Impulsively Reading Since...

“In the wild, polar bears are notoriously difficult to get to, to monitor and observe in any way.”

In polar bear news...

I feel like I want to make this a weekly feature or something. There are things out there for sale that people have to be buying. If no one bought them, if there was zero demand, the market would correct itself by eventually pulling these objects from the shelves of stores, yes? I mean, I don't know much about economics but this is just common sense.

This has to be especially true of fresh food items because they have an actual shelf life. Even if you're not bothered by 'sell by' or 'use by' dates these items will eventually actually go bad and have to be disposed of because - even if I cannot understand why someone would buy it now - I'm pretty sure no one would purposely buy rotting food unless you needed it for a Sherlockian experiment of some kind.

What brought these thoughts into my head? Shrink-wrapped potatoes. Shrink-wrapped potatoes sitting next to and actually mixed in with the normal (dare I say naked?) potatoes.

I looked closely at one of the shrink-wrapped potatoes and determined that it had not been scrubbed clean before it had been dressed in its little plastic bag, sealed neatly, and slapped with a label identifying it as a potato. That eliminated the only possible reason I might be willing to pay more for this potato than the one right next to it.

Of course, the last time I asked this sort of question I learned that my entire grocery shopping strategy had evolved to account for the fact that I lived on the third floor for years and most people do in fact own enough canned goods at any one time to have to plan for moving them from house to house. So perhaps I'm just looking at it from an odd perspective and don't realize it.

Guys, quarryquest spoils me terribly. She took a lemon to 221B for me!

I am ridiculously behind on my flist due to rl issues - apologies to all - but I am throwing this up because I owe many, many thanks to 221b_hound who offered wonderful encouragement and insightful suggestions as well as eanor who basically made me cringe when she asked if I’d run out of time and thrown together the last bit - seriously, I nearly dove underneath the couch - but she was right, it was crap. I fixed it (or at least I hope I did) - thank her if you enjoy this story at all.

Title: Seasoned Truths

Recipient: keerawa for this most recent round at acd_holmesfest

Author: impulsereader

Rating: PG

Characters, including any pairing(s): Holmes, Watson, Mary, Watson/Mary, Holmes/Watson left to the reader’s interpretation

Warnings: None apply.

Summary: A look at moments within five canon stories, some points of which may have been narrated less reliably than artistically for various reasons. But then, reliable is a relative term; don’t you agree?

Disclaimer: I’ve used canon text extensively within this story. None of the text which has been italicised was written by me, it’s all straight out of ACD canon, copied and pasted from the html docs provided by Project Gutenberg. Accordingly, I am using this space to express that both Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Project Gutenberg are, in my opinion, utterly brilliant.

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"You come at a crisis, Watson," said he. "If this paper remains blue, all is well. If it turns red, it means a man's life."

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Hugh Stewart in his excellent booklet “Elements of English Country Dance” says: “Give weight: This is a common (despairing) cry”. Some people never seem to come to terms with it. If you're in a square set and you circle left, the men's hands are underneath and the ladies' hands are on top. The men push upwards and the ladies push downwards, so that there's some tension in your arms — you can actually feel that there's someone there. It's not an affectation; it's not something that you do because it looks pretty — it's sheer mechanics. It enables you to apply a force to the other person and thereby move them — while they're doing the same to you. The way to get a good circle (walked or slipped) is that you all give a slight pull to the person behind you. Try it. - colinhume.com

***

John frowned at the schedule because it was suddenly claiming that he had plans for that evening (right this moment, in fact) which it hadn’t done just that morning when he had checked it and it had instructed him to hand Sherlock his phone, a pickaxe and if he could find one, (a very rare qualification where his flatmate was concerned) a rubber stamp bearing the legend ‘Excellent!’. It had taken a stab at relating these instructions to their participation in the Production by tacking on the statement: Grandmother requested I ring her.

Even more alarming was the fact that the late-breaking activity was labelled: Dance Lesson. His first instinct was to go directly upstairs and pack a few things into a bag. A weekend in Dublin seemed an ‘Excellent!’ alternative. This action was forestalled by the ringing of the doorbell.
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Yeah, I'm totally late. But of course I taped it! It's England v. Wales and poor Douglas and Arthur are probably scheduled to be tipped a measly five hundred pounds each...(time travel, nostalgia, whatever...) ETA - holy cow, Wales won playing in Cardif - if only there was a fourth Birling Day to be told! Can you imagine the tips?

So I'm watching this and it's american football - without any padding or helmets. The players are wearing shorts. One guy has some blue headgear going on but it can't possibly be a helmet since everyone else is completely bareheaded.

I've got players in both red and white (because the flag's red white and blue [please note Wales is not uniformed per any of Arthur's rules and therefore I've no idea which they are]) and they're just now starting to look muddy after half an hour.

Please note that I know nothing about american football. I permanently swore off it when I was forced to play some form of it in high school and told I had to start with - and I quote - one down.

Please think about that for a second. Down is a negative term just on its own. Added to that, after a certain number of them you must give up your turn - it therefore proves to be the equivalent of an out (I understand baseball just fine - much simpler). Why do I need to start with one down? I haven't done anything at all wrong yet.

So - my real hope is that rugby has a more sensible scoring system than american football and this 'starting with one down' thing is some bizarre invention of our own as well.

One of the things that is striking me is the ball is being handed out of the tackles. Whereas in american football the player embraces the ball, holding on for all he is worth (in an effort to gain yardage?) as everyone within sight piles upon him - these guys are consistently shoving the ball out of the pile into a teammate's hands.

*

In another match - Italy won!!! (Mr Mandela is singing) possibly more later...

I've started up Foyle's War and been rewarded with both David Tennant and Roger Allam all in the first series. :-) Oooo... plus Amanda Root in the next episode.

in the course of researching a story continue to amaze me.

They've made violin strings from spider silk. Isn't that awesome? My search was completely unrelated but now I'm tempted to write these in somewhere.

I confess. Every single time I find Pretty Woman on television I turn it on regardless of how far along it has progressed. And I enjoy it. Every time.

I can only defend myself slightly by saying that after I've done so I pop in My Fair Lady to keep things balanced.

I cannot honestly say I then read Pygmalion as a follow up. That would be a bit too virtuous, canceling out my guilty pleasure in the first place. :-)

So September reached new levels of potential slashiness, as pointed out by azriona in her lovely comment, and I was aware of this when I was writing it. I left all the potential in there. I didn't censor it even though I have no intention of following through.

My own personal view of J&S’s relationship is that they do love one another. I just don’t need them to have sex as a result. My post-Reichenbach John had a panic attack because Sherlock popped onto a roof without giving him any warning. Clearly this man cares about his friend and partner to the point of loving him. So I’m writing a love story minus the sex. They are brothers. They have chosen one another. Society doesn’t really have a category for this outside marriage – hence all the slash fic. As I believe I recall pargoletta pointing out in her review of Belgravia, they are in a relationship and the closest equivalent is probably Anne Shirley's concept of 'bosom friends' or 'kindred spirits'.
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