Solarpunk Sunday Suggestion:

Read something on the anarchist library website

Genuinely I think one of the best things you can do to build characters in your story is give them a kink. You do not have to put that kink in the story. You do not have to tell anyone but yourself. But thinking about their wants and needs and what would bring them comfort or desire, about whether they crave power or crave a situation where they're blessedly free from any power, about which taboo they might kind of want to cross, is really useful for getting inside their head. Also "what situation would make my character stupid horny enough to make a terrible mistake?" is a good plotting device. "It's a plot hole that they made that dumb decision" no they were just whistling like a lustful kettle and forgot to turn their brain on.

Chai tea bag + lil but of brown sugar + apple cider packet + 16 oz. mug of hot but not quite boiling water

it will not Fix You but like. maybe. maybe.

tags by @eridan-ampora

Update: this is the best post I've ever made because everyone is sharing their Warm Beverage recipes in the notes. Go check the notes for more Warm Beverages That Will Fix You.

Secret Recipes To Try At Home

Here are the instructions since people keep asking!

Panera Mac N Cheese Wendy’s Frosty Olive Garden Alfredo Sauce Chick-Fil-A Nuggets Starbucks Frappucino P.F. Chang’s Chicken Lettuce Wraps Chick-Fil-A Frosted Lemonade Red Lobster Cheddar Biscuits Sonic Cherry Limeade

Holy fuck

I have all the knowledge of the universe

And I will use this knowledge for evil purposes! I wasn’t sure if I was clear before!

If you live in the USA and you're pleading for donations to pay your rent, bills, or get food then dial 211! Please dial 211 before the last minute!

It's a toll free service with people who will help you find programs in your community to pay those bills, find food, and find housing! They will give you numbers to call so you can get help.

It is not 100% foolproof. Their job is to direct you to a program they believe will help your current issue, but it's still a step up from praying random strangers online will give you enough cash before a deadline! The added benefit of these community programs, which get funded by the local government most of the time, is if there are more people using them then they can get more money to help more people.

You're not taking resources from other people if you use your community services. Your taxes pay for them. Use them.

Dial 211 first to see if they can help, and if for some reason they can't, then make your donation posts!

https://www.211.org/

Hi I work for my state's 211 service. It really breaks my heart how many people only know to call us at the last minute. 211's can provide a whole wealth of resources to use before things ever get to a cut off utility, eviction, or homelessness!

I can't speak for all 211's but most should also have a website detailing all the agencies in their database. if you don't like phone calls, this can be something to reference instead.

If you don't have health insurance but you need to see a doctor, reference 211! We list clinics that provide free or discounted general care, vision, and dental services to low income households and people without insurance! Many hospitals also have financial aid policies that can severely reduce your bill if you had an expensive procedure!

If you're stuck in a dead end job or need educational resources reference 211! There are a lot of programs focused on providing basic adult education as well as trade skills or other high demand fields! State governments are generally more interested in funneling people into work than providing benefits, but you can still use this to your advantage especially if you have some form of disability but are still able to work. That includes if you're neurodiverse or have mental health issues! Most of these programs are extremely underutilized.

If you believe you qualify for public benefits but the bureaucracy of the process is in your way, reference 211! There are agencies specifically geared towards helping people obtain the benefits they qualify for- for free!

If you need help with your taxes-

If you need help finding a pro bono lawyer-

If you need help finding affordable housing/section 8 housing-

If you need help finding food pantries-

If you need help paying for your prescriptions-

If you need help obtaining disability aids or assistive technology-

If you need help finding transportation options-

If you need help following a natural or personal disaster (like a home fire)-

If you need help repairing a home you or your family owns or it needs modifications to be accessible-

If you need Queer resources-

Reference your 211!!!!!

I had no idea what 211 was before working for it but I wish I had. I've learned so much about what resources are actually available to the community even in a ho hum area of the country like my state. I've saved my partner literally thousands of dollars just from the medical resources I've gathered.

Not enough young people know about or utilize these services but they are there for you!

P. S.

This isn't an intended use of 211, but I like to reference the agency listings when I look for jobs. Many of the agencies listed are non-profits which, while they certainly are not perfect, generally have lower barriers of entry to decent paying jobs with benefits. The work environments tend to be much kinder and at least pretend to be forward thinking. You're more likely to find jobs without as many people applying as well, especially if they're only advertising their positions through their own website.

People with low spoons, someone just recommended this cookbook to me, so I thought I’d pass it on.

I always look at cookbooks for people who have no energy/time to do elaborate meal preparations, and roll my eyes. Like, you want me to stay on my feet for long enough to prepare 15 different ingredients from scratch, and use 5 different pots and pans, when I have chronic fatigue and no dishwasher?

These people seem to get it, though. It’s very simple in places. It’s basically the cookbook for people who think, ‘I’m really bored of those same five low-spoons meals I eat, but I can’t think of anything else to cook that won’t exhaust me’. And it’s free!

SPREAD THE WORD THIS IS FUCKING GOD TIER OH MY GOD, SOMETIMES I HAVE SPOONS SOMETIMES I DON’T BUT NO COOKBOOK OFFERS LEVELS IN THEIR RECIPES THIS ONE DOES!

@aita-the-isu I feel like we would both benefit from this and also the title made me think of something you'd say 🤣

Kid Pix just became pubic domain, so the remade (but pretty much exactly the same) version is now available here. It's uh, wild, highly recommend checking it out not only for the wonderful nostalgia but you can legit make some incredible looking stuff!

FIND IT HERE

Commenting fanfiction is the easiest thing in the world once you start doing it. 

I leave a comment on every single fic I read. Sometimes when I read published books I go and leave a comment somewhere the author can find it. Granted, I literally majored in ‘leaving comments on fics’ (English Education), but once you start doing it it just becomes second nature. Now you’re gonna go to the Ozymandias school of leaving comments: 

Problem: I can’t leave kudos again.

Problem: I don’t know what to say :(

Problem: I’m embarrassed to leave a comment (what if I annoy the author?)

Problem: I don’t know how to express myself/my experience 

This? This is an amazing post. This is the Captain Awkward of commenting posts—it addresses all your fears directly and gives you actionable scripts for each one.

This is helping alot!

Always helpful to remember this when my brain is not working right.

where are those startups that are disrupting the glasses industry

zenni and it’s amazing and i love it 40 dollar bifocals fuck yeah

Hey I’m reblogging this again because if you need glasses here’s what I do:

I can’t articulate how many literal headaches Zenni has saved me because I just used to wear my old prescription until I had trouble keeping my eyes open from the strain. Now at the first hint of eye strain it’s like “Not today, Satan!” and I can plan for the $100 expense that’s going to last me potentially years.

I’ve had glasses places try to bully me into buying their overpriced glasses (even though they were supposed to offer eye exams no strings attached.) The Stanton Optical manager called me repeatedly trying to get my sale, after one of his employees literally mocked me for wanting to buy cheaper glasses online. I was firm about it and didn’t give in because fuck them.

I bought my first pair of glasses from Zenni around christmas and I absolutely adore them. I got the more expensive blue light reflecting lenses and even with the USD to CAD exchange rate they were well under 100 dollars. I won’t be buying glasses anywhere else for a long while.

Bought my uncle a burger and milkshake in exchange for letting me disrupt the holiest day of the week, NFL Sunday Football, so I could install a Pi-hole and free the household of ads...the thing abt the specific boomers I live with is they told me not to trust people on the Internet but they do not understand the algorithm or online advertising and think that Facebook has their best interests at heart. And every time I have tried to explain to them that no, blorbo from my dashboard is not selling my kidneys on the dark web but Google from your capitalism is definitely selling your web searches to every advertising company on the planet, they think I am paranoid. How could their personal friend Mark Zuckerberg want anything bad to happen to them etc. I am fighting battles I did not know existed!!!

Update I have had Pi-Hole successfully installed for two (2) hours and have since learned that 40% of the web traffic in this household went to advertisements. FORTY FUCKING PERCENT. We live in hell. This is the greatest gift I have ever given my family that they will not understand or acknowledge or feel any gratitude for.

Update #2: it was rising all night but the number it finally settled on was...60%. 60% of the web traffic in this household went to advertisements. I can't tell if this high number is bc I live in Silicon Valley and probably am subject to the Algorithmic Internet in ways people outside of Silicon Valley are not or it is normal to have 2/3rds of your web traffic be ads, but it did make me set up a recurring donation of the EFF lmfao.

Okay I have had multiple people ask, so here are the useful websites that me and Beryl used to muddle our way through:

Using Pi-hole and Raspberry Pi (on the Raspberry Pi website, really good overview of what Pi-hole does)

Tumblr-archived Twitter thread about one household's experience with Pi-hole (this is what sold me on it. Also the tweets were published in 2022 and Pi-hole is actively being developed, so I think some of the teething problems he mentioned might have cleared up or are at least being addressed.)

Pi-hole website (gives broad strokes of the software and imho is not actually that helpful, however this proves that I am not making shit up)

Pi-hole documentation (read prerequisites carefully, you do NOT need the newest model of Raspberry Pi to run this thing!! You don't even need a Raspberry Pi at all, you can run it on a bunch of Linux systems however I'm very stupid when it comes to Linux and when my options are install and learn a whole ass new OS or spend $$ on a Raspberry Pi and hook it up to my TV with a wired mouse and keyboard I will unfortunately be spending money)

Privacy International's guide to setting up Pi-hole on a Raspberry Pi (bro this one saved our asses)

You guys can ask me questions if you want but I guarantee I will not know the answers bc I don't know shit about fuck, I just followed the directions and reaped the rewards. It did take us 2 hours to set up bc I'm bad at following directions (and it's kind of complicated if you've been out of the software game for a while like I have), and you do have to be sososo brave about fucking around with your internet provider's configuration. So make sure you eat before you do it!! However it has been so worth it for me so far, given that now all my devices at home are running faster and I'm not seeing any ads while web browsing. We will see what complaints my family comes up with, but I love it so far.

Also!! if you've never heard of Raspberry Pi, which I realize are not all of my followers are lost in the Silicon Valley sauce so you might not have, here's is their website and their page for using Raspberry Pi at home.

(And here is the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that fights for digital privacy, free speech, and innovation, if you, like me, were presented with cold hard data about your personal internet usage and suddenly realized that our internet is fully a dystopia. haha.)

After a few months with pi-hole, I recently switched to AdGuard Home. It was recommended/is co-promoted in a pi-hole discord server, and it seems to be blocking a bit more successfully/consistently for me than the pi-hole did.

I also use Blokada on my phone when I'm not home and have the Windscribe browser extension which includes 10GB of free VPN traffic and has uBlock integrated into it. (AdGuard does technically make things that do this but I like those better; ymmv).

It all takes some setup and tinkering, but I highly, highly recommend taking steps to clear out some of the internet garbage and protect your info.

I fucking hate game apps. I wanted to play tetris the otherday so I figured there must be a simple tetris app out there its the most basic game. But every app is like heres your daily log in bonus of 10 gold! You get 5 free plays a day. Here's an ad. To replay a level costs 1 diamond. You can eart gold by earning points in levels. 1000 points = 1 gold. You can exchange 550 gold for one diamond but we have a sale right now that they only cost 500 gold. Heres an ad. You can buy a loot crate of diamonds for 5.99$! You leveled up! Heres 1 free diamond. Youve run out of free replays for today, would you like to buy some more diamonds? Heres your daily tasks, make sure to log in every day this month for a free reward chest. its free! Heres an ad. Would you like to sign up for this credit card to recieve 10 free diamonds? Invite a friend and you can earn points! Ding! Youve leveled up. Heres an ad. This is our special bonus play weekend, you get one free replay and a pack of diamonds only costs 4.99$. You can use your gold to purchase new skins for the tetris blocks. This ones shaped like cats! It costs 100 diamonds. You need to collect them all. Free to play, may be some in-app purchases.

I agree with literally everything op is saying and I don't want to detract from their point but this website here, specifically for mobile games (though they intend to eventually branch out to other types) is creating a database that flags those exact types of predatory things. It also flags games as safe, so if you want to look for safe mobile games this is an invaluable resource.

https://www.darkpattern.games/

It also has definitions, explanations, and examples of all the different types of psychological manipulations games pull on the website so if anyone ever tries to give you "just don't spend money, it's easy" you can send them this

://www.dreamstime.com/ ://www.freepik.com/ ://www.craiyon.com/ ://stock.adobe.com/ ://storybird.ai/ ://www.dinosaur.org/ ://pngtree.com/ ://creator.nightcafe.studio/ ://www.123rf.com/ ://lumenor.ai/ ://neural.love/ ://www.vecteezy.com/ ://openart.ai/ ://www.artpal.com/ ://generativeai.pub/ ://promptbase.com/

Block these sites in your uBlock Origin so you won't see that shit in your searches

The extension in the screenshot is uBlacklist and it's quite easy to use, both manually from the control panel to add the sites with the asterisk, or when in a search results page and clicking the "block this site" option. It's how I've gotten rid of random Pinterest site results, too.

They also provide subscription lists that keep up sites such as these and others on their github:

https://iorate.github.io/ublacklist/subscriptions

hey. listen. when you use too much detergent in your laundry you aren't making your clothes cleaner, you are making them degrade faster. the machine isn't able to rinse out the entire cup of soap you put in, so some of it is left in the fibers of your clothes. when they dry this makes the fabric stiffer and more brittle, so the fibers are more likely to erode and break. over time this makes your clothes wear out much faster than if they were properly rinsed with minimal soap. you are wasting money by overusing detergent, not just on the detergent itself but the clothes you are shortening the lifespan of.

you are also ruining your clothes by cramming too many into the wash at once. the machine washes them by agitating them and rubbing them together but if they're crammed in there there's more friction. so they're less likely to get clean and they're wearing each other out. don't use tiny loads of laundry bc that's a waste of water but focus on medium sized loads with only a tablespoon or two max of laundry detergent.

you can also hang up your cotton shirts to dry to prevent them from shrinking in the dryer, and to maximize the lifespan of printed graphics on your shirts or sweatshirts. this saves electricity and keeps your clothes nicer for longer.

fabric softener is a scam, you don't need it because most detergents come with a softening agent already. dryer sheets are handy to minimize static in the dryer, but you can get a reusable wool ball that does the same purpose so they're not necessary either.

use bleach detergents sparingly, only if you notice your whites becoming stained or dingy. using bleach on every load of whites will degrade them.

also most of the time you really only need to wash with cool water. unless something is really soiled, (especially with something greasy, remember heat melts and removes grease,) cold water works just fine for day to day dirty clothes.

that's all

DO NOT DO THIS!!!

If a website has a paywall, like New York Times, DO NOT use the ctrl+A shortcut then the ctrl+c shortcut as fast as you can because then you may accidentally copy the entire article before the paywall comes up. And definitely don't do ctrl+v into the next google doc or whatever you open because then you will accidentally paste the entire article into a google doc or something!!!! I repeat DO NOT do this because it is piracy which is absolutely totally wrong!!!

Also do NOT append "12ft.io/" before a URL ! Typing an URL like this https://12ft.io/<URL> will redirect to a site that would break the display of the page by removing the paywall !

Honestly it's kind of prohibited to mash CTRL+P before some paywall windows can load in to get a PDF of the article. Really shouldn't be done tbh very dangerous🤷🏿‍♂️ ❌️

For anyone that's at all interested, I genuinely do think that watching James Somerton's new video is a good idea. Obviously use adblocker or find a reupload. But it's a really good one to practice spotting manipulative statements and tactics, which is an important skill to develop.

Watch Hbomb's and Todd's video, then his. What is he lying about? What is he misrepresenting? What is he avoiding to mention?

And if you feel yourself being convinced by his words, why is that? Is there a type of manipulation you might be vulnerable to? (We all are vulnerable to something, and knowing this is useful and important)

I know I used to be kinda scared to watch things by "bad people" or things I knew I'd disagree with, because I was afraid it would confuse me and convince me. But you cannot avoid this by only carefully controlling what you're exposed to, because eventually something, some propaganda, will absolutely get to you. You have to work on your skill to analyse things and think critically about them, on your own, and find your own conclusions.

@screampotato Yeah, he absolutely spent most of the video setting up numerous excuses to absolve himself of blame. Briefly saying "these are not excuses" at the end does not undo that. If they aren't excuses, they should not have been mentioned the way they were.

I don't think they're only excuses, though. I think they are instructions for anyone who still wants to defend him online, on how to do it. "It's not his fault, he had undiagnosed adhd!" - And suddenly the conversation is not about what he actually chose to do, and who he harmed, it's derailed into a conversation about the effects of adhd, Is This Ableism, etc etc

I don't think it's going to work in this case because there's simply not enough people left on his side, but I've seen this tactic used in other apologies by other youtubers and their fanbase did exactly that.

Jumping in here before people use the "He wasn't trying to excuse himself, but he was explaining things from his perspective!"

I know that explaining what you did wrong and the things that pressured you into behaving the way you did isn't the same thing as absolving yourself from blame.

It can be a valuable tool in interpersonal relationships to be able to say "Hey, I didn't see your foot there when I stepped on it. Really sorry about that. *I will try to look where I step in the future so I don't do it again*."

But.

There is a difference between explaining your perspective because you want the other person to know your intentions didn't match the outcome and ..... making a town hall meeting where you present your case for why you stepped on that person's foot to everyone. One is a personal appeal to repair damage done by unintentional harm... the other... is a public declaration.

(Not to mention throwing Nick under the bus more and more as this thing plays out. No surprise there.)

And I get it, Somerton is a 'public figure' as much as anyone on the internet can be, so it feels as though a public response makes some kind of sense.... except that it doesn't if the goal is to make amends to the injured party.

There are times where you explaining your side is giving much needed context to a conflict, where you are not excusing your actions but do want the other person to understand the situation leading up to the action. Because the intent can indeed affect the impact of the action on an interpersonal level.

But he's not reaching out to the creators he hurt and talking with them (at least, not with this video I don't claim to know what he is doing behind the scenes).

He is releasing a public video to talk to *his audience*.

He isn't making amends, he is appealing to people's sympathy to be able to continue his work. He's already trying to reboot his video essay thing and I know he's talking about working more on his movie stuff. He is trying to salvage what he sees as his career.

This would even hit different if he was bowing out of the business.

There is a time when explanations aren't meant to be excuses... but this is definitely not one of those times.

Yeah, you explained that really nicely, thank you. He really purely focused on his intent, insisting he didn't do it maliciously or on purpose (though some of what he says, blaming the pressure from sponsors to put out two videos a month for the plagiarism, contradicts his claims of it being due to adhd and memory issues and accidental)

He's either ignoring, or genuinely does not understand, that whatever his intent was does not change anything about the actual actions he chose to take and the actual harm those actions caused.

Well to be completely fair I think the time pressures from sponsors and algorithm chasing could compound the memory issues rather than contradict them. For example, he could be more meticulous and careful because of his known memory issues, but the time pressure to upload made it so he didn't have the time to recheck everything when his memory flubs - or something like that.

Now, I think Somerton is a liar who is throwing everything at the wall to see if something sticks, but even taking him at his word that all these things are factors it doesn't look great.

Because those pressures aren't going to go away. The content crunch and the time pressures and the sponsors are all going to keep chugging along. The movie industry is notoriously stressful in this regard as well.

If everything he said is true, I don't see how he can move forward in this industry without a drastic overhaul and probably more support (not financial, but like in staffing people or interpersonal support in his life in general).

So like, even if we take him at his word- which considering he has lied to his audience and others so many times in the past I don't know why we would but *even IF* we did - he isn't a creator that people can rely on to not repeat these "mistakes" again.

But the man's a grifter and I probably won't spend much more time thinking about him after this and honestly I am being too charitable even engaging with his premises.

people NEED to stop gatekeeping making music like ohhhh i don’t have an instrument ohhhhh i don’t know music theory ohhhhh i’m not gonna pay for some program. SHUT UP. take my hand.

you need NONE of that shit!!!!! there’s a website called beepbox.co. literally all you have to do is press things until it sounds a modicum of nice. it’s easy it’s free and it works on anything which has a browser because it’s a website.

if even ONE person starts making music bc of this post it will be worth it.

making bad music is just as important and okay as it is to write badly or draw badly or sing badly. you AREN’T BEHOLDEN TO MAKE GOOD MUSIC. making music is not utilitarian HAVE FUN. HAVE FUN!!!!!!!!!

love how people will encourage people to just start making shit and see what happens when it comes to drawing and writing but when it comes to beginner musicians (music makers if you wish to be less formal) it’s just COMPLETE RADIO SILENCE. it feels like no one even knows you MAKE music it just sprouts up from the ground one day and some guy picks it up. am i alone in this dark cave

Frothing at the mouth every time I see a sex ed resource that says "use condoms" without any further elaboration. "Condoms prevent STIs and pregnancy in the vast majority of cases when used correctly" but then they don't talk about what correctly IS

Correct use of a condom means

Bonus: a lot of people think hand stuff can't transmit STIs. Wrong! If you give your partner a handjob and then touch yourself you can get HPV, herpes (low risk), and infections like chlamydia and gonorrhea

This isn't meant to be stressful, and the most common STIs are the most treatable - and often curable - but getting gonorrhea in your eyes after a facial still extremely sucks and yet no one talks about the fact that any mucous membrane can be effected, not just your genitals (yes this includes your mouth and throat)

In ten years of doing sex work where I saw 10 clients a day most of the time I've had 4 condom fails ever. One was what I mentioned above when it snapped on my leg, one was a client on top of me didn't get off fast enough after he finished and the condom came off, and the other two were a Glyde brand magnum that was inexplicably twice the thickness of a regular condom and didn't stay put on anyone so I suggest just avoiding Glyde entirely (their water based lubes also stain fyi). With all other brands correct use = extremely safe