Peachy Keen

moving apartments is the worst activity that exists

worst activity that doesn't exist is "infant tennis"

Worth noting that 1.5°C last year still technically doesn't violate the Paris agreement because its over multiple years, and 2023-24 was an El Niño. That said the underlying message is absolutely the truth, climate change is very real and very current. Every tenth of a degree, every hundredth of a degree, matters. Don't stop campaigning.

When I see a video of a cat minding its own business with nothing else going on I unmute immediately cause I know that mf is about to make a funny noise

pushed over by ghosts! sad

these things are awesome. they're like the high elves of hogs

Dealing with my fear of rejection by never asking for anything, and my fear of being a burden by never doing anything that involves other people. Foolproof.

despite the amount of chemicals i have absorbed into my body and the external stimuli i have immersed myself in i am still not doing very well has anyone else on god's beautiful earth encountered this issue

little clown otter

"Ok, ma'am that'll be 226.03$."

I take my wallet out of my pocket and unfold it. It is empty other than a single moth that lazily flies out. The moth lands on the tap point of the card reader. There's a beat, and my payment is processed. The moth flies back into my wallet and I put it back in my pocket.

sorry kids daddy lost all his money betting on rhinoceros beetle fights again there won't be a christmas this year

I witnessed something wonderful on my walk today.

We went down to the park, where the lake drains under a footbridge into a stone-lined gully that someone generous might call a creek. Usually it’s a trickle at best, but it poured last night, and the water was still moving pretty briskly. 

As we got closer, I heard kids yelling, so we went over to have a look. I was nervous, because earlier this summer we’d seen a mother cat and her kittens hanging out a few times in the (then bone dry) spillway. We hadn’t seen them in over a month, but I didn’t want to think of them being there when the water started coming down.

Instead, when I looked over the side of the bridge, I saw a skinny kid (maybe 8-10 years old) carrying an enormous catfish clasped in both arms.

The catfish had to be the length of this kid’s torso, and it was flopping around trying to escape, but the kid doggedly kept climbing over mud and slippery rocks until he reached the lake and chucked the fish in. And behind him came… another kid, holding a fish.

When the lake flooded, it must’ve washed a bunch of these catfish downstream, where they collected in pools. Now the water levels are starting to go down, and the fish are trapped, doomed to dry up and die. Not on these kids’ watch. As we watched, they rescued four fish, and one of the adults present said there were at least six left. The kids showed no sign of stopping. This is the kind of thing you love as a kid, a life or death mission you can throw your heart and soul into while getting gleefully covered in muck and slime. I was tempted to offer my assistance, but this was their Quest, and I did not want to impose.

When we continued on, the Great Fish Rescue was still going strong. Godspeed, kids. In a time of such great discord and meanspirited behavior, you will live on in my memory as a beacon of goodwill. 

the children will grow up and move on and in the time of their greatest need will be attended by an utterly massive catfish

coworkers under 35 love me for my cowboy bebop jacket, coworkers over 35 love me for my cd player, management loves me for my mental illness-fueled punctuality. everyone feels vaguely wary of me for my overall poor impression of acting like a human

“white people join the kkk because they are made to feel inherently evil! we need more white positivity if we want to stop this! black people need to stop being so mean!” <- unironically how you all sound when you talk about incels

I rambled about this in tags on another post but I can’t emphasize enough how only focusing on large-scale issues WILL lead to hopelessness & burnout. Activism must include small-scale, achievable works. If you don’t have something you can get your hands around and look at directly, despair will eat you alive.

I want to elaborate here for people who don’t think they’re capable of practical activism due to disability: what a LOT of volunteer groups need most is clerical and logistical support. Maybe you can’t get down to the river to pick up trash, but how about working the sign-up table? Or sending out email reminders or creating promotional graphics? How about making calls to the city to get funds for supplies?

Many volunteer groups rely on retired people to run their day-to-day functions, so as the economy worsens and retirement ages go up, charities are feeling the squeeze as their aging participants aren’t replaced. If you’re unable to work full-time due to disability but have the means to attend a zoom meeting once a month and take minutes, there’s an activist group that needs you. If you don’t have the financial means to donate to charities you care about, there’s a local advocacy group that needs help deciding how to allocate donation funds.

If you’re not sure how you or your disability can fit into a group, call and ask. My prison book group works from a basement that isn’t wheelchair accessible, so when I was unable to do stairs last year, I built them a database.

You can help and you are needed.

At one place where we used to live there were some great older ladies who scoured Facebook and Craigslist for free furniture and other home items. When they saw something, they’d contact their list of people with larger vehicles and trucks to see who would be able to go get it first and deliver it to someone who needed it.

They helped so many people who lost items due to fire and storms, housing instability, etc. If there wasn’t someone on the list but it was something that was often needed (like baby items), then they contacted people who had a bit of extra room in a garage or a shed and could store it until it was needed.

There are tons of items being given away for free but they tend to get picked up quickly and if someone is working, taking care of kids, doesn’t speak English, doesn’t have reliable internet access, or doesn’t have a truck, it can be difficult to take advantage of that. Someone who can’t leave home much due to a disability but can keep an eye on Facebook and text and coordinate group chats can help a huge number of people.