Fifth Floor Common Room, Sunday Morning

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

It wouldn't be the first time Dolf surfed the TV channels in the common room; he'd gotten over the shock of being reintroduced to audiovisual stuff pretty quickly. It was the lack of familiarity of the channels that still threw him, at this point, and he was determined to do something about that.

It might be a case of a very small victory, but it was something, and kept him from feeling like he had to relearn everything.

Still, he had to admit he was very, very relieved to find that, given enough presses of the next channel button, Eurosport finally appeared. Sure, it wasn't football but the Vuelta, but it was still strangely comforting.

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[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

Faramir was on his way back from a morning ride with Baru when the noise coming from the common room distracted him. The device which was showing moving images reminded him of the screens he had seen in his Monday class.

It was only after he'd stared at the images for a while that he noticed Dolf occupying one of the seats. "Hullo, Rudolf," he greeted. "What is that that you are watching?"

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"Sports, on bicycles," Dolf said, grinning at the sight of his friend. (He'd been here for barely two weeks, and so had Faramir; it was all right to think of him as a friend, in Dolf's estimation.) "Every year there are three big tours. This is the last."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

And really, Faramir would not argue with his reasoning.

"I'm afraid not much of that made sense to me," he admitted, stepping further into the room so he could get a better view. "The things with the two wheels are bicycles?"

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"Yes," Dolf replied, grinning at Faramir. "Come on, sit down," he added, enthusiastically, happy to share something. "The goal is to be the first one over the finish line. Right now, anyway. The real winner is the fastest of the whole tour."

TV was doing his English a lot of good.

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"So a tour consists of several races?" Faramir asked. He tugged off his gloves and put them on the table before he took a seat on the couch.

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"One almost each day," Dolf said, sitting back. "They're called 'stages'. And the person wearing the red shirt, he's the one who's winning."

Well, TV was helping his English some. That didn't mean he was always too clear.

He paused, and frowned. "...No, the gold, I think. Sorry."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

Faramir rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he looked for the one wearing a golden shirt. "He does not appear to be winning now," he commented while modding the race.

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"No," Dolf agreed, watching intently.

Actually, there seemed to be two people in gold. Three?

"...I don't think gold is the winner's colour after all," he said, philosophically. "It must have changed."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"I shall simply remember then that they get some colour to acknowledge that they are winning," Faramir offered, and he could not quite help the next question, even if it might be trying to make Dolf explain it.

"How are these images moving?"

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

...Ah, a more technical question than 'what is this?', which Dolf could have explained just by pointing out it was a play in a box like he would have, normally.

He scratched the back of his head. "Um, I'm not a... scientist," he said, his careful, awkward wording reappearing under the pressure. "You have a picture, and... if you put one picture after the other very fast, it... tricks your eyes? And looks like moving."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

Perhaps Faramir should have started with the less technical question, it would have made more sense to him. Sometimes, however, he tended to overreach.

"That are a lot of pictures to paint," he remarked, squinting at the television like he was expecting to see the seperate pictures if he paid enough attention.

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

Urrgh! Ariel hated it when she woke up early on a Sunday; it defeated the whole purpose of Sundays! But she was and she couldn't get back to sleep, so she figured she'd better make the best of it and see if there were any other poor unfortunate souls around who were up and about.

Naturally, that meant the common room, and how exciting! There were people!

"Oh! Good morning, everyone!" Ariel greeted them in a friendly, laughing way, almost forgetting that she was annoyed.

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"Only for cartoons," Dolf said, following Faramir's gaze back to the television. Oh, how to explain this? He barely understood it himself! "This is... not painted. They have machines, that copy light onto paper. Like... a mirror that keeps the picture."

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

Dolf looked up at the sudden greeting, and smiled at the girl in what he hoped was a friendly way, himself. "Hi," he said. "Did you want to watch TV with us?"

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"Copy light onto paper," Faramir repeated slowly, sounding awes. "That sounds like magic, capturing something that one cannot touch."

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"Oh, sure!"" Ariel beamed as if this was quite the invitation, bouncing easily over to the couch and plopping down. "What are we watching?"

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"It's not," Dolf replied, shaking his head. "It's really really not. Though science can look like magic, I guess."

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"The Vuelta," Dolf said-- and then thought back to his conversation with Faramir earlier. "...Racing bicycles in Spain."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"Perhaps, but it sounds almost too poetic to be science," Faramir said with a laugh and he shook his head. "Can anything be captured like this?"

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"If you have a camera," he said, nodding. "They get smaller every year."

[thinkbetterofme.livejournal.com]

"Anyone could do it?" he asked in surprise. "It sounds like you would need skill to capture something to detailed. Not just anyone can make a painting, or at least not a good one."

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

"It's in the machines," Dolf replied, shrugging. "The people who make the machines have the skill. They teach the machines how to-- capture? It."

A pause.

"... in a way," he muttered. He didn't think Faramir needed that kind of word-babying, really.

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"Oooooh," Ariel said, eyes widening at the screen slightly and, yes, yes, she saw it now! Sometimes the television showed things so foreign to Ariel that she didn't know what to think, and this was not helped by all those very tight pants. "How exciting! I find bicycles to be very intriguing; it should learn how to ride one one of these days. Do you know how to ride one?"

And, really, once she said it, she felt it as a silly question. Wouldn't most humans know how to ride a bicycle?

"I mean," she continued, "it can't be much difficult than a jet ski, I'd think, just more work with the legs."

[swordsandsoccer.livejournal.com]

Dolf blinked, and then he laughed, mostly out of surprise, because that was a really rather weird comparison to make. "Not much more difficult than a jet ski," he agreed, "Everyone knows how to ride one, where I was born. Bicycles. Not jet skis."

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"They don't have them at all where I was born," Ariel gushed in a wistful, envious sort of way. Her decision that she needed to learn only grew when she looked at the television again; it was almost like a dance, the way they moved together like that, like a school of fish! "Either of them! But I learned how to ride a jet ski for a class here; it's so much fun!"