good lord

YEAH I GOT NOTHING

i don’t understand a single sentence in this and i’m ok with that

I haven’t stopped saying “it’s called quantum jumping, babe”

I would genuinely like to know who to blame for making these children so disconnected from the concept of imagination that they think the simpler explanation for what they’re doing is that they’re projecting their consciousness into one of infinite realities where fictional characters are real.

topical :/

WHY IS IT TOPICAL

Me shouting at my rash ointment

great post everyone

In the fan newsletter volume 100, the members were asked to answer to questions from each member and here’s my take on the translation:

Toshiya

Kyo > Toshiya

- Rich or Extremely rich? (referring to food such as ramen broth) Rich

- All humanity is turning into dogs: woof 🐶

- Very hard or very soft noodles? Hard

- Pigmon or Kanegon? (from Ultra Q) Pigmon

- Would you dye your hair blue again? If everyone dye their hair like the old days then I’ll consider it.

Die > Toshiya

- Are you the type who sleeps well at the hotels during tours? depends on which day

- How often do you change your smartphone? 4-5 years

- What do you usually order from Starbucks? Drip coffee

- Which electric appliances are you very particular about? Electric toothbrush

- If you were to drive, which car do you want to drive in? Shelby Cobra

Kaoru > Toshiya

- Any recommendations lately? ask and answer by yourself

- You’re not watching anime recently? I watch it sometimes

- Which is the most delicious ramen shop? If it’s hard to say here then tell me next time: I’ll tell you secretly

- What would you say if Die send you a picture with his hair completely shaved off? maybe he can’t deal with the intense heat..?

- How do you want our next song (album) to turn out? I want it to come with a different kind of excitement

Shinya > Toshiya

- Which country do you like aside from Japan? the US, Hawaii

- Which manga did you like the most as a kid in elementary school? Musashi no Ken

- Are you becoming farsighted? My vision is getting worse so it could be that…

- Do you want to live in Nagano in the future? I'm thinking about it lately

- Are you planning to keep your black hair forever? Silver hair

Kaoru

Kyo > Kaoru

- Jumping up and down (びょんびょん) or chuckle (むひむひ)? (I think he’s referring to fans’ reaction) chuckle

- Which one is better, Light salt or Cheese Karl snack? Curry

- Aren’t you gonna grow your hair long? It’s troublesome

- Aren’t you going to dress up as a pirate? I’m not doing anything this Halloween, so I won’t do that

Kaoru > Kaoru

- Gonna do “it”? Give “it” to me

Die > Kaoru

- What make Hanshin so strong this year, let me hear your opinion: pineapple candy

- If a Hanshin member was to throw an MVP, who would that be? Kinami Seiya

- If you could scout one player from an 11-members team (other than Hanshin), who would that be? Yamamoto Yoshinobu

- If Hanshin finally got “it” after 18 years, what do you think is going to happen at the Dotonbori river? become the prey of Idiots, onlookers and youtubers.

* I don’t watch baseball so I’m not so sure about this whole conversation, but I know Die is a huge GIANTS fan while Kaoru is at Hanshin’s side, and people in Osaka often jump into the Dotonbori river when celebrating something big (new year, winning the olympic games..) so Die is talking as if the Hanshin would surely win the game (or winning over the GIANTS? idk..)

- If the GIANTS were to change the manager, who would that be? I think Abe Shinnosuke…? but the atmosphere would be…

Toshiya > Kaoru:

- We will die at some point in life, would you rather (1) be remembered by everyone in the world or (2) always be remembered by one particular person until they die? 1

- If you have a chance to time-travel for once, which timeline would you choose (1) before you were born, (2) after you’ve passed away? 2

- If there is one drug that brings super power, would you choose the one that (1) make you look young like your 20-year-old self or (2) keep the same appearance, but have the strength of a 20-year-old? 2

- Which member is most likely to runaway from terrors? Kyo

- Who is the most manly member? Toshiya

Shinya > Kaoru

- Which country do you like aside from Japan?Hawaii

- Which manga did you like the most as a kid in elementary school? Toriyama Akira

- Are you becoming farsighted? Yes, I am

- Who is your favourite Hanshin player? Kakefu Masayuki

- Which LINE stamp do you use the most? Kaoru chan

Kyo

Kaoru > Kyo

- Any recommendations lately? Fish from Fukushima

- Are you building plastic models? I’m building them intensely

- What would you say if Shinya send you a picture of him and Tom Hanks? from Deep State?

- Have you seen Mad Heidi? I haven’t seen it, but I’ve watched MEN

- How do you want our next song (album) to turn out? Isn’t Ramen Jiro (without the broth) the best thing ever?

Toshiya > Kyo

- We will die at some point in life, would you rather (1) be remembered by everyone in the world or (2) always be remembered by one particular person until they die? must be 2, right?

- If you have a chance to time-travel for once, which timeline would you choose (1) before you were born, (2) after you’ve passed away? maybe 2, to the future

- If there is one drug that brings super power, would you choose the one that (1) make you look young like your 20-year-old self or (2) keep the same appearance, but have the strength of a 20-year-old? 2, the inner strength (health)

- Who is the most affectionate member? Must be me

- Who is the best at telling lies? Must be Shinya

Die > Kyo

- Any scary experience at the hotels while touring? a fan peeping through a peephole and put their ear to the wall (in Osaka)

- Favourite game console? Mega Drive

- The most intimidating movie character in your opinion? Norman Bates

- How many pair of sneakers do you have? about 50?

- FOOD (don’t know why he’s using english here lol) that touched your soul lately? Blowfish dish from the restaurant that senpai took me to

Shinya > Kyo

- Which country do you like aside from Japan? None. Aren’t you Shinya!

- Which manga did you like the most as a kid in elementary school? Jojo. Aren’t you Shinya!

- Are you becoming farsighted? Dunno. Aren’t you Shinya!

- Have you gotten more tatoos? I’ll get more when I’ve become a skin-head. Aren’t you Shinya!

- Will you give up smoking? No. Aren’t you Shinya!

Die

Kyo > Die

- How many times do you go to the beach each year? when I think about it, I guess I haven’t went to the beach for years

- What is your choice of drink on a cruiser, beer or wine? I get drunk immediately after having wine so I think it’s better to go with beer

- The whole world is destroyed: If everything and everyone dissapear all at once then I’m not scared

- Won’t you dye your hair red again? or would you dye it blue? Frankly, during the pandemic when I could not see anyone, I’ve made a mistake and dyed my hair blue. It didn’t suit me at all, to the point that it gets creepy. So I cover it with red dye right on the next day.

- What’s your favourite colour other than red? BLACK&WHITE (he used english here)

Kaoru > Die

- Any recommendations lately? Prison’s book of rules

- Favourite type of meat for Yakiniku (grilled meat)? high-quality outside skirt steak, thick-sliced beef tongue, beef organs

- After Hara Tatsunori, who’s going to be the GIANTS next manager? I wanna see Abe Shinnosuke as the manager already

- What would you say if Kyo send you a picture of him standing on top of the mountain that he’s just climbed? The Zoom meeting has already started

- How do you want our next song (album) to turn out? raw (fresh) sound

Toshiya > Die

- We will die at some point in life, would you rather (1) be remembered by everyone in the world or (2) always be remembered by one particular person until they die? I’ve spent my whole life with this band so maybe 1

- If you have a chance to time-travel for once, which timeline would you choose (1) before you were born, (2) after you’ve passed away? If I can not return to this life time then I’d want to see what the future is like

- If there is one drug that brings super power, would you choose the one that (1) make you look young like your 20-year-old self or (2) keep the same appearance, but have the strength of a 20-year-old? 2-I’ll work on my appearance somehow…

- Who’s a foodie among the members? Our interests may vary but isn’t everyone a foodie?

- Which members hold the most secrets? All of us are secretive but I think “that person” definitely stood out.

Shinya > Die

- Which country do you like aside from Japan? The humidity right now makes me really want to feel the air of Los Angeles

- Which manga did you like the most as a kid in elementary school? Captain Tsubasa

- Are you becoming farsighted? I’d say my vision has gotton worse from 2007-when I got lasik surgery

- Favourite GIANTS player? It’s hard to choose one, but I’d say Kuwasa Masumi, he lived near my house back in Osaka, and used to be my hero when I was in PL Academy

- Your luggages always seem heavy, which item is the heaviest of them all? Dyson airwrap styler, hair dryer, hair iron, hair oil, hair cream, hair treatment spray… most of the items that added weight to my luggage are hair related

Shinya

Kyo > Shinya

- You’re already dead. No, I’m not dead

- If you can become another person, would you choose to be Yoshiki san or Gackt san? please choose one. I’ll choose Yoshiki san because I’m a drummer

- Aren’t you going to build a room in your balcony? I don’t have a balcony in the first place

- Would you try the punch perm hair style? I really want you to try it? or eipper. you only have two choices, punch perm or eipper? If only these two choices then eipper…

- You’re already dead. No. I’m not dead.

Die > Shinya

- Would you wear anything other colour aside from white at the liveshows? Please answer with something different from “No”. Maybe there’s no other options in the future?

- Would you change your hair style? Please answer with something different from “No”. Maybe there’s no other options in the future?

- Would you change your phone to the iphone 15? Please answer with something different from “No”. I’ll skip for once next time

- Favourite Apple’s product that you’ve owned? please also explain why. I’d say the Macbook Pro that I’m currently using. Without it, nothing will work out

- If you didn’t become a Youtuber then who would you be? Maybe a drummer

Kaoru > Shinya

- Any recommendations lately? What kind??

- What kind of game should I, Tooru and Fujieda play? Who’s “I”??

- If you have the Rock f Solo sheet for Kurenai (ロックfソロシート), please give it to me. I only have DIR’s records

- What would you say if Toshiya send you a picture of him DJ-ing in the club? You’re spinning the Kurenai Solo Sheet! Yay

- How do you want our next song (album) to turn out? Ah! the person who ask this question… must be Kaoru kun? Am I right? 😏😏😏

Toshiya > Shinya

- We will die at some point in life, would you rather (1) be remembered by everyone in the world or (2) always be remembered by one particular person until they die? Maybe everyone in the world

- If you have a chance to time-travel for once, which timeline would you choose (1) before you were born, (2) after you’ve passed away? Absolutely the future, I want to see the future world

- If there is one drug that brings super power, would you choose the one that (1) make you look young like your 20-year-old self or (2) keep the same appearance, but have the strength of a 20-year-old? Inner strength

- Who the most domestic member? Die san

- Most ambitious member? Kyo san

——————

And that’s it. They haven’t change one bit 😂

IT’S ALMOST HALLOWEEN

I know I have like a bajillion moments that are all my “favorite thing P!ATD ever did,” but Halloween 2008 seriously ranks way up there.

THE SONG & VIDEO:

CONTESTS / PROMOS / “THINGS I DID NOT WIN”

THE SHOW(S):

settling a debate, reblog for reach

Here’s the necessary clarification for non-USAmericans who are confused by how confidently USAmericans are claiming these are not the same thing: American biscuits are almost identical to British scones. But not American scones. Behold the continuum:

American biscuits:

These are layered quick breads. They are almost always baked in a round shape, and when they're not, they're baked square; you will pretty much never see a triangular American biscuit. They’re usually made with buttermilk, which gives them a nice slightly tangy flavor. They’re not at all sweet on their own, but they’re also not particularly savory, and as a result, they’re a bit of a blank slate: they pair well with butter and jam, but alternatively, they pair equally well with a savory sausage gravy. There are recipes that are firmly on the savory side by virtue of adding cheddar cheese to the dough, but in those cases, people will usually specify “cheese biscuits” or “cheddar biscuits”. American biscuits can be a breakfast food, or a lunch food, or a dinner food, all about equally.

British scones:

These are very similar to American biscuits, but a little bit lighter, and noticeably sweeter. You can have these with butter and jam (or, more likely, clotted cream and jam), but unlike American biscuits, I’d never dream of serving them with anything savory like a sausage gravy. You will sometimes see bits of dried fruit, like currants or dried blueberries, baked into them, but this isn't all that common, and it's basically the extent of weird baked-in flavorings. You will sometimes see these baked into a triangle shape, but more commonly, they are round. They’re great as a breakfast food, but they’re better with an afternoon tea; you’d probably never see them as the accompaniment to a hearty, savory dinner.

American scones:

American scones are denser, sweeter, and significantly more buttery than British scones, without the more clearly defined layers that British scones have. They are almost always baked in a triangle shape, and only very rarely baked round. American scones come in a variety of flavorings – it's not uncommon to find pumpkin spice scones, double chocolate scones, lemon strawberry scones, blueberry scones with fresh blueberries baked right in, etc. It's also not uncommon to find them glazed, like a doughnut (but usually slightly less so). You do not typically top these with butter or jam, or indeed, with anything – they are eaten as-is, as an accompaniment to coffee or tea. They are mostly a breakfast food, though they may occasional feature at an afternoon tea, if someone even has one of those, which in the States, people mostly don't.

American cookies:

American cookies are exclusively a sweet dessert. They are often baked soft, and best eaten warm, although they're perfectly fine to eat cooled, and you can certainly find shelf-stable cookies in stores (which are usually hard, rather than soft, see eg. Chips Ahoy). Oatmeal raisin cookies come the closest to the place that American scones leave off, and it isn't very close. All sorts of flavorings and mixed in bits are common, although chocolate and nuts are more popular mix-in additions than dried fruit. Glazes are fairly uncommon, but not unheard of. The archetypal accompaniment for American cookies is a glass of milk, although they're perfectly nice to enjoy with tea or coffee. They are not, however, a breakfast food. Americans do consider shortbread and gingerbread to both be types of cookies, but if you refer to "cookies" in the abstract, those aren't what people typically think of.

British biscuits:

British biscuits are like American cookies, but pretty much always hard and served at room temperature. I've even heard the opinion that a British biscuit should always be "crisp", with softness as a sign that a biscuit isn't fresh. Americans are familiar with this style of treat, and generally think of British biscuits as "the type of cookies that you get in a tin" – they're very much a thing in America, but they're considered a smaller and much less popular subset of the broader "cookie" category. Like American cookies, these are often eaten as a dessert, but they are much more commonly seen as an accompaniment to tea than the American cookie is.

Tl;dr: This is like an even more complicated version of the crisps/chips/fries thing, I’m afraid. We're simply talking about different things.

LOL almost nobody—except washed up conservative movie stars from the 80s—wants a Twitter Blue verified checkmark if Elon is paying for it.

Lost followers after reblogging that whole thing about JKR being radicalized over the years, and that disturbs me.

Like if you think saying that people can be radicalized and manipulated into hate is somehow justifying it, yikes. And if you think that people are somehow just good or evil and that you are not at risk of buying into propaganda, have I got some very red flag news about that!

Idk if its because I am an older Millennial maybe (most who unfollowed were younger) but I watched a ton of that generation slide from one of the most progressive to the far right before my every eyes. Hell, my dad fought alongside his black friends in the Detroit race riots and now he watches Fox News 24/7 and talks about the border wall. Yet still claims he could never be racist because of how he used to be. He doesn’t even realize what he has become.

JKR isn’t a deluded old woman or innately evil, but in fact THE prime example of how well-meaning ignorance and privilege can be weaponized and encouraged down a pipeline, until it turns into a force of hate, and should be a cautionary tale about why educating and being open about these issues are necessary. Because there are those out there who will use those divisions and ignorance to their own ends. And just digging in our heels and saying “that could never be me!” is the very thing that puts you more at risk. I’ve lost so many loved ones down that pipeline and it is more slippery than most realize.

Stay alert, stay compassionate, stay humble, and make sure you move through life guided by reason rather than reaction. I love y’all and don’t want to see your passion twisted to get used against the world.

Thinking "I could never be a bigot" is the first prerequisite for becoming a bigot.

In the UK we've seen a few people ride this crazy train to the end of the line in the last few years. Perhaps because our political landscape is different from that of the US, it's easier to see it happening. There has never been an expectation here that being a conservative means you will hold insane views. It might mean you have some objectionable political ideologies, but you are still expected to be a somewhat normal human being who occupies the same planet as the rest of us.

So when we see somebody make the transition from being just a bit right-wing in their thinking, to being a full-on conspiracy lunatic, it really shows. We've seen it with a lot of our politicians and other public figures.

There's a guy called Neil Oliver who used to present historical TV. His views were always a bit weird and biased (historians and archaeologists did not like him at all), but he wasn't an actual crazy person. But he rode that crazy train to the end of the line and became a fully-fledged antivaxx COVID denier, who is now babbling about one world government and peddling antisemitic conspiracy theories. It happens.

JK Rowling's radicalisation has really disturbed people, because she was famous for books which championed ideas of equality and rights for marginalised groups. In retrospect, those books had some biases and prejudices in them as well, but they were ones that most white Britons carry without realising it. So the seemingly sudden change from that to being someone spreading hatred of trans people and seeming to consciously back antisemitic ideas was a massive whiplash. A real shock. Even more of a shock than the fact she seems to have forgotten how to write a readable book.

Now, I'm a pro-independence Scot who was active on Twitter in the years after 2014. So I already knew she was disingenuous, a bit of a troll, and had some fairly reactionary views. Perhaps her further radicalisation was less of a shock for me. But it still took me aback.

This happens. It happens to people who are too secure in their own self-concept as a Good And Progressive Person. They feel that because they are a Good And Progressive Person, all their thoughts and feelings and biases must also be Good And Progressive, because Good People don't have Bad Thoughts, and of course, Bad People never have Good Thoughts.

By painting JK Rowling as having always been a secretly Bad Person, and Harry Potter as having always been secretly propaganda for Bad Thoughts, we make ourselves vulnerable to the same kind of radicalisation. The truth is that she is just a person, a white cis woman with some unexamined biases, who wrote a series of books that were good-hearted and had good messages, and also reflected some of those biases. And now she has taken a ride on the crazy train, and it's scary to see.

Because it could happen to any of us.

This fake yarn is supposedly better for sheep.

Aimed at people who don’t know where wool comes from, it’s 100% plastic. Yes, plastic.

So any garment you wash will release microfibres into the sea. It’ll never decompose.

You’re supposed to believe that sheep shearing is violent and cruel. There are imbeciles out there that work in an unprofessional manner while shearing, but that’s not the case overall.

Sheep don’t suffer from having their fleece removed.

Left on, the fleece can become a home for fly eggs and the subsequent maggots which can eat the sheep. Chemical treatments are available to prevent that happening. It’s much better for the sheep, the land and the farmer to avoid chemical use.

Don’t be fooled. Wool is a sustainable material, one we should make more and better use of.

Any garment you wash will release microfibres into the sea. It’ll never decompose.

This is very important.

And you need to wash acrylic wool garment more often than natural wool. They get stinky way more easily.

In my almost-decade of owning sheep, there have been exactly two(2) bad shearers try to start up in the area. Know what happened? The first farm they went to called every other shepherd in the area and said “This guy cut one of my sheep and didn’t think it was a big deal, don’t hire him.” And neither of them ever did business in the area again.

Some farmers are less conscientious than they should be about taking care of their stock, and the occasional tiny nick will happen, but no one is going to hire a shearer who is a) incompetent enough and b) uncaring enough to actually injure the animals to the point of bleeding, let alone the kind of horrors the internet claims.

Also, most breeds of sheep will literally die if they go too long without being sheared. PETA (and let’s face it, most of this anti-wool stuff can be traced back to deliberate misinformation from PETA) doesn’t care if sheep die, they have openly stated that they would prefer every domestic species that can no longer survive without humans go extinct rather than live in “"slavery.”“

Humans and sheep have lived together for over ten thousand years, they’ve been domesticated longer than dogs! Their lives consist of doing whatever the heck they want (for the most part they only want to walk, eat, sleep, play, and make lambs) while being fed and cared for, for the low price of having their hair cut once a year. Why would anyone boycott this natural, biodegradable fiber humans have been using for so long to the benefit of both species, in favor of plastics that are killing the planet??

Also loving the “the sheep will be snuggly warm tonight” like… You shear sheep in the spring, when the weather warms up and they no longer need it, and they grow it back for next winter.

Also, you literaly NEED to shear sheep multible times a Year or they fucking Overheat and die in their own wool

Twee, deliberate mislabelling which appeals to kind-hearted people who know nothing about how the real thing is produced.

On the funnier side, ignorance about anything closer to nature than a supermarket shelf can result in gems like this one:

Regular yogurt for me.  Thanks.

(As for ignorance, this post is epic and getting more so every time I see it.)

*****

Back on topic.

Shearing’s not skinning and it’s not painful, unless some guy getting busy with a manscaping clipper means he’s flaying himself alive.

Shearing is an all-over haircut, call it sheepscaping if need be though expect some odd looks, and good shearers - as @ruusverd​ said, bad shearers earn a bad rep and soon earn no more money - will leave less nicks on an entire sheep than I might inflict on my face if I forget to change my razor-blade. 

That’s pretty impressive when dealing with a notoriously dimwit animal that doesn’t understand “now just sit still for a minute” and finds “see that open gate, go through it” a difficult concept. (Going through an unexpected hole in the hedge, however, is something sheep do with great ease and willingness, especially if there’s a soon-to-be-ex herb garden on the far side…)

“All warm and snuggly in their woolly jumpers…” Oh puh-leeze. A jumper is a garment which can be taken off and put on as required. A sheep’s fleece is nothing of the sort. Ireland’s just had a heatwave, so which of these two would have been more comfortable the other day when it was 30°C / 90°F in the shade?

*****

But look at the blood! goes the outcry about sheep with red stains. Here’s what that “blood” is. Unless the outcriers believe the front half is royal and bleeds blue, it’s just dye.

Why dye? There are various reasons: to show who owns which sheep in a mixed flock of the same breed, or to indicate if one has been dosed with something, or to mark if a ewe has mated with a ram.

The ram wears a harness - AFAIK not black leather with chrome studs, at least not on any farm near here - which holds a dye-pad on his chest. After he’s done his business, the hopefully-preggers ewe will have a patch of that dye on her rump as in the photo.

Different colours let the farmer know which ram’s been busy if there’s more than one, or with one ram, on what day the mating occurred so they can calculate when to expect lambs. That kit suggests rams get one day a week off…

*****

Besides shearing sheep to stop them overheating, if the weather is rainy rather than sunny they’ll still need sheared to stop them getting waterlogged.

A waterlogged sheep is a top-heavy sheep, and since rainy weather will have made the ground slippery, a top-heavy sheep can all too easily become a sheep on its back - a broad, flat back that won’t roll - unable to get upright.

Sheep internal organs aren’t meant to be upside down and inversion will eventually kill them, if they’re not gutted by a fox first. Crows will have had their eyes long before then.

Forget deceitful propaganda about fake wool, here’s some REAL advice about how to do a sheep a (literal) good turn.

I’ve done it myself, and though she’d already lost one eye - hoodie crows don’t miss a chance - that ewe survived and next spring produced what I was told were two fine lambs. I felt pretty good about that.

I still do.

*****

This is what shearing really looks like, and that’s not the behaviour of an animal in distress or pain. Baffled, maybe, but any human whose haircut started with a judo throw would be baffled too..

The end result is a 12lb / 5.5kg load of insulation which the sheep no longer has to carry about. How’d you like being stuck inside that lot on a hot day?

The “shearing is cruel” fruitloops rely on deliberate lies, gullibility and lack of knowledge. Be aware.

 Or maybe…

Fondly remembering the time that a cat owner casually entered their calico Maine Coon in a cat fancier’s competition and the judges lost their minds because the cat was 1) male and 2) able to bear children

Anyway here’s Dawntreader Texas Calboy as a silly lil kitten

Here’s an excerpt from one of the articles about the drama his entry caused among the Cat Fanciers that I thought was very earnest and sweet <3

And also some of Calboy’s children!

@pangur-and-grim

He is fearfully and wonderfully made!

ALT

I was about to say he would technically be an intersex king (not because I dislike the concept of trans cats, just bc intersex rep is sorely needed too) but I did some more reading on this icon and actually found the article OP referenced.

ALT

He’s not your usual male calico kitty as it turns out. That’s already cool and rare, but he’s even cooler and rarer than that!

ALT

ALT

Calboy is a chimera!! Which is really fucking cool of you ask me. The chances of having a male calico this way are slim to none, but the mad lad still exists! What an icon. I would die for Calboy.

Everyone in the tags of this post @ cat show judges

Originally I was looking for an adult picture of Calboy

(He’s so pretty 🥰)

But I also found a source for the article screenshotted above! And folks it’s WILD. It’s an incredibly interesting read if you happen to love hearing about niche hobby drama. It’s also just a fantastically written article!

The parts I find the most interesting are about how conservative the cat fanciers association is. This isn’t even all of the parts that talk about that.

People are so mad about this cat spefically because he has female colors. An animal who couldn’t choose how it was born. This is happening in Texas by the way. Hm. I wonder how they treat trans people over there?

Reblogging again for this crucial addition

this is the funniest tweet i’ve seen in months bye

these are all the geek equivalents of Lovecraft’s Cat’s Name

his cats name couldn’t be that bad!!!! it’s a cat, what’s the worst name?

i am wrong, what the fuck

Me every time this post comes back

go Google why chainsaws were invented, it’s really fun :)

why.

I’ve seen everything at this point, so why were chain saws in-

oh what the FUCK WHY

Thanks I hate it.

I could have gone my whole life without knowing it, thank you motherfucker

To be fair, its not AS bad when you read into detail. But ya. Still like getting slapped in the face with a cold fish.

i’m boutta google why chainsaws were invented now.  feel like i’m going on an adventure.

really speaks to how i’ve been around the internet, that that wasn’t what i was expecting it to be, but it was also really close to what i expected it to be.

Every time I see this post it’s gone in a completely different direction and every time it’s cursed as fuck

#like...why use this baby word when you can just say how you feel about it

Found this in the original post tags and I just... SIGH

Here’s the thing, anon. Squick isn’t just ‘I don’t like this’, it’s ‘I think this is gross and it makes me deeply uncomfortable but I pass no judgement on those who enjoy it, because I acknowledge that everyone is different and those same people may have the same visceral reaction some of the things I enjoy’ and was originally made popular in the kink community.

So yeah, if you want to say that every time you come across a trope or whatever you find icky then go ahead, say that every time.

Also, this term dates back to Usenet in the early nineties, so sure, go off.

This frustrates me so much because squicks and triggers are fundamentally different things and as someone with PTSD, the distinction is super useful!

Squicks are things I find personally gross but may not be gross to someone else. They don’t upset me or provoke my PTSD, they simply do not pop my corn. Example: Omegaverse. I don’t like it, it makes me uncomfortable and I’m not going to read it, but if you like it, you do you.

Triggers are things which directly provoke my PTSD. This means that my triggers may seem completely normal and innocuous to someone else, because my triggers are so personal and intrinsically linked to a specific event in my life. My reactions to these triggers can include panic attacks and flashbacks to this traumatic event. Sometimes being triggered can affect me for several hours or even days.

Describing something as either a squick or a trigger allows me easily establish the difference in my potential reaction to something without having to go into painful detail about why bodily fluids might make me back button quickly but poker games might leave me a crying wreck. 

Making this distinction, and having a specific word for something that is not your slice of pie, but also not an actual psychological trigger, is also REALLY important for making sure that the word “trigger” can retain its original, specific, purposeful, and collectively understood clinical meaning (both inside and outside online fannish communities).

If we encourage everyone to lump things that just make them slightly uncomfortable or simply aren’t to their taste in under the word “trigger”, it actually dilutes the meaning of the word. It makes it harder for us all to, for the most part, collectively agree on and understand what exactly is being described when the word gets used.

And that destruction of shared precise definitions is a problem! It is really useful to have the communal language to be able to clearly and quickly delineate between “this grosses me out, no thanks” and “this is going to set off a trauma episode, rattle my brain, and probably throw off the rest of my day/week as a result” while also maintaining your privacy, and to know that you will be understood in what you are saying. Not having it is actually detrimental to the effort of making our communities safe and navigable for people living with trauma. Which is a goal that is much more important to me, personally, than the idea of not being “cutesy” (a word which in this case which sounds a lot like it’s being used as a euphemism for “cringe”).

(Also, one has to wonder if people told Shakespeare he was being childish when he made up entirely new words that are still widely used in the English language today...... 🤔)

My understanding is that “squick” was also created to avoid using more judgmental terms like “gross” or “disturbing”--like yeah, I do find X kink gross or disturbing, but that’s my personal feeling, not an objective fact about the world, and if I’m explaining to my friend who is super into X that I’d prefer they leave it out of the story they’re writing me in the fic exchange, I want to use politer language!

“Squick” does sound silly, like onomatopoeia, but I think that’s part of its role--it’s a word that defuses if, again, you’re saying something squicks you in front of an audience that may include its connoisseurs. When I say I’m squicked, I’m clearly not getting onto a high horse of dignity and moral righteousness. At the same time I’m not being so indirect for the sake of politeness--”oh, it’s not my favorite thing, I’m not sure it works for me, I haven’t found a fic about it that clicks for me”--that someone could misunderstand how much I do not want to see it.

And, to reiterate, it is a grown up word made by grown up nerds in the 90s so if you think it was somehow born on and limited to Tumblr I'm going to need you to actually do some fandom history research before you ever speak authoritatively again about anything fandom-related or adjacent.

I love and deeply miss the term “squick” and really want to see it brought back. It allows dislike for its own sake and without judgement. It’s polite, gentle, and has an air of “you do you.” A squick is not a trigger. Triggers are related to trauma. You’re allowed to not like things and not have them related to anything other than just finding them unpleasant. And that aversion can be strong! That’s okay! I really don’t like watersports. Like, gag-reflex levels of aversion, but it’s not triggering. I just really don’t like it.  I feel like we’ve lost the right/ability to just... quietly not like things and move on with our lives. Not everything is for everyone, and you don’t need a reason to not like something. Just politely and quietly excuse yourself. No need to draw attention, and if someone asks you why you just say, “No, it squicks me out.” No judgement. No narrative necessary. 

There is a sad trend of trying to make everything you personally dislike morally reprehensible in some way to justify your dislike of it. You're allowed to just not like something for no real reason. You do not have to justify why you dislike something, and the word "squick" is perfect for that. It say "look I really really don't like this thing, but it's ok if you do" and that is useful.

I think the biggest problem is that a lot of these kids are VERY into the whole fandom purity culture thing, so they actually DO want to make it out to be morally reprehensible, and they DON'T think it's ok that other ppl might be into it.

From National Geographic:

Yes! This is exactly the sort of thing I focused on when I was studying ecopsychology in graduate school! If you’re interested in more of this sort of thing, here’s a link to my master post of the many ways nature is good for us.

By Yash Pandit

i want to shake those two little Victorian girl bitchs hands who faked the pictures of themselves playing with fairies and thank them for paving the way.

OP can we please see the pictures

The photos are of (and by) Elsie Wright and Frances Griffith, who were respectively 13 and 11 at the time! Not Victorian, but just after - the pictures were taken around 1920.

Something that amazes me about this story is how absolutely bonkers it is that they got away with it for so long, and how if you just read about the story and didn’t see the pictures, you’d be damn near convinced that they actually took photos with actual fairies or something until basically the very end, and even then you might wonder.  Because most written accounts of what happens goes something like this: they took these photos and someone saw them, and BREAKING NEWS! And now suddenly believers and skeptics alike are itching to get ahold of these photos and determine whether or not they are real, because just looking at the photos had them either completely convinced, or else certain that some kind of photographic trickery must have been used. So there were all these experts who examined the photos, the camera, the film/plates, the whatever, to try and find out how they faked these photos (or IF they faked them). Like, expert experts. Like they got the folks at Kodak to examine them. (Over the next few decades they’d also be xrayed and all kinds of stuff.) And they couldn’t find anything. There was no evidence of early 20th century photoshop. They examined the photos, the negatives, everything, and concluded that they hadn’t been tampered with. Arthur Conan Doyle was LOSING HIS SHIT because he thought they were real and this proved it. Whether you believed in fairies or not all the experts were coming to the conclusion that the photos were totally real, and the skeptics were getting really really mad about it. Because there was no way these photos were real! Except they totally seemed to be! And the girls were sticking by their story. (And actually Elsie and Frances were 16 and 9 respectively, when the first two photos were taken in mid-1917, and the photos became public in mid 1919.)

Doyle was still losing his goddamn mind and so to put the matter to rest, another believer went to them in 1920, bringing cameras and stuff for them to photograph fairies with. The thinking was that if they were using equipment that had been examined and everything beforehand, and then developed not by the girls, then the opportunity for fakery was cut out and they could determine the truth. And lo and behold, the three pictures they girls took (alone, because “the fairies won’t show up if we’re not alone”), were also verified as being real!!! Okay, okay, you don’t believe in fairies, and believe the photos have to be fake, but still, there is the mystery of how did they do it???

And if that is what you read it’s understandable to be thinking that woah, what did these girls capture on film? Were these children just on to some advanced af photo trickery? What advanced technique did these kids figure out that fooled all the experts? Did they really actually capture pictures of something supernatural?

No. They fuckin cut some drawings of fairies out of paper and took pictures with them.  There was no trickery detected with the photos or photo equipment because they didn’t have to fake that part. They were genuine photographs….of little girls with propped up drawings. Elsie copied some drawings from a book, added wings, cut them out, and propped them up. You look at these photos today and they look fake as fuck. These are obviously little drawings. They do not look the slightest bit realistic. There are people out there TODAY who will argue that it’s totally possible that these girls took pictures of actual fairies. Because that’s a better story, I guess. But if you hear that version of the story and then see the photos it’s just laughable. 

I can only assume that the reason anybody fell for it at all is the same reason that people praised the special effects in old movies that now look ridiculous. 

But at the same time….nobody noticed that these fairies looked like children’s book illustrations???? Like it took another fifty years for this to be put to rest, because even if you didn’t believe they were real, NO ONE COULD FIGURE OUT HOW THEY COULD HAVE FAKED THEM. It wasn’t until the fricken 80s when someone tracked down the girls that they admitted to having faked the photos by using little drawings. And even with that admission and the actual book they copied from, plus computer examination revealing that there were little strings and stuff holding the cutouts in place, there are STILL people who will maintain that these photos were real.  For their parts Elsie and Frances disagreed over the veracity of the fifth photogragh (not pictured here). Both claimed to have taken it, and Elsie said it was fake while Frances said it was real. (Even in the 80′s.) The truth is most likely that it was a double exposure and so both girls did take it. Also they apparently kept up the lie because once they had fooled Arthur Conan Doyle they felt too weird about telling the truth. Seriously, EVEN THEY DIDN’T UNDERSTAND HOW THEY HAD FOOLED SO MANY GROWNUPS. THEY WEREN’T EVEN TRYING TO PULL A HOAX. 

Read that last sentence again. They really weren’t. They were just trying to take some fun little photos. And ALL THESE GODDAMN ADULTS WERE FREAKING THE FUCK OUT THINKING THAT THEY HAD PHOTOGRAPHED ACTUAL FAIRIES. AND IT WAS SUCH AN AWKWARD SITUATION THAT THE GIRLS JUST WENT WITH IT.  They didn’t keep it up for money or fame or pride, they kept up the hoax because it would be too awkward to tell the grownups they’d fooled them. 

THEY CREATED A MYSTERY THAT LASTED LIKE 50 YEARS BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T KNOW WHAT TO DO IN AN AWKWARD SITUATION. 

Frances straight up said: “I never even thought of it as being a fraud – it was just Elsie and I having a bit of fun and I can’t understand to this day why they were taken in – they wanted to be taken in.” 

TL;DR: Two kids were dicking around with a camera and some fairy drawings, accidentally fool top experts in the world with super fake looking photos, feel too awkward at having fooled so many smart people to admit that it was all fake until a few years before their deaths. True. Icons.

I would like to offer a few brief thoughts to anybody having any kind of sexual awakening because they saw content from a professional stage production of Cats

There are three reasons the people in the musical about cats are making you horny.

First, these are professional dancers primarily. Cats is a massively demanding show on a physical level, and the vast majority of parts demand – more than acting or singing skill – an incredible amount of dancing. That isn’t to say the ensemble isn’t good at acting or singing; only that most roles can get away with less-than-stellar voices or acting. They cannot survive being bad at dancing. This means that the physique of most people on that stage is going to be godlike. This is like, cream of the crop of conventionally attractive physique, here.

Second, these are professional actors portraying characters defined by their feline confidence. Confidence is the soul of sexiness. The fact that they move and act with such graceful sureness is extremely alluring. It isn’t “meant” per se to be attractive; it just IS, as part of the categorical nature of physical confidence.

Finally, they are in costuming and makeup that is just feline enough to feel otherly while remaining firmly anthropomorphic. Which is to say that they are an entry level furry experience. An on-ramp, if you would.

All of that being said what I really mean to say is that it isn’t your fault these people are so sexy, and also you are a furry and should just get over this weird hangup you have about it.

This post isn’t about them. If they want the Old Deuter D then they know what they’re about and they don’t need the pep talk.

Aw hell. I’ve got shareholders now.

would you say that cats is the most furry-inducing piece of media, or is there something else that has led to the emergence of even more furries?

There is no inducing furries, only revealing them.

@pinksilvace

Top 10 Best Trees in my local forest

10. I know I know this is a stump hence why it’s #10, but I love that it looks like the outline of a person’s body. A person that was drawn and quartered apparently. I should do a Top 10 Stumps one day, I’ve seen some cool ones!

9. Another stump, but I initially wanted to include this one in my top 10 as a tree, and then it was felled recently :( It was one of my favourite local trees because it had such big roots (larger than most nearby trunks!) that emerged from the ground here and there like undulating sea serpents. I was sad when it was cut but on the other hand it had the sweetest-smelling resin in the world. It was a very windy day so the smell travelled everywhere, and this tree’s fresh resin made the entire forest smell like candy floss.

8. I just like that this one looks like a busy giant centipede crossing the stream on its way somewhere. I’ve always wanted to use it as a bridge but so far I’ve not dared.

7. This one looks like it belongs in a jungle with these thick vines all over its trunk. I had the Playmobil jungle set when I was a kid and it was one of my favourite toys and I would have absolutely loved to find a jungle tree near my home.

6. This tree already looks cool during the day, but at night by torchlight these scaly-looking roots look exactly like a T-rex’s paw clawing at the ground. It’s a mandatory stop every time I go on a nighttime walk in the forest with my cats.

5. This one is unremarkable most of the year but then there’s 1 week every autumn when it just catches fire and it’s a happily-anticipated yearly event (for me).

4. Yes I’ve already made a post about the remarkable tree but I actually went to check it out since then, and it’s the most ridiculous story. 

See, there used to be a genuinely remarkable tree there and it was known as the King of the Forest. Then this tree was felled like 70 years ago but the road sign was already there, so they decided it would now refer to a nearby, nearly-as-cool-tree, which became known as the Queen of the Forest. Then the queen was also cut down. There were no other remarkable trees nearby but people still refused to remove the sign so a normal boring tree became the new remarkable tree. There’s a little sign next to it (otherwise you wouldn’t remark the new remarkable tree) explaining that this is the Viceroy of the Forest (yes, really!) and sort of summing up how this ordinary fellow came to be promoted. I didn’t take a picture of it, that’s how unremarkable it is, but I love the story behind its Viceroy title, it’s exactly this:

3. Now, this one is in the top 3 because it’s my cats’ favourite tree:

Its trunk has completely split in two and one half of it fell over but remained attached and now forms a very long arching “tongue” that touches the ground. My cats LOVE walking on it, it seems to make them feel very important, like a red carpet for cats. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos featuring cats doing their catwalk because they only accompany me at night… But look at this strange tree arch (it’s like six metres long!) and picture three important-looking cats walking on it:

2. This one is shaped like a harp!! A very beloved landmark in my woods, it makes me smile every time I walk past it.

1. This one is just excellent, green-tipped like a Caran d’Ache pastel pencil and with roots that look like they harbour a whole city of little wood sprites. (ft. a Pandolf for scale):

1. (it’s a tie) This tree might not be as cool or fun-looking as the others (although in winter it looks dashing!) but it’s the tree that marks the beginning of my land so it feels like a welcoming friend. For sentimental reasons it will be ranked first.

oh my god, ok, to clarify: THESE ARE NOT PICTURES OF EMBRYOS. DO NOT THINK THESE ARE PICTURES OF EMBRYOS. THESE ARE PICTURES OF GESTATIONAL TISSUE (like the caption says).

Gestational development goes from "1 to 1 million": Starting with the fertilized egg, it begins to multiply upon itself, going from 1->2->4->8 etc (becoming the blastocyst after about 3 days, or roughly 64 cells). It's a clump of cells that becomes denser and more detailed, eventually elongating into an embryo. It does NOT fan out like a jellyfish, lmao. That's how you know you're looking at tissue (specifically, this is the tissue that surrounds said embryo). And you see the size of these tissue segments? The embryo they surrounded would've been even smaller.

There is a lot of intentionally disingenuous language around gestational development. A lot of it is straight up fearmongering, mixed with certain brands of religious idealization (that is, the idea that pregnancy starts with a "tiny baby", identical in all ways to one that's already born and completely independent to its parent in all life-sustaining biological functions, and it spends 9 months just... getting bigger. That's not the case, and anyone who tries to sell you that shit is a liar).

There's a reason that when the website Catholic News Agency tried to rebuke these photos a few days ago, claiming that they were intentionally hiding the "real baby photos" (even though their own counterpoints basically surmounted to church function gossip), they showed a photograph of an embryo at 9 weeks, and ignored any of the available imagery of embryos from weeks earlier- that's probably the absolute earliest point that you can get an embryo at "obviously humanoid" on sight. Everything prior to that is very... uhh... "dinosaur chicken nugget"-esque.

Then, the other big issue is that so many of the "images" of embryonic development we see online- the ones seen by potential parents, and shown in educational courses- are not photographs. They're artistic recreations, usually computer generated. They're not REAL. Or, they're incorrectly attributed in time, willfully cropped, or otherwise sensationalized.

If you would like to see what embryos look like at the same stages of time shown in these pictures, you can look at a series of photos from appropriately developing ones that were unfortunately spontaneously aborted (aka miscarried) here (EXTREME TW in the previous link for medical imagery, blood and flesh. Also hey, these are high def incredibly magnified images of early embryonic development, which looks... kinda weird! You can actually see the embryos surrounded by the material in the pictures above, but said material above was washed of blood prior to photographing. I'm not sure how to better describe it which is why im not embedding them here, so if you have any problems with those general aspects then be advised)

It takes a bit of doing, but you can also explore the University of New South Wales embryology department wiki here. The same pictures are used here (as well as MRI scans!), and they've added more pertinent details, including embryonic sizes and attributes, and when certain things develop. Same TWs apply, although there are a lot more black and white medical scans that might be easier to digest.

And the last thing I want to mention before I end this is that the MYA Network, which sourced the images in the Guardian, did not lie. Like I said up top, it clearly says that this is tissue, not the embryo itself. Their own website, which hosts the same images, is very clear about that. However, I cannot ignore that this information was presented in an obviously misleading (if effective) matter, typical to journalism of any viewpoint.

The 6 week image, for example, brings up the inane "heartbeat bill" concept, but if you were to take these images as ones of actual embryos, you would think the idea of an embryonic heart is entirely made up (It's incredibly simplistic. The "sound" at 6 weeks is grossly exaggerated. It is not in any way a sufficient "justification" to make abortion unthinkable at that point, bc nothing ever will be. But it is there).

TL;DR: ..... i dunno. "Knowledge is power"? I just saw a lot of people running with the "this is what (the embryo) looks like?!?!?!" thing and I just had to say no, it's not, and going along with that misunderstanding, unintentionally or not, is not going to help anything. (Also hey, look up some literature on the pregnancy process. Go through it with your friends if you have to. I just think more people should know about this thing that 50% can do, lol.)