I was in Birnam wood earlier this year. There is very little of the old forest left.

Government control, more. Continually restricting things that go against their viewpoint. Pushing digital ID online despite obvious security risks.

The most obvious thing would be that we and other creatures would have sight as a secondary sense. If light went that slowly we would have to develop other ways of navigating the world, such as echolocation, smell or touch.

Run of the moors, run of the hills

And like that to school at summer's end

Us being children of five years of age

Without a word of English in our heads

That's my literal translation anyway.

I was talking to an American yesterday who couldn't understand the concept of the Highlands yesterday. His whole idea was of a place presented magically but with little more than funny accents in it.

I tried to get over to him all the history of suppression, eviction, lack of economic development etc... but the big one is cultural. If the Highlands lose their culture (and they already have largely) then they are indistinguishable from anywhere else.

I mean make him read Hallaig by Somhairle MacGill-eain.

And, ideally, go and visit a cleared township.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/nc8uhBogrBCjgjYs9

I used to walk out there most weekends when I was at school. Until about 175 years ago, those were homes. Families lived there.

The white dots you see are sheep, which is of course why families don't live there now.

Good Gaelic, incidentally, where did you speak it?

If you look closely they tend not to be "Tom Clancy" but "Tom Clancy's". No Clancy book with the apostrophe is worth reading.

Why be so specific? Speaking as a Tom Clancy who read the first four or five.

St. George is likely based on Michael, but I imagine the logic would be that the dragon was some kind of convoluted version of the King of the Nagas.

St. Jehosophat is one of them.

Neither of them are currently recognised.

Catholics don't formally recognize them but most or maybe all orthodox christian churches do.

Their status is curious (along with clearly fictional saints like St. Brigid, the former Irish Goddess of Fire).

Canonization is mostly considered to be under the remit of Papal Infallibility, which means it cannot be revoked. If the Pope gets drunk on sacramental wine and saints Pikachu the Pokeman character, Pikachu (somehow) enters heaven. Doubt that, and you commit heresy.

But that's not absolutely, totally decided RC law - just a majority opinion. AFAICT.

What absolutely has happened is that saints without plausible historical backing have had their feast days revoked, and (sometimes but not always) have been removed from the lists of saints the Church encourages Catholics to pray to. (St. Christopher is now believed to be allegorical, but prayer to "him" is still encouraged nonetheless.) Basically, they've been demoted, like the uncle that is technically still a blood relation, but doesn't get the invite to Thanksgiving dinner.

Now please pass the Turkiye.

Brìde is a funny one. It is just about possible that there was a real Brìde who was an abbess, or several in fact, but she was so heavily blended with the pagan deity that she is virtually indistinguishable in some respects.

We have a lot of places named after her in Scotland. West and East Kilbride, Lhanbryde and various churches and centres named after her.

Many cities are heat sinks and make the problem worse locally due to lack of tree cover and an overabundance of concreta and tar.

You criticise the previous poster for seeing Communism everywhere and then recommend them a book by Adorno, a dyed in the wool red. That will confuse 'em.

https://iep.utm.edu/adorno/

Why? I wanted to point out the significant overlap in the views of Adorno and the ones expressed by the poster.

Also, that essay is a real banger.

"I know it's the US"

It could be Australia or Canada. They have similar.