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Janto McMullin

@jantomcm.bsky.social
54 followers 124 following 265 posts

Map freak. Currently obsessed with gothic stonework. He/him

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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Sometimes a character seems alien or weird, but it's not a plot point, eveyone treats them like a normal person doing normal things. That's when I suspect the author has, if not a self-insert, a Serious Message About Living a Good Life, or is in fact a creep in real life
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
If I had to guess, I think people most often assume this in relation to romance - the assumption is one lead is the fantasy, so the other is the insert. Or an author includes a side character who's generally a good person who really likes books
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
And having gone regularly to a Carnegie library as a kid, I am inclined to think "he can't be that bad". So simple!
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Dog poop bags at -15 takes it to another level
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
My personal take on it is that the Underhive is the only really squalid and unsanitary part, and sending your troublemakers down there to murder each other is a form of population control during times of relative peace
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
It sounds similar to the warfare of 'Celtic' Ireland, at least in the myths most would know. While of course there are epic battles, often it's the feuds and raids that get you, and there is a very ritual combat aspect to the Tain with the single combat at the ford after a series of ambushes
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
I wanted to understand how to communicate with my French boss a bit better, everthing I looked up said "argue a lot, but always from logic, not emotion"
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Also, to be blunt, while most farmers don't fit this mold, I know a few who inherited land for whom it's a conveniently subsidised live-action roleplay hobby more than it is contributing to food security or anything like that
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Oh I agree - there are some positive signs, but mostly in the most marginal places like the islands, of grass-roots stuff focused on conservation as a way for communities to survive
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
The problem is often, from experience with my own family, people want to hang on to their own lived past, and resent being told they're doing anything wrong, especially by outsiders from Dublin or London
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
A lot of people blaming motorists, but it's also likely cyclists are also bigger risk takers in Italy based on how they behave on a motorino scooter
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
It feels like German ideas of frugality and debt aversion cast a long shadow up here
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
It at least used to be the case that if your parents are middle class and you're at all academic, you are probably getting extra "grinds" to boost your test results, or resitting the exam after an extra year of just grinds to score high enough for your favourite subject
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
I believe this had to be put into practice in Ireland where medical students ended up being chosen by lottery due to an oversupply of students with maximum points
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
They're old enough to have such a fantastically illiberal take on the Irish Famine it's no wonder laissez faire became a dirty word for many in Ireland
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
I'm actually playing around with this in my Vampire campaign - sorta subverting the whole "We rule the night, we have the best conspiracy, old vampires are basically gods" by having corpo-military baddies doing all sorts of shady stuff with/to any vampires that fall into their clutches.
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
They are so close but so far from realizing the Russian state still considers them second class, disposable assets compared to 'real' Russians
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Up until very recently in Ireland, being a nun could be an attractive chance to actually have a career, maybe even travel
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
I just felt like it was clear academic management (along with probably owner-run SMEs and NGOs) was a kind of hospice for bad management ideas
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
Sciences Po faculty both relieved and insulted to be ignored as they sweep yet another scandal under the rug
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
I think that was his point, you get an early explicit rather than implicit understanding of grammar, instead of the implicit "vibes-based grammar" mothertongue speakers typically have
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
You were lucky it wasn't the local PD/Sheriff checking in on a clearly mentally unstable hobo
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
I did meet an elderly polyglot translator who'd studied Latin much younger and claimed learning it early was the gateway to picking up pretty much any other language
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Yeah - very helpful if you ask in my experience too, but as an introvert myself if I gave into Finnish shame I'd be completely sunk. by contrast, we were once "abducted" by a Dublin airport worker who saw us with a small kid and started vigorously pushing our trolley toward the bus
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
Probably most relevant when it comes to Ireland's strategic position for undersea cables and Atlantic waters and total dependence on the UK airforce / Navy
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
It is a bit of a problem regarding integration though when the joke is social interaction is frowned on, and the prefered method of humour is deadpan irony
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
Remember the older Mac Pros had a convenient latch to open the case which someone used to conveniently steal RAM from the design studies computer room in college
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
Out of curiosity, how does it pan out for the kids of immigrants who end in the vocational track? Here in Finland it's widely seen as a kiss of death towards low-skilled work for immigrants
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
Need to back-port this into V20 to add some drama to players who want to be very 'white hands' in only taking a bit of blood or even just animal blood/blood bags. Thinking of just increasing the DC of Frenzy checks by 1 for animal blood, 2 for dead blood. Sucks to be Brujah
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
I do have a would-be humanist in VtM taking the blood that's to be discarded after testing. The trick is it's never enough for demand. Also he now hates the PCs and would rather burn his op to the ground than let them take an inch
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
Vice versa, Americans can happily charge right into a patch of nettles
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 05/06/2026
Derpy VTM elders talking about being torpified
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 01/05/2026
Exactly - the MPs sharpened the sword, never expecting it be turned on them
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 09/04/2026
I mean, it starts out kinda grounded where they are worried about cops and old money, and by the end they're beating off and killing all comers, including feds, so I'd say it's pretty glamorized
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
Honestly there are pubs in Dublin you wouldn't trust to make a decent one
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
Suffering from a head cold, I asked for a hot whiskey at our local place in Florence. They said sure, so I left no instructions. Ended up with a generous brandy glass of pure whiskey heated with the espresso machine. Had about the same effect as Vicks
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
I always naively assumed pharmacists and doctors were trained in the same shorthand to make forged prescriptions harder to pull off
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 19/03/2026
I am here for AI destroying bad academic writing. But I now treat anything that sniffs of AI's favourite cheery "why this matters" summaries and listicles as boring boilerplate to be skimmed with extreme prejudice and skepticism Having an interesting voice as a writer is going to be very valuable
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
Rural Italians (and Irish) talk shit about people from the next village, as in 'people from X are all crazy'
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
Best I've encountered in the wild is swimming pools being translated as earthquakes
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
Yeah, most likely origin of the term blue-blood to distinguish aristocracy's 'pure' Visigoth Germanic roots as opposed to darker Mediterranean skin, these people were doing racism early
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 23/01/2026
You don't have that many kids being a prude
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Reposted by Janto McMullin
Seva @seva.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
“The strong do what they can" is what Athens said right before destroying itself. New piece on the Carney Doctrine, Vaclav’s grocer, and American hubris. hegemon.substack.com/p/the-strong...
hegemon.substack.com
The Strong Will Suffer What They Must
Vaclav's Grocer and American Hubris
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 15/01/2026
What's funny is at the swimming pool in Bamberg, it was overwhelmingly American soldiers claiming things with towels despite bilingual signs forbidding it
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 12/01/2026
One rainy day going a bit too fast on English roads that spare front plate will decapitate someone
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 11/01/2026
Funnily enough some Irish firefighters I knew who assisted after 9.11 also felt their NYFD colleagues were reckless cowboys
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 09/01/2026
I dunno... stuff like Line of Duty seem like very procedural internal affairs stuff, and a few seasons in there's crooked cop assassins gunning people down on the regular
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 08/01/2026
Indeed - and it fails to grapple with the issue that law enforcement often give confused or contradictory instructions that are impossible to comply with. In this case, eye-witnesses claim she was being told to move.
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Janto McMullin @jantomcm.bsky.social · 08/01/2026
Or even the gap between Sweden's image in the English-speaking world as opposed to say, Poland
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Reposted by Janto McMullin
RJ Palmer 🔜 LBX 637 @rj-palmer.com · 24/12/2025
Feel really bad for any women posting photos of themself on twitter right now and anyone who has ever posted photos of their kids. Things are about to get much worse for everyone.
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