals really are seeing eye cats in the way that I meant, and that is in the capacity of being able to care for and lead a human in unfamiliar as well as familiar territory.  The issue of territory (and repetetive actions such as exit points and location of food in houses), instinctive nurturing reponses and associated responses to animal distress signals, imprinting, the superior (non-seeing) senses of smell that both cats and dogs have compared to humans and the all too human tendancy to anthropomorphise animal behavior to me indicate that these anecdotal websites don't really refute my statement that there are no seeing-eye cats.  I spent about an hour looking before posting here tonight and other than these blog sites, there are no places where I could find evidence that cats can be used as guides for blind humans.  There were some websites that suggested the opposite, but even they tended to either be commentaries about books on cats, or catlover websites. The lack of evidence either way simply seems to suggest that they just don't exist, except in animal to animal relationship, which I believe has far more behavioural factors to be considered than just a surface statement of saying my cat is a seeing eye cat for my dog.

I don't wish to belabour the issue in this thread any further (in case you all get bored and runaway or think that I am being freaky and obsessive :-/).  The cat character (Grimalkin, if you wish), is by far from done playing a significant part in this story and I will continue to discuss as it comes up.  At this point,  my point is that this cat, over a sustained time frame cares for a human being, not only bringing Guthwulf food (which is normal cat behaviour), but leading him to new food sources (not referenced on any website I have looked at) in new territories (dangerous behaviour if you are tending kittens or a sick member of a group), providing company (not unusual in domesticated cats) and generally being a guide for humans in ways that only dogs (and in some cases pigs and small ponies) are observed doing.  *ducks rotten tomatos amidst bored groans*

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@ just charlotte

Maybe Camaris had his fortune was read by someone? Geloe, Morgenes or Amerasu in his possible visit to Jao'Tinukea (whatever :) )

Amerasu is my guess, she saw something on the road of dreams telling him the world would end if he didn't get rid of thorn and go jump in a lake ;D

gah! AT bump of doom!

*unlurks*

hi guys!

*relurks*

Firsfron of Ronchester wrote:

Miriamele and Simon meet once more. She does not immediately recognize him; she barely speaks to him. She does not ask about Leleth. She goes to take a nap.

As I said in the last thread, Simon knew who was arriving. Miriamele didn’t know who was waiting for her.*

And Miriamele claiming to need to lied down… yeah, not a very nice thing to do, but… it reminded me a bit of myself. Admittedly, I was in kindergarten/primary school at the time I did this – every time I was supposed to do something that I didn’t want to do because I was scared – and I was scared of a lot of things – I claimed I was too tired to do it.

As for Leleth, Miriamele hasn’t even seen/noticed Geloë yet – how would she know Leleth is there?

Firsfron of Ronchester wrote:

By the time Miriamele arrives, it does appear Aditu is dressing more appropriately: this week's reread indicates Aditu has borrowed Vorzheva's clothes. So Miriamele is then just repeating what she's heard from others, rather than what she's seen herself.

But it also says somewhere that she is still showing more bare skin than is proper – which doesn’t have to be a lot. Heck, I even feel embarrassingly half-dressed when I go to dance practise in my slightly-too-short dress (which doesn’t quite cover my ankles) and with nothing on my head.

Firsfron of Ronchester wrote:

"Elysia, mother of God!"

"No. My mother named me Aditu."

Which ranks as one of the funniest lines in the entire series.

I can only agree. I wanted to quote it to our apprentice boy, but he wasn’t at work today or yesterday.
Ah well. Going to make him read MST, and then we can spend the next couple of weeks quoting lines at each other.

JustCharlotte wrote:

ylvs wrote:

Apart from this very simple one?

Good spotting!  I'm way to lazy to have ever looked that up!   It's funny though, I always saw the cat as youngish, for some reason.

Probably because we assume that Grimalkin is the same as the scatter-catter, who is young.
I used to assume that, too, but when I think about it, it doesn’t make much sense. The roof cat is shy, scared of Simon – Grimalkin isn’t scared of people.
Though the cat that saves Simon from Pryrates in DBC might be the same as Grimalkin.

Hah. I propose a ridiculous theory. The mind-contact with Pryrates made Grimalkin more intelligent than other cats, which explains any un-cat-like behaviour. *sagenod*