Episode Transcript
[0:00:28 – 0:00:30] AdamSnowLog: Bonjour et bienvenue.
[0:00:32 – 0:00:36] AdamSnowLog: My name is Francois Le Castor, coming to you live in the snow globe.
[0:00:38 – 0:00:41] AdamSnowLog: And it is April 2nd, 2024.
[0:00:42 – 0:00:44] AdamSnowLog: Thanks for being here tonight.
[0:00:47 – 0:00:52] AdamSnowLog: We officially have the latest first ski jour for real in a winter.
[0:00:53 – 0:00:58] AdamSnowLog: It came on Thursday the 28th of March.
[0:00:59 – 0:01:01] AdamSnowLog: We finally got out there.
[0:01:03 – 0:01:32] AdamSnowLog: felt good you know the trail was kind of iffy but we got a pretty good amount of snow on the trail and the neighbor had run the the neighbors had both run their machines on there it looked like and uh some smaller dog teams and uh yeah got arrow in the harness on thursday after work and took a nice run out over the beaver pond and we end up going past there quite a ways and had ourselves a nice little run so
[0:01:35 – 0:01:58] AdamSnowLog: never gave up on those skis and had them waxed and ready to go all winter and Yeah, the snow log report, which is what made that whole adventure possible over the course of the three-day blizzard warning that ran from Sunday through Tuesday afternoon really We got a good 15 inches.
[0:01:59 – 0:02:02] AdamSnowLog: It’s just a smidge over 15 so we’ll call it 15
[0:02:04 – 0:02:13] AdamSnowLog: And two kind of big waves of snow with a real windy ice storm in the middle that put a nice layer of ice in there for us.
[0:02:15 – 0:02:16] AdamSnowLog: But overall it was pretty good snow.
[0:02:17 – 0:02:18] AdamSnowLog: Packy but not too dense.
[0:02:19 – 0:02:21] AdamSnowLog: So it set up really well for the trails.
[0:02:21 – 0:02:27] AdamSnowLog: And then it was cold just enough after that to develop some sort of trail out there.
[0:02:29 – 0:02:32] AdamSnowLog: Uh, school’s got two different Monday and Tuesdays.
[0:02:32 – 0:02:33] AdamSnowLog: School’s got a school day.
[0:02:34 – 0:02:35] AdamSnowLog: Uh, school’s got a school day.
[0:02:37 – 0:02:38] AdamSnowLog: School’s got a snow day.
[0:02:40 – 0:03:07] AdamSnowLog: two of them so that’s pretty awesome and the plows didn’t really seem to be in a hurry to plow the old gravel roads out here in the sticks but I was able to get into work on Monday and then Tuesday I just had the snow day too schools are closed, daycare is closed nothing really had to get done so I spent the day at home it was pretty nice
[0:03:09 – 0:03:36] AdamSnowLog: so yeah we’re gonna call 15 and that’s back up from zero so i posted a picture of the um of the snow log on graph paper for the year in which we’ve now hit gone backwards to zero twice and there’s been more heavy rain than there’s been heavy snow but nonetheless we currently have some decent trails um in the neighborhood and pretty much all up and down the north shore uh so
[0:03:40 – 0:03:42] AdamSnowLog: Yeah, really made my week.
[0:03:42 – 0:03:44] AdamSnowLog: So, pretty great.
[0:03:45 – 0:03:57] AdamSnowLog: I saw the Edwin Gott and the Vankenvort both sailing downbound today.
[0:04:00 – 0:04:03] AdamSnowLog: Snow seems to be done, but there was a chance of some flurries tonight.
[0:04:03 – 0:04:06] AdamSnowLog: But we’re going to get more than snow.
[0:04:06 – 0:04:08] AdamSnowLog: We’re going to get some really wicked north wind.
[0:04:08 – 0:04:09] AdamSnowLog: The old north wind.
[0:04:10 – 0:04:11] AdamPewPew: It’s going to blow.
[0:04:11 – 0:04:16] AdamSnowLog: So yeah, seeing those two big boats in close on the north shore, you know.
[0:04:17 – 0:04:20] AdamSnowLog: Either the north wind’s currently blowing or it’s going to blow.
[0:04:20 – 0:04:25] AdamSnowLog: Because they only take that extra long route if necessary.
[0:04:27 – 0:04:32] AdamSnowLog: Pretty neat to see those two big boats in near shore.
[0:04:33 – 0:04:36] AdamSnowLog: You can hear the wind already starting, but I think tomorrow it’s supposed to get even worse.
[0:04:40 – 0:04:48] AdamSnowLog: Um, this, uh, it is April now, but the previous weekend was the end of, uh, trout fishing for ice fishing season.
[0:04:49 – 0:04:54] AdamSnowLog: And, uh, we had some really nice weather and we had some snow out there, so we made the most of it.
[0:04:55 – 0:04:58] AdamSnowLog: Uh, we caught a lot of fish this weekend, which was pretty great.
[0:04:59 – 0:05:03] AdamSnowLog: Uh, yeah, Saturday, uh, got out on, uh,
[0:05:03 – 0:05:10] AdamSnowLog: I’ve been wanting to do this for a while, but I was able to get Arrow out with my buddy Josh.
[0:05:10 – 0:05:17] AdamSnowLog: He’s got a bunch of these really big, big dogs from the far north.
[0:05:18 – 0:05:20] AdamSnowLog: They’re like freight sled dogs.
[0:05:22 – 0:05:30] AdamSnowLog: And so he’s got a team of them and I brought Arrow out in harness and we hooked her up in the team with those big dogs, which was pretty comical.
[0:05:31 – 0:05:37] AdamSnowLog: And then me and Pike rode in the sled and Josh Drova drove the team out.
[0:05:37 – 0:05:40] AdamSnowLog: We ended up driving on a section of the Bear Grease Trail, which
[0:05:41 – 0:05:51] AdamSnowLog: I’ll tell you what, this winter has been a weird one, but I think one of the, when they canceled the Bear Grease, I mean, it really, like, made me way more sad than I thought it would be.
[0:05:51 – 0:05:56] AdamSnowLog: Like, it really, it actually, like, hurt when they canceled the Bear Grease.
[0:05:56 – 0:06:06] AdamSnowLog: And it was kind of, like, the beat, you know, when you started to know, like, this just ain’t going to be a normal winter when the Bear Grease went and then the other races and, like,
[0:06:07 – 0:06:31] AdamSnowLog: no trails to be had and it was like what the hell is going on around here um but even for one weekend we were able to have ourselves like a real legit winter and uh yeah we got to run the team on the bear grease trail and so technically we were in the lead of the bear grease and uh yeah i was really proud of the team i was really proud of arrow she did great and i was proud of little pike
[0:06:33 – 0:06:53] AdamSnowLog: brought ample snacks and that saturday wasn’t very windy so it was really nice out there actually brought some comfy chairs we were bundled up had some hand warmers stuffed in our snowsuits and a lot of snacks and you know the fish were biting like crazy and like real shallow
[0:06:55 – 0:07:03] AdamSnowLog: So, yeah, it was a really nice day out there with the dogs, the boy, friends, and some really nice fish.
[0:07:04 – 0:07:06] AdamSnowLog: So that was wonderful.
[0:07:06 – 0:07:12] AdamSnowLog: And then on Sunday, the last day of the season, we just went up.
[0:07:13 – 0:07:16] AdamSnowLog: We did a nice hike into Trout Lake just north of here.
[0:07:17 – 0:07:33] AdamSnowLog: Went in from the bogus tower way onto the back door and there’s a cool reef system back in there and we hit on there and we got a caught a laker right away on the jigging rod and then we just got into like a mess of rainbow trout which is stocked fish in there obviously.
[0:07:35 – 0:07:43] AdamSnowLog: But yeah it was real sunny well mostly sunny with some clouds and there’s a little bit more wind coming our kind of hard out of the west on Sunday but
[0:07:43 – 0:08:11] AdamSnowLog: every once in a while the wind would die out and then be pure sunshine and it was just quite quite wonderful to be out there for the final day of the trout season so give you a quick ice report uh trout lake had quite a bit more that was a bigger lake we had i don’t know 15 16 and that that ice looked really good and we were out on kemo the day before fishing in shallow and uh
[0:08:12 – 0:08:41] AdamSnowLog: i don’t know that was probably closer to like a foot of ice and the top third of it looked a little extra bubbly and off-colored i’ll just say that so it wasn’t the best ice um yeah so that’s where we were fishing uh managed to catch a splake um which do manage to make their way up into chemo from uh teapine trestle pine lake they stuck the splake in there and they get up through the creek there so
[0:08:42 – 0:08:46] AdamSnowLog: We did get a couple splake and we got some nice Lakers on that trip.
[0:08:46 – 0:08:50] AdamSnowLog: And then, yeah, another Laker and a bunch more rainbow on Sunday.
[0:08:50 – 0:08:52] AdamSnowLog: So like a trout triple threat.
[0:08:52 – 0:08:54] AdamPewPew: Pew, pew, pew, pew.
[0:08:55 – 0:08:56] AdamSnowLog: Trout triple threat.
[0:08:57 – 0:09:03] AdamSnowLog: for the weekend, and a lot of good hiking and dog activities, so pretty great.
[0:09:04 – 0:09:05] AdamSnowLog: I do have an RIP.
[0:09:06 – 0:09:09] AdamSnowLog: RIP to all those trout that I just ate for dinner tonight.
[0:09:11 – 0:09:20] AdamSnowLog: Also RIP to my old Jiffy metal scoop, which I’ve had, I think, since my early 20s, if not my teenage years.
[0:09:20 – 0:09:22] AdamSnowLog: I’ve had that scoop a long time ago.
[0:09:23 – 0:09:30] AdamSnowLog: And it was really beat on, but you could, you know, it was sort of half a weapon, half a scoop.
[0:09:30 – 0:09:37] AdamSnowLog: It was really a heavy duty one, but it was starting to come to the point where one bad scoop and the whole thing’s gonna break in half or something.
[0:09:39 – 0:09:45] AdamSnowLog: But little Pike was really interested in like kicking slush into the holes and he was interested in the fish too.
[0:09:45 – 0:09:59] AdamSnowLog: Let’s not kid ourselves but he was having fun kicking slush in the holes and then demanding that I scoop the hole out and then I was showing him how to do the scoop and I think everybody listening can see where this story is going.
[0:09:59 – 0:10:04] AdamSnowLog: There’s an unfortunate accident in which the scoop got dropped on the hole and
[0:10:06 – 0:10:19] AdamSnowLog: RIP to the old scoop so It’s down there somewhere Josh buddy Josh says he’s got some scuba equipment He marked the spot and it’s gonna go back out there and it’s pretty shallow water.
[0:10:19 – 0:10:25] AdamSnowLog: I mean honestly very it’s very shallow So maybe there’s a chance he’s like I’m gonna go back in there and I’m gonna find that scoop in the summer.
[0:10:26 – 0:10:33] AdamSnowLog: So Who knows maybe maybe that’ll maybe that storyline will come back around in August who’s to say
[0:10:35 – 0:10:39] AdamSnowLog: But, yeah, it was a pretty fun final weekend of trout fishing.
[0:10:39 – 0:10:47] AdamSnowLog: It was great to see the storm and get to run the snowblower and actually have the place look a little bit like winter around here for a bit.
[0:10:49 – 0:10:57] AdamSnowLog: I’ve just had this, like, misguided notion this entire winter that this was somehow an anti-winter or not a real winter at all, but…
[0:10:59 – 0:11:17] AdamSnowLog: Snow takes many forms and you know we got to do a lot of fishing at least and you know we’ve still got some snow on the ground right now and to those of you who were saying the ice was no good you know weeks if not months ago already and that you know
[0:11:18 – 0:11:23] AdamSnowLog: We’re never going to see snow again, and that winter’s over, and celebrating spring a little too, way too early.
[0:11:26 – 0:11:33] AdamSnowLog: Winter’s a big chunk of the year up here, and there’s still plenty of ice on the lakes, and I won’t be surprised if it snows hard again.
[0:11:36 – 0:11:36] AdamSnowLog: You never know.
[0:11:37 – 0:11:38] AdamSnowLog: That’s why we keep the log.
[0:11:39 – 0:11:41] AdamSnowLog: I’m having myself a sip of…
[0:11:44 – 0:11:50] AdamSnowLog: a new triple berry and uh it’s pretty good i got it over there in the
[0:11:52 – 0:12:00] AdamSnowLog: old fancy whiskey bottle bottled these wines up a week and a half ago, so they turned out pretty nice.
[0:12:04 – 0:12:16] AdamSnowLog: I was wondering, we’re now in Chapter 8 of the Snow Log this winter, and that means we’re into the second third of the Return of the King extended edition.
[0:12:18 – 0:12:20] AdamSnowLog: So, we’re almost done with the story here.
[0:12:20 – 0:12:37] AdamSnowLog: We got this chapter, which I just finished watching 10 minutes before I hit record, and got a good hour and a half left after that to conclude the story of Mr. Frodo and the Ring and what’s going to happen.
[0:12:39 – 0:12:45] AdamSnowLog: There’s still really been no indication of who Sauron is or why he hates the men so much.
[0:12:47 – 0:12:53] AdamSnowLog: Um, he gave the rings to all the former kings, which turned him into Nazguls, yeah?
[0:12:54 – 0:12:59] AdamSnowLog: So, I mean, he’s been out to get the men forever, and just can’t seem to finish them off.
[0:12:59 – 0:13:05] AdamSnowLog: There’s just something pesky about them, sneaky, uh, sneaky humans.
[0:13:06 – 0:13:08] AdamSnowLog: But like, what’s the deal really?
[0:13:08 – 0:13:13] AdamSnowLog: Are we ever going to get an explanation to the motivations behind Sauron’s quest?
[0:13:14 – 0:13:19] AdamSnowLog: Are we ever going to really see a backstory on how Sauron came to be?
[0:13:21 – 0:13:22] AdamSnowLog: I’ve been kind of asking around.
[0:13:22 – 0:13:31] AdamSnowLog: I don’t really want to be spoiled, but I am starting to be concerned that they’re just going to leave the main bad guy to be just a spooky eye in the sky.
[0:13:32 – 0:13:39] AdamSnowLog: And really nothing more as far as developing that character, which I guess I’d be disappointed in.
[0:13:40 – 0:13:46] AdamSnowLog: And I really didn’t want to have to go and watch the Hobbits movies right away, but it sounds like I might need to if I want more detail there.
[0:13:47 – 0:13:55] AdamSnowLog: I just really like the way they started this movie with the little flashback to Smeagol and the boat with his buddy Deagol.
[0:13:56 – 0:13:58] AdamSnowLog: Even just a little bit like that helps.
[0:13:59 – 0:14:07] AdamSnowLog: As of now, with only one part left to watch of these incredible movies, really nothing on Sauron.
[0:14:08 – 0:14:08] AdamSnowLog: Who is Sauron?
[0:14:09 – 0:14:09] AdamSnowLog: What’s the deal?
[0:14:09 – 0:14:10] AdamSnowLog: What’s going on there?
[0:14:13 – 0:14:14] AdamSnowLog: We resume this section with
[0:14:16 – 0:14:26] AdamSnowLog: Frodo and Sam and Smeagol are climbing the wicked stairs up to what turns out to be a crazy spider.
[0:14:28 – 0:14:34] AdamSnowLog: But, yeah, they’ve been sent into Mordor with the Ring of Power, a bunch of witless halflings.
[0:14:35 – 0:14:38] AdamSnowLog: And they get themselves into a bread fight.
[0:14:38 – 0:14:39] AdamSnowLog: Bread fight.
[0:14:39 – 0:14:40] AdamSnowLog: Bread, bread, bread, bread, bread fight.
[0:14:41 – 0:14:41] AdamSnowLog: And breaking out.
[0:14:42 – 0:14:46] AdamSnowLog: And, yeah, Frodo basically breaks up with Sam.
[0:14:46 – 0:14:48] AdamSnowLog: He’s like, you can’t help me anymore.
[0:14:49 – 0:14:50] AdamSnowLog: Go home.
[0:14:51 – 0:14:53] AdamSnowLog: And leaves him crying on the side of the stairs.
[0:14:53 – 0:14:55] AdamSnowLog: I thought it was pretty heartless, but…
[0:14:57 – 0:14:59] AdamSnowLog: Yeah, they’re going to a spider cave scenario.
[0:15:01 – 0:15:01] AdamSnowLog: And…
[0:15:04 – 0:15:14] AdamSnowLog: Sam ends up, like, falling all the way down the stairs, and he finds the breadcrumbs at the bottom that Smeagol had thrown down there and then blamed on him, and, uh, he’s poisoned you against me!
[0:15:14 – 0:15:22] AdamSnowLog: Uh, and, uh, just in the nick of time, Mr. Frodo remembers the light of Elendril.
[0:15:23 – 0:15:24] AdamSnowLog: Elendril?
[0:15:25 – 0:15:32] AdamSnowLog: And, uh, is able to, like, repel the spider attack, and, uh, Smeagol’s no longer trying to hide the fact that he’s
[0:15:33 – 0:15:35] AdamSnowLog: trying to guide them to their doom.
[0:15:35 – 0:15:38] AdamSnowLog: You shall go to your doom, children.
[0:15:40 – 0:15:47] AdamSnowLog: And ends up attacking them and Mr. Frodo just sort of rolls them off the cliff.
[0:15:49 – 0:15:52] AdamSnowLog: So, I know, he’s probably not dead, huh?
[0:15:52 – 0:15:56] AdamSnowLog: He just fell down a very, very steep cliff.
[0:15:58 – 0:16:07] AdamSnowLog: Sam jumps in and at the last second the spider has paralyzed Mr. Frodo and wrapped him up in a sarcophagus.
[0:16:09 – 0:16:10] AdamSnowLog: Is that what that’s called?
[0:16:11 – 0:16:12] AdamSnowLog: It’s not a cocoon, is it?
[0:16:13 – 0:16:17] AdamSnowLog: You’re all wrapped up in the gooey stuff, and he’s looking pretty paralyzed.
[0:16:18 – 0:16:20] AdamSnowLog: But, yeah, Sam thinks he’s dead.
[0:16:20 – 0:16:21] AdamSnowLog: He fights off the spider.
[0:16:22 – 0:16:25] AdamSnowLog: Very brave and heroic, fighting off of the spider.
[0:16:25 – 0:16:29] AdamSnowLog: And then the orcs come down the stair, and they’re like, all right.
[0:16:30 – 0:16:32] AdamSnowLog: We’ve got this cocoon Frodo here.
[0:16:33 – 0:16:34] AdamSnowLog: He’s paralyzed.
[0:16:34 – 0:16:35] AdamSnowLog: We’re going to take him into the tower.
[0:16:36 – 0:16:37] AdamSnowLog: And then off they go.
[0:16:37 – 0:16:41] AdamSnowLog: So Sam is going to follow him, and that’s how they’re going to get into the tower, I guess.
[0:16:42 – 0:16:46] AdamSnowLog: So the spider in hindsight really did him a favor, really did him a solid.
[0:16:48 – 0:16:54] AdamSnowLog: So that is the whole section of what’s going on with Frodo and Sam.
[0:16:56 – 0:16:59] AdamSnowLog: Meanwhile, the dragon Nazgul.
[0:17:00 – 0:17:07] AdamSnowLog: I guess I jumped the gun on using the Nazgul outro music last week for chapter 7.
[0:17:07 – 0:17:14] AdamSnowLog: Because the line and the meanest Nazgul stuff yet all occurs here in chapter 8.
[0:17:15 – 0:17:16] AdamSnowLog: But that’s alright.
[0:17:16 – 0:17:18] AdamSnowLog: There’s plenty of Nazguls that go around.
[0:17:18 – 0:17:20] AdamSnowLog: Plenty of Nazgul dragons.
[0:17:21 – 0:17:26] AdamSnowLog: and he says he’s going to break the wizard, which he does.
[0:17:28 – 0:17:34] AdamSnowLog: Poor Faramir has been sent on a suicide mission to retake the river by his insane, deranged father.
[0:17:35 – 0:17:36] AdamSnowLog: Whatever this guy is.
[0:17:36 – 0:17:37] AdamSnowLog: The steward.
[0:17:38 – 0:17:38] AdamSnowLog: Gutless coward.
[0:17:40 – 0:17:47] AdamSnowLog: Sends his son to his doom along with all those poor men to go retake the river fort.
[0:17:48 – 0:17:49] AdamSnowLog: It’s pointless.
[0:17:50 – 0:17:51] AdamSnowLog: It’s a waste of resources.
[0:17:51 – 0:17:52] AdamSnowLog: Anybody can see it.
[0:17:53 – 0:17:54] AdamSnowLog: Really sad to see.
[0:17:54 – 0:17:54] AdamSnowLog: Um…
[0:17:57 – 0:18:00] AdamSnowLog: And then, yeah, they got the Gondor cavalry charge heading out.
[0:18:01 – 0:18:08] AdamSnowLog: And, of course, like, dude’s just sitting in his tower being all sad, eating a sad old charcuterie.
[0:18:09 – 0:18:16] AdamSnowLog: Just stuffing his face and, like, having the hobbits sing to him while his boy goes off to die.
[0:18:17 – 0:18:18] AdamSnowLog: Oh, my God.
[0:18:18 – 0:18:21] AdamSnowLog: There’s literally nothing worse than close-ups of, like, old guys eating.
[0:18:22 – 0:18:36] AdamSnowLog: Um, I remember when I worked at trail center, like I can’t like, I almost like can’t like handle milkshakes anymore due to the amount of like old people coming in and like slurping milkshakes real loud at the counter.
[0:18:36 – 0:18:48] AdamSnowLog: Um, I don’t know if that’s just a me thing or if that’s a universal, but, um, and I think these filmmakers know what they’re doing when they like do the closeup of like old guy, um,
[0:18:49 – 0:18:52] AdamSnowLog: just eating a whole tomato or whatever the hell’s going on here.
[0:18:55 – 0:18:57] AdamSnowLog: I mean, clearly the guy’s cracking, right?
[0:18:57 – 0:19:01] AdamSnowLog: You know, by the end of the section, he’s fully cracked.
[0:19:01 – 0:19:04] AdamSnowLog: He’s just acting a little erratic and then he just totally cracks.
[0:19:06 – 0:19:07] AdamSnowLog: No good, so…
[0:19:09 – 0:19:21] AdamSnowLog: Um, the father from the Matrix comes back and intercepts Aragorn, and he’s like, hey, Arwen, you know, she’s not doing so hot, bud.
[0:19:22 – 0:19:25] AdamSnowLog: Uh, her fate is tied to the fate of the ring.
[0:19:26 – 0:19:32] AdamSnowLog: Uh, the Evenstar dims, uh, the Evenstar dims every day as Mordor grows more powerful.
[0:19:33 – 0:19:45] AdamSnowLog: Um, is the Evenstar the, like, the pendant that he’s wearing, or is this just more of a meta, is the pendant a metaphor for a more elvish, like, home star or something that we’re not aware of?
[0:19:47 – 0:19:49] AdamSnowLog: Um, are we in a binary star system here?
[0:19:49 – 0:19:52] AdamSnowLog: What’s going on beyond, uh, Middle Earth?
[0:19:53 – 0:19:58] AdamSnowLog: Is Middle Earth on a planet, or is this, uh, what’s happening right now?
[0:20:00 – 0:20:03] AdamSnowLog: Yeah, I assume that they’re on a planet.
[0:20:04 – 0:20:05] AdamSnowLog: I don’t know.
[0:20:06 – 0:20:07] AdamSnowLog: They’ve nearly zoomed out.
[0:20:07 – 0:20:08] AdamSnowLog: Where is Middle Earth?
[0:20:08 – 0:20:11] AdamSnowLog: I got the map, but the map stops.
[0:20:13 – 0:20:16] AdamSnowLog: What’s beyond the map is what I’m getting at here.
[0:20:16 – 0:20:17] AdamSnowLog: What’s the even star?
[0:20:18 – 0:20:19] AdamSnowLog: Is it just the pendant or is it more?
[0:20:21 – 0:20:24] AdamSnowLog: I’m asking for me because I have no idea what’s going on right now at all.
[0:20:26 – 0:20:37] AdamSnowLog: Um, but I don’t know, it seems that, uh, it seems that the father elf’s talk had a little bit of an effect on Aragorn, and then of course…
[0:20:40 – 0:20:42] AdamSnowLog: He’s like, you got to get the murderous mountain folk on your side.
[0:20:44 – 0:20:48] AdamSnowLog: They’re going to help you out, and they will only follow the true king of Gondor.
[0:20:48 – 0:20:52] AdamSnowLog: You got to get the Endural, the power of the Endural sword.
[0:20:52 – 0:20:56] AdamSnowLog: And, of course, it’s back, maybe the shards.
[0:20:57 – 0:20:58] AdamSnowLog: They got them all back in one piece.
[0:20:58 – 0:21:02] AdamSnowLog: We saw him starting to hammer on it in the last chapter.
[0:21:03 – 0:21:10] AdamSnowLog: And sure enough, Elfdad shows up with the completed shards back into their form.
[0:21:11 – 0:21:13] AdamSnowLog: So yeah, there you go.
[0:21:13 – 0:21:16] AdamSnowLog: He can both unify the army of the dead.
[0:21:17 – 0:21:29] AdamSnowLog: uh, with the sword, it’s like a spellbinding, uh, kind of mechanism, but it also, clearly that sword can take off, uh, Sauron’s hand, or finger, it’ll take off his whole head.
[0:21:32 – 0:21:35] AdamSnowLog: Can’t wait to find out what’s going on with that sword.
[0:21:36 – 0:21:40] AdamSnowLog: But he’s basically like, hey, man, you can go with these guys, but you don’t have enough people.
[0:21:40 – 0:21:43] AdamSnowLog: He’s got a sneak attack coming with the pirate boats.
[0:21:43 – 0:21:49] AdamSnowLog: You’ve got to take the detour down the Dim Holt Road, which you do not.
[0:21:49 – 0:21:53] AdamSnowLog: If you’re ever in Quetico, do not ever take the Dim Holt Road portage.
[0:21:53 – 0:21:54] AdamSnowLog: It is a nightmare.
[0:21:54 – 0:21:57] AdamSnowLog: You’re going to want to avoid at all costs.
[0:21:58 – 0:21:59] AdamSnowLog: Uh, trust me on this one.
[0:22:00 – 0:22:01] AdamSnowLog: Trust me, dear listeners.
[0:22:02 – 0:22:05] AdamSnowLog: I’m telling you as a friend, do not take the Dim Holt Road.
[0:22:05 – 0:22:11] AdamSnowLog: But, um, the elf father, he’s like, I’ve seen it in the Matrix, you can do it.
[0:22:11 – 0:22:17] AdamSnowLog: You can get down that, uh, narrow passageway into the evil mountain and, uh, go unlock the secrets of the dead.
[0:22:19 – 0:22:20] AdamSnowLog: Uh, you know what this means, though.
[0:22:23 – 0:22:24] AdamSnowLog: It’s a skullvalanche.
[0:22:24 – 0:22:25] AdamPewPew: Skullvalanches!
[0:22:28 – 0:22:39] AdamSnowLog: Oh, I failed to note that we started the show not with the Skullvalanches, but the Avalanches, and that was Extra Kings, off of the 2001 album Since I Left You.
[0:22:39 – 0:22:54] AdamSnowLog: Yeah, we’re still listening to the Avalanches, but the Elf, the Gimli, and the King got themselves in a real Skullvalanche scenario here in the Dimwalt Road Caves.
[0:22:54 – 0:22:54] AdamSnowLog: It’s…
[0:22:55 – 0:22:55] AdamSnowLog: tough sledding.
[0:22:55 – 0:22:57] AdamSnowLog: Like I said, you do not want to take that portage.
[0:22:58 – 0:22:58] AdamSnowLog: It’s full of skulls.
[0:23:00 – 0:23:01] AdamSnowLog: And Creepy Fog.
[0:23:02 – 0:23:06] AdamSnowLog: 2003 this movie came out, but the effects up until this point have been marvelous.
[0:23:07 – 0:23:12] AdamSnowLog: And the effects, especially in this chapter of Return of the King, have been really good.
[0:23:12 – 0:23:15] AdamSnowLog: I was really impressed with the Army of the Dead stuff.
[0:23:17 – 0:23:20] AdamSnowLog: Uh, Lady Eowyn, Eowyn?
[0:23:21 – 0:23:22] AdamSnowLog: Lady Eowyn, daughter of Theoden.
[0:23:23 – 0:23:24] AdamSnowLog: I think I’m getting the hang of this stuff.
[0:23:25 – 0:23:30] AdamSnowLog: Um, she really wishes to go to battle and, you know, fight for her kingdom.
[0:23:30 – 0:23:33] AdamSnowLog: And her father’s like, how about you just go home and smile some more?
[0:23:33 – 0:23:34] AdamSnowLog: Let me tell you what.
[0:23:35 – 0:24:01] AdamSnowLog: don’t be telling anybody they need to smile more uh you can’t say that in 2003 and you cannot be saying that in 2024 um why don’t you just go home and smile some more while the world burns honey um so i was happy to see that she’s just like hell no i’m grabbing a helmet i’m grabbing a sword i got a horse and i’m grabbing me a hobbit for a squire and we’re going with so hell yeah hell yeah lady
[0:24:03 – 0:24:04] AdamSnowLog: Uh, yeah.
[0:24:05 – 0:24:06] AdamSnowLog: The, uh…
[0:24:06 – 0:24:11] AdamSnowLog: I’d be remiss if I made it through this section without talking about my friend the Pigman Orc.
[0:24:11 – 0:24:13] AdamSnowLog: Brother Andrew, are you listening?
[0:24:13 – 0:24:14] AdamSnowLog: You still haven’t gotten a hold of me.
[0:24:14 – 0:24:17] AdamSnowLog: Is this… Is the Pigman from Minecraft the same guy?
[0:24:19 – 0:24:21] AdamSnowLog: Pigman Orc has a sweet…
[0:24:21 – 0:24:22] AdamSnowLog: He doesn’t need a horse…
[0:24:23 – 0:24:26] AdamSnowLog: Are we allowed to enter the hyena into the horse rankers?
[0:24:27 – 0:24:28] AdamSnowLog: Because if so, I am intrigued.
[0:24:29 – 0:24:31] AdamSnowLog: And I did like the hyena.
[0:24:31 – 0:24:33] AdamSnowLog: I think it is cute.
[0:24:34 – 0:24:36] AdamSnowLog: More hyenas, less horse, please.
[0:24:37 – 0:24:38] AdamSnowLog: I can’t believe you just said that.
[0:24:38 – 0:24:39] AdamPewPew: How dare you?
[0:24:41 – 0:24:42] AdamSnowLog: Just more hyenas.
[0:24:42 – 0:24:43] AdamSnowLog: Same amount of horse, please.
[0:24:44 – 0:24:45] AdamSnowLog: And extra dragons.
[0:24:47 – 0:24:57] AdamSnowLog: Um, Pigman Orc’s got a sweet hyena that he’s riding around on, and they start launching the heads of their defeated foes right into the castle at Minas Tirith.
[0:24:58 – 0:24:59] AdamSnowLog: Savage.
[0:24:59 – 0:25:00] AdamSnowLog: He’s like, I smell fear.
[0:25:01 – 0:25:03] AdamSnowLog: Let’s shoot some heads in there and really give it to them.
[0:25:04 – 0:25:05] AdamSnowLog: Oh my gosh.
[0:25:06 – 0:25:15] AdamSnowLog: They got their artillery with the boulders and then they’re just shooting hunks of the castle out from Minas Tirith into the fray.
[0:25:15 – 0:25:25] AdamSnowLog: Just smushing large swaths of orc and troll and whatever other mine pit slurry creations they’ve got wandering around out there.
[0:25:25 – 0:25:27] AdamSnowLog: Is the mine pit portion over at this point?
[0:25:27 – 0:25:30] AdamSnowLog: These are just regular orc derived in the natural way.
[0:25:32 – 0:25:34] AdamSnowLog: I am asking for myself once again.
[0:25:36 – 0:25:38] AdamSnowLog: The artillery is nuts.
[0:25:38 – 0:25:40] AdamSnowLog: Those towers are just terrifying.
[0:25:40 – 0:25:43] AdamSnowLog: Like, minus tier, those are looking straight F, friends.
[0:25:44 – 0:25:46] AdamSnowLog: It’s not looking good at all here.
[0:25:46 – 0:25:54] AdamSnowLog: As soon as they started, like, whomping those planks down on top of the walls with their…
[0:25:55 – 0:26:18] AdamSnowLog: with those towers, and they’re just spilling orcs out of them, it’s, ooh, I don’t know how anybody has the courage to stand and fight against something like that, and then they’re just, like, whacking at the door with a normal kind of ram or whatever, and then they’re like, no, okay, it’s not working, buddy, and they’re like, you know what, let’s bring in the grand, okay, grand, grand,
[0:26:18 – 0:26:18] AdamSnowLog: Grand.
[0:26:19 – 0:26:19] AdamSnowLog: All right.
[0:26:19 – 0:26:20] AdamSnowLog: Yeah, all right.
[0:26:20 – 0:26:21] AdamSnowLog: Grand.
[0:26:21 – 0:26:22] AdamSnowLog: Grand.
[0:26:23 – 0:26:28] AdamSnowLog: The Grand is sweet, and I’m going to be real.
[0:26:28 – 0:26:37] AdamSnowLog: If you had the Grand to begin with, why would you start with the other lesser battering ram, only to make the Grand seem more grand?
[0:26:37 – 0:26:38] AdamSnowLog: Is that what’s going on here?
[0:26:39 – 0:26:39] AdamSnowLog: But I don’t know.
[0:26:39 – 0:26:40] AdamSnowLog: It doesn’t really matter.
[0:26:40 – 0:26:43] AdamSnowLog: That thing’s badass, and it smashes the hell out of that door.
[0:26:43 – 0:26:45] AdamSnowLog: They Granded that thing to a pulp.
[0:26:46 – 0:26:51] AdamSnowLog: Grand Grand Grand Grands are not allowed to be in the horse ranker.
[0:26:52 – 0:26:53] AdamSnowLog: No doubt about that one.
[0:26:53 – 0:26:54] AdamSnowLog: Um,
[0:26:56 – 0:27:09] AdamSnowLog: So yeah, Aragorn convinces the army of the dead to follow him with his new sword, and they intercept the ships, and they’re like, hey pirates, be prepared to be ported by the three of us.
[0:27:09 – 0:27:15] AdamSnowLog: And they’re like, oh, here comes the army of the dead, and they pirate the pirates.
[0:27:15 – 0:27:18] AdamSnowLog: They got them good with the little pirate trick there.
[0:27:20 – 0:27:41] AdamSnowLog: um bait and switched them pretty hard off the banks of the river there so they take over the pirate fleet which is nice um yeah the crazy father’s like trying to like burn him and his son to death even though he sent him to his doom he somehow came back with a couple arrows in his chest just like his brother but he’s somehow living
[0:27:42 – 0:27:44] AdamSnowLog: And he’s like, you know what, to hell with it, we got no chance.
[0:27:45 – 0:27:49] AdamSnowLog: I’m just burning us in a bunch of napalm or whatever, spider goo.
[0:27:52 – 0:28:03] AdamSnowLog: Claiming they’re doomed, but in the foreground, I’m sure you guys know, I’m excited to see a flower on the tree at Minas Tirith.
[0:28:03 – 0:28:07] AdamSnowLog: The old white tree, not so withered anymore, is it?
[0:28:08 – 0:28:11] AdamSnowLog: So, happens to be flowering all of a sudden.
[0:28:11 – 0:28:11] AdamSnowLog: I wonder…
[0:28:13 – 0:28:18] AdamSnowLog: Does it have something to do with the sword and Aragorn taking his rightful place on the throne?
[0:28:18 – 0:28:19] AdamSnowLog: I hope so.
[0:28:21 – 0:28:25] AdamSnowLog: That’s just one flower, so I’m going to predict we’re going to see the whole thing covered in flowers.
[0:28:25 – 0:28:28] AdamSnowLog: Or it’s going to get burned by a Nazgul.
[0:28:30 – 0:28:35] AdamSnowLog: Uh, the dragon Nazgul does take up the promise to, like, get after Gandalf and break him.
[0:28:36 – 0:28:44] AdamSnowLog: And he, like, just sends some crazy, like, sonic weaponry and spells at him and just shatters the shit out of his staff.
[0:28:45 – 0:28:54] AdamSnowLog: And, uh, he’s about to finish him off, but of course he doesn’t just finish him off because… Because we hear a horn in the distance.
[0:28:55 – 0:28:55] AdamPewPew: Ah-woo!
[0:28:55 – 0:28:56] AdamPewPew: Ah-woo!
[0:28:59 – 0:29:01] AdamSnowLog: It’s a nice horn and you know what that means.
[0:29:02 – 0:29:03] AdamSnowLog: The riders are Rohan, baby.
[0:29:03 – 0:29:05] AdamSnowLog: They’re back and they got more horses than ever.
[0:29:06 – 0:29:08] AdamSnowLog: Holy wow, that’s a lot of horses.
[0:29:10 – 0:29:11] AdamSnowLog: These horses are multiplying.
[0:29:12 – 0:29:14] AdamSnowLog: The riders need more horses.
[0:29:14 – 0:29:16] AdamSnowLog: There’s too many riders.
[0:29:16 – 0:29:17] AdamSnowLog: Not enough Rohan out here, buddy.
[0:29:18 – 0:29:23] AdamSnowLog: They got the whole ridgetop covered in Rohan riders, and they’re coming for them.
[0:29:24 – 0:29:26] AdamSnowLog: And they even got the pig man scared.
[0:29:27 – 0:29:34] AdamSnowLog: And the orcs, you don’t see them turn and run, but the riders of Rohan will do that to even the toughest orc and pig man.
[0:29:36 – 0:29:39] AdamSnowLog: Pretty awesome seeing right there, like, sun is rising.
[0:29:41 – 0:29:46] AdamSnowLog: They arrived just in the nick of time to help temporarily maybe…
[0:29:47 – 0:29:48] AdamSnowLog: stem the tide of the battle.
[0:29:49 – 0:29:56] AdamSnowLog: Um, but of course, um, it’s short lived because they do get them to turn and they’re like, drive them in the goddamn river.
[0:29:57 – 0:30:01] AdamSnowLog: and they look and they’re like, oh man, here comes, here comes the elephants.
[0:30:01 – 0:30:06] AdamSnowLog: That’s like, well, you guys had the advantage for a good 35 seconds there with the horses.
[0:30:06 – 0:30:19] AdamSnowLog: And they’re like, well, you know what, what’s better than a couple thousand horse is like 25 huge elephants with like spikes on their tusks, uh, with a bunch of arrow guys up top.
[0:30:20 – 0:30:20] AdamSnowLog: Um,
[0:30:21 – 0:30:32] AdamSnowLog: I’d like to say in this section, I was complaining earlier that the battle sequences were too tame and no blood to be had.
[0:30:34 – 0:30:36] AdamSnowLog: They’re sanitized, right?
[0:30:36 – 0:30:38] AdamSnowLog: It’s PG-13 battle scenes.
[0:30:38 – 0:30:47] AdamSnowLog: But in this movie, they’re getting a little tougher and a little harder to watch, especially this section with a lot of horse and elephant brutality.
[0:30:48 – 0:30:51] AdamSnowLog: Leave the elephants and the horses out of it.
[0:30:52 – 0:31:11] AdamSnowLog: I don’t want to see that, um, yeah, getting a lot of, like, beheadings all of a sudden, though, I mean, it’s getting a little gruesome here in Middle Earth, which, as to be expected, I guess it’s the battle for all, for everything, huh, it’s for, it’s for all the orbs, this one.
[0:31:13 – 0:31:18] AdamSnowLog: Uh, and then Aragorn finally shows up with the army of the dead on the pirate boats.
[0:31:19 – 0:31:20] AdamSnowLog: Like, okay.
[0:31:22 – 0:31:24] AdamSnowLog: You know, the elephants, maybe not so bad.
[0:31:24 – 0:31:26] AdamSnowLog: We got some backup here.
[0:31:26 – 0:31:29] AdamSnowLog: And then, uh, Lady Ewen.
[0:31:30 – 0:31:31] AdamSnowLog: I hope I’m saying that right.
[0:31:31 – 0:31:38] AdamSnowLog: Lady Ewen and her hobbit squire, they face off with the meanest, baddest dragon Nazgul.
[0:31:39 – 0:31:41] AdamSnowLog: Very spooky Nazgul.
[0:31:42 – 0:31:42] AdamSnowLog: Um,
[0:31:42 – 0:31:46] AdamSnowLog: And she just lops the dragon’s head right off.
[0:31:46 – 0:31:47] AdamSnowLog: Very impressive.
[0:31:48 – 0:31:53] AdamSnowLog: And then basically stabs the Nazgul right through the eyes.
[0:31:54 – 0:31:57] AdamSnowLog: The shadowy face of the helmet.
[0:31:58 – 0:31:58] AdamSnowLog: Helmetry.
[0:31:59 – 0:32:07] AdamSnowLog: And he crumples up like a little piece of tinfoil under too much gravity.
[0:32:08 – 0:32:09] AdamPewPew: The end.
[0:32:10 – 0:32:12] AdamSnowLog: And so they all lived happily ever after at the end.
[0:32:12 – 0:32:15] AdamSnowLog: I’m glad we all got to enjoy this film together.
[0:32:17 – 0:32:18] AdamSnowLog: And no, no, no.
[0:32:18 – 0:32:19] AdamSnowLog: There’s still more to come.
[0:32:20 – 0:32:21] AdamSnowLog: What’s going on out there?
[0:32:21 – 0:32:27] AdamSnowLog: There seems like there’s a lot of loose ends to wrap up still with only like an hour and a half left to go on the extended cut.
[0:32:28 – 0:32:32] AdamSnowLog: But we will get there next time, friends.
[0:32:32 – 0:32:33] AdamSnowLog: Thanks for being here tonight.
[0:32:34 – 0:32:38] AdamSnowLog: I’m pretty excited to find out how this thing finishes up.
[0:32:38 – 0:32:40] AdamSnowLog: Will we get any more snow?
[0:32:40 – 0:32:44] AdamSnowLog: How many more big boats will I see in the next couple days with this crazy north wind out there?
[0:32:46 – 0:32:53] AdamSnowLog: Oh, and before I forget, I mentioned earlier I was working…
[0:32:55 – 0:32:59] AdamSnowLog: this misguided notion that this was somehow an anti-winter.
[0:32:59 – 0:33:02] AdamSnowLog: Well, that’s like the working title for an essay I’ve been working on.
[0:33:04 – 0:33:06] AdamSnowLog: Arrow’s got a shaker collar for you all there in the background.
[0:33:08 – 0:33:11] AdamSnowLog: I’m working on another shorter story.
[0:33:11 – 0:33:13] AdamSnowLog: Shorter, it’s still over a thousand words.
[0:33:14 – 0:33:18] AdamSnowLog: For Paddle and Portage, I just sent off the final copy earlier today.
[0:33:19 – 0:33:44] AdamSnowLog: with some nice pictures from that adventure out on chemo lake and uh so that’ll be coming out in the next the next issue of the paddle and portage digital magazine so um you know if you enjoy that sort of thing uh go ahead and check it out over there it’s uh they got a good thing going and uh i’ve really been enjoying having a outlet for some like more long form creative writing
[0:33:46 – 0:34:03] AdamSnowLog: which kind of goes hand in hand with podcasting but as you know it’s a completely different kind of form of storytelling so I’m having a lot of fun did that longer article about trout fishing opener earlier this winter that I got a lot of nice feedback on and
[0:34:04 – 0:34:22] AdamSnowLog: I had been really thinking about this winter in the wrong way, so I wanted to tackle that subject, and luckily we got a nice blizzard at the end to get a little bit of redemption there, so it didn’t end up being as bleak as it was looking at one point.
[0:34:23 – 0:34:29] AdamSnowLog: It’s not so much an anti-winter, it’s more of a misguided notion of such.
[0:34:29 – 0:34:40] AdamSnowLog: That was the working title, I had a good time writing it, and it feels good to put the final edits into a story like that and finally ship it.
[0:34:40 – 0:34:44] AdamSnowLog: I wanted to give a plug to that work and Paddle & Portage at the end here.
[0:34:46 – 0:34:48] AdamSnowLog: Anyways, we’ll wrap it up and leave it there.
[0:34:48 – 0:34:49] AdamSnowLog: Thanks for listening, friends.
[0:34:50 – 0:34:52] AdamSnowLog: As we always say, snow takes many forms.
[0:34:53 – 0:34:53] AdamSnowLog: Good night.
