DuckPond

Old enough to know better, young enough to do it anyway.

[alienducky]

Feels weird to do, but let's make a pinned post

Hi. I'm Ducky, or Nic. She/her. I'm into all sorts and regularly forget to tag anything, so please excuse my blog

Fire Emblem Three Houses/Hopes fan, who loves the Rainbow Rangers the best (please send Claude things my way?). Side blog is @three-duck-houses

I'm making a crochet Fire Emblem Three Houses wyvern, but Tumblr search hates it in the ap so here it is. Finished body - Wing span - Finished wyvern ver 1 (brown)- Finished wyvern ver 2 (white)

Also made an Alligator Loki!

I wrote Miraculous and My Time at Portia fanfic at one point, it's on AO3 at Alien_Duck, and also here on tumblr at @dragoninthecloud and @alienduckpond

My art tag is Duckpond Doodles, and my crochet tag is Duckpond Crochet

[bruneburg]

beastly reminder

[bruneburg]

Almost. Years ago my computer suddenly stopped working and lost everything on it. Fortunately a relatively recent backup still existed bc of my family, a recent parts switch, and dumb luck. But last year a friend of mine got hacked and lost close to everything he had done creatively in the last 17-ish years. Art. Novels in progress. Entire conlangs. DnD character Sheets. Music he had made. All gone. He never backed any of it up. Few months later I started this habit (or ritual, almost) of drawing a reminder beast any time I would make a full complete backup. In hopes that seeing these things might remind others and myself. (Another factor here is that I am an animator and some of the stuff on my computer took literal years to make. And the film university I go to urges us to take this stuff seriously, too.)

[gatheringbones]

“Life after menopause is exceptionally rare in animals. It can evolve only in creatures where grannies help younger family members survive. Only human, killer whale, and short-finned pilot whale females routinely live for substantial periods after they stop breeding. Like humans, killer and pilot whales have roughly twenty-five to thirty childbearing years, then can live another thirty or so. And as Ken’s just explained, some live a lot longer. Up to a quarter of the females in a group are postreproductive. These whales are not waiting to die; they are helping their children survive. As human children often benefit from their grandmothers’ attention, killer whale grandmothers boost their grandkids’ survival. A rather bizarre twist of killer whale society is that killer whale mothers remain crucial to the survival of their adult children. When older killer whale females die, their adult children start dying at high rates, especially males. Male killer whales who are under thirty years old when their mothers die suffer a tripling of the annual mortality rate compared to males in their age group whose mothers are still alive. Male killer whales who are more than thirty years old when their mothers die face death rates more than eight times as high as males in their age group whose mothers are still living. Daughters under thirty show no mortality increase after their mothers’ death. But daughters older than thirty when their mothers die have more than two and a half times the death rate of same-age females whose mothers are alive. Males’ handicaps of the extra drag of their huge dorsal and pectoral fins and the extra food required for their immense size (at around 20,000 pounds, males can be one-third more massive than females) seem to make them reliant on their working mothers for food. Females don’t have the males’ impediments, but while raising young, females may rely on food shared by their no-longer-breeding mothers. Adult females share essentially all the fish they catch, and more than half goes to their children. Adult males share their catch only about 15 percent of the time—usually with their mothers. While no one fully understands their strange death pattern following the loss of a mother, extreme parental care is likely at the root. Toothed whales are the world’s champion nursers. Short-finned pilot whales continue to produce milk for up to fifteen years after the birth of their last calf, likely nursing other females’ young. In bottlenose and Atlantic spotted dolphins (further study might reveal others), some females never give birth. Denise Herzing dubbed them “career females,” because their role in society does not include motherhood. They might be infertile. They might be gay. But their contribution is crucial: they do a lot of babysitting. When Herzing entered the ocean with a visiting nine-year-old girl, “White Patches, the eternal babysitter herself, had never seen me babysitting a young human before. Her excitement vocalizations were audible and electric and she continued to swim around us, eyeing the human youngster attached to me.” (Researchers sometimes call babysitters “aunts.” That’s precisely who they often are.)”

— Beyond Words, by Carl Safina

[canine-t33th]

What colour is this fuckers hair

Blonde

Green

other? (say in tags)

Remaining time: 17 hours 1 minute

I'm having an argument over this i need you guys to settle this for us

[hacvek]

reminder to worldbuilders: don't get caught up in things that aren't important to the story you're writing, like plot and characters! instead, try to focus on what readers actually care about: detailed plate tectonics

[olyia-stories]

@dragonpyre any chance you could elaborate on this

[dragonpyre]

I grew up learning about land formations. Seeing fictional maps that don’t follow the logic and science of them makes me upset

[serinos-kitt]

What are the most common sins you’ve seen relating to this? I wanna know

[dragonpyre]

Mordor.

Why is the mountain range square. How did the mountain range form. Why is there one singular volcano in the center. Why does it act like a composite volcano but have magma that acts like it’s from a shield. If it’s hotspot based volcanic activity why is there only one volcano.

And then the misty mountains!!!! Why isn’t there a rain shadow!! And why is there a FOREST where the rain shadow should be!!!!!!!!

[serinos-kitt]

So what is a rain shadow?

[lethalbutterfly]

Wind blows clouds in from the sea, but mountains are so tall the clouds can't get past 'em, so you get deserts on the windward side of mountain ranges because clouds can't get there to water the land, or do so only very rarely.

[roach-works]

this is because, as clouds are forced upwards by rising land, they cool and dump their rain. so the side of the mountain facing the ocean (or an inland sea, or a great lake) gets all the rain as the clouds are squeezed out, and the opposite side gets nothing.

my favorite thing is the american great lake snowbelts! so, the 'flow' of weather across north america, in very general terms, blows from the northwest on down south and east to the gulf of mexico.

so the wind is blowing from west to east, and in the winter it's a dryer wind than in the summer because it's colder. but after blowing across a great lake for a hundred miles, the wind is wet again. and that wet turns into snow. so for all of these lakes, the big cities are on the west side, not the east sides, because the east sides absolutely suck to live on.

the sole exception is buffalo, NY, which literally has to be there because, unfortunately, that's where all the important canal stuff between lake ontario and lake erie is happening.

also this always strikes me as cool, check out where cleveland is:

it's right at the edge of that snowbelt. and you see way more cities west of it than east, too.

[beatrice-otter]

#but again. mordor looks like that becaue sauron made it#and he's an ass

On a Watsonian level, sure.

On a Doylistic level, Mordor looks like that because plate tectonics was a fringe, ludicrous, laughable theory that nobody outside serious geology nerds had ever heard of until scientists proved seafloor spreading in the early 1960s. The first edition of the LotR trilogy was published in 54-55. We literally did not know that plate tectonics was real until almost a decade after the book was published, so obviously, it was not something Tolkien could have been considering as he made his maps.

I don't know enough meteorological history to know when white people figured out about rain shadows and added it to geology classes, or what would have been taught about volcanoes and such. But any education Tolkien got on the subject would have been in childhood/adolescence; his college education focused on the liberal arts, not the sciences, and his professional study was linguistics and the middle ages. So anything Medieval and earlier European authors wrote about he had a pretty good chance of knowing about. But not much exposure to modern science. So his science knowledge was probably limited to "what English schools taught at the turn of the 20th Century."

[whetstonefires]

I mean, it's true he didn't know about plate tectonics, but he did know what mountains look like, and that it's not normally That. And it wasn't his style to break that kind of norm without cause.

LotR has recurring themes of the reckless imposition of one's will on the natural world creating ugliness, an order you thought was inherently an improvement that in fact is inferior to what you have displaced. (Typified by reckless tree-felling; a reflection of the despoiling of the English countryside and the world by Progress.)

Mordor is a rectangle because Sauron is an asshole.

[beatrice-otter]

#the rain shadow thing otoh was undoubtedly total ignorance#but those mountains were made as the fortress of a demigod#too steeped in evil to understand beauty#it's *supposed* to look like something that Shouldn't Exist#like quite often this is something that happens in worldbuilding yes#things are arranged Wrong because a person doesn't grasp the underlying logic#but mordor is a bad example for the same reason it's an obvious one#it's So Very Wrong because it was designed to be wrong#to give you a bad feeling with how much it shouldn't look like that#if he just wanted it unapproachable on all sides it could've been in a caldera formation it didn't *need* corners#the corners were a choice#tolkien's job involved lots of looking at maps and things okay#meanwhile people whose lives revolved around the weather generally knew where the rain happened#long before it was formalized into 'rain shadow effect'#people not having The Science doesn't mean they don't have eyes and brains

[maryellencarter]

I wrote an entire paper in college analyzing the geology of the Misty Mountains and to a lesser extent the White Mountains (the Misty Mountains are easier because we get a cross-section via Moria). One thing I discovered that still knocks me for a loop when I think about it is:

Moria is the only place in Middle-Earth where mithril is found, right? That's kind of a big deal. So, why? What makes that location so special? Is it just random?

I found a paper that had just been published *that year*, 2011 or 2012 as I was writing it, that studied the locations of precious-metals mines in the Pyrenees, the similarly long skinny mountain chain that divides Spain and France. This paper discovered that where there was a bend in the mountain chain, from one of the continental plates having an awkward corner in it that got subducted under the other plate, that had dug deeper into the mantle and caused precious-metal-bearing ores to flow up to the surface in ways they didn't do anywhere else in the Pyrenees.

There's a conversation in The Fellowship of the Ring where one of the hobbits -- I don't have my copy handy or I'd get the direct quote -- asks why they can see the Misty Mountains ahead of them at one point if they're still heading south from Rivendell, and it's explained that south of Caradhras (which you may recall is the surface mountain under which Moria runs) the mountain chain bends and runs southwest instead of due south for a while.

Tolkien had absolutely no way to know *why* this particular feature of a mountain range was associated with intrusions of rare and unique metal ores, but he had gone backpacking in mountains enough to know How Things Should Look.

(And as prev excellently points out, when Jirt made screwed-up geology it was very much on purpose. Mordor shouldn't be square! Mount Doom shouldn't be doing any of the things it does! A composite volcano shouldn't even have especially hot lava! Even the Gulf of Udun, the circular feature at the upper left corner of the square, shouldn't be like that -- perfectly round features should be impact craters or calderas, not The Mountains Just Do This In A Suspiciously Convenient Way. These are all the way they are because Sauron forced them to be, in defiance of the laws of nature. Remember, he's akin to Balrogs and was a Maia of Aulë -- he's a volcano spirit in many ways.)

[sunflowergardens-world]

Amazing work by the LoTR fandom, as always.

[mysteryteacup]

This also serves as an excellent example of why worldbuilding needs - more than realism - to be cohesive and work with the themes of your story.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

yeah google has gone downhill ever since they let ai take over their platform

[sigynpenniman]

This is not new. Several years ago, the creators of Phineas and Ferb had issues with Dropbox for the same reason: they got copyright struck on private files of their own show, because they got picked up by Dropbox’s content ID system. MOST cloud providers use tools like content ID to scan uploaded files, EVEN PRIVATE ONES, for copyright infringement or “objectionable” content. Do NOT trust the cloud, under any circumstances, with anything potentially pirated, questionable, or as your sole backup. There’s nothing wrong with using cloud storage for convenience, but it should never be your only copy, and it should be totally avoided with pirated or copyrighted content. This is part of the reason I have harped so hard on not storing the TPK leaks in Google Drive as a long term solution. They will get nuked eventually, they’re in contentID now.

[gerardsguitar]

Backups.

3-2-1

3 copies

2 storage methods

1 off-site

1 copy on my NAS (HDD)

For example, for anything important, I try to keep at least:

1 copy on my main drive on my PC (SSD)

1 copy in the cloud (ideally, I would keep a copy on a family member/friend's NAS at a different house instead but thats not possible for me rn)

[sigynpenniman]

PREV IS EXACTLY CORRECT LISTEN TO PREV

[dogpuppy]

[squirrelly-13]

they got married btw

[visit-me-here-in-wonderland]

oh you’re not kidding

[velinxi]

Staying alive was never Jason's strong suit

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[no-sharks-on-the-sun]

[no-sharks-on-the-sun]

they killed him for this

[ms-demeanor]

How do you feel about driving?

I can drive, I am good at driving, I enjoy driving.

I can drive, I am good at driving, I do not enjoy driving.

I can drive, I am bad at driving, I enjoy driving.

I can drive, I am bad at driving, I do not enjoy driving.

I haven't learned to drive, I think I would enjoy driving.

I haven't learned to drive, I do not think I would enjoy driving.

I can't drive anymore, I was good at it, I enjoyed driving.

I can't drive anymore, I was good at it, I didn't enjoy it.

I can't drive anymore, I was bad at it, I enjoyed it.

I can't drive anymore, I was bad at it, I didn't enjoy it.

Remaining time: 16 hours 7 minutes

[moghedien]

I feel like I need to share this because idk if Europeans are familiar with the presence of Aldi in the US, but at least especially in my area they’ve been growing a lot recently. Like Aldi bought out some local failing grocery chains where I live (Louisiana) and have opened Aldis in all these somewhat rural communities and small towns, which for the record I’m fine with

But as a result of this they are advertising a lot more in my area and also in many cases, the people in these areas have never been confronted with Aldi or any European grocery store. So the ads that Aldi is pushing out to its new US customer base feature a cowboy shopping at Aldi who is explaining to new Aldi customers how Aldi works. Like this cowboy is explaining you gotta put a quarter in the shopping cart and why there are very little name brands. A cowboy is how they want to reach their American customer base. They gave us a cowboy

[moghedien]

Here he is, the Aldi Cowboy

[galileosballs]

Games that let you pet dogs are a dime a dozen now, but let's not forget that Tales of Symphonia let you go a step further by having one of your party members personally assign a name to every dog in the world, with a reward for finding them all.

Note that you cannot name dogs when this party member isn't in your party (or when... she doesn't feel up to it, to put it in a spoiler-free way) and that once a dog is named its speech bubble will have its name in it. There are 30 dogs in total. Some are missable. The walkthrough has to include the note:

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

[kyurinoir]

I dont rly understand how he functions with night vision on. like I'm assuming its only activated when dark (??) but in dark castle it seemed maybe a bit foggy at best... isn't it hard to see 😭

sorry if this is incoherent I just had some joke to make about him not being able to distinguish colors with it on but couldnt think of a good excuse to make it fit 😬 clearly im not a writer LMAO

[leefi]

“I thought I’d bought salt beef but instead I’d bought Sylvain Jose Gautier.”

[bogkeep]

i feel like one of my persistent Autism Struggles is that for most things, there's an Assumption of Baseline Understanding, and i seem to lack that Baseline Understanding for a lot of things so when i ask for explanations, they tend to skip the foundational aspects that will actually let me connect the dots. and i absolutely do understand that we have to have that assumption on some level, we have to trust that the people around us DO have a basic understanding of how things function, this is fine. it's just always kind of a gamble when you reveal to someone like "oh yeah this particular field of knowledge is a yawning abyss with nothing in it and i know i'm asking for a lot right now" because i also, unfortunately, deeply resent being condescended to. AND explaining something truly from the ground up is not necessarily a skill everyone has. i know. i know and i'm sorry and i'm trying.

this can be stuff like "ok you just namedropped a bunch of usamerican celebrity names and institutions i have never heard before in my life but with an air of confidence that i definitely know them and their impact on culture" which isn't even an autism thing it's a sorry for living on a different continent thing, and MAYBE it'll be explained to me under the guise of "for THOSE who live under a ROCK". thanks. other times it's like ok so there's a shortform video trend of "wearing VS styling" but nobody explains the difference. in the first shot they're wearing a shirt and in the second shot the shirt is tucked in. can someone tell me how one is wearing and one is styling or do i need to watch a hundred of these and go off of vibes. i am too fashion illiterate to understand what makes wearing a garment differently an act of Not Wearing It anymore, or why it's better. why do you start a video by saying "people don't know how to style their clothes" and never once giving a definition of styling. maybe i'm just being obtuse, maybe these people are just framing things in a catchy manner and "wearing" and "styling" are overlapping venn diagram terms and not oppositional at all, but how can i know if nobody uses their words to say what is going on. please?

[curiositysavesthecat]

Do you think it's weird and/or predatory for a 13 year-old and a 30 year-old to be best friends if they're not family members or related by blood? Assuming everything is innocent and platonic. Nothing romantic or sexual.

Yes, it's weird and predatory

It's weird. But not predatory

It's predatory. But not weird

No, it's not weird or predatory

Remaining time: 5 days 2 hours

*This poll was submitted to us and we simply posted it so people could vote and discuss their opinions on the matter. If you’d like for us to ask the internet a question for you, feel free to drop the poll of your choice in our inbox and we’ll post them anonymously (for more info, please check our pinned post).

[creelson]

unpopular opinion but I don't think there's anything weird or predatory about an innocent friendship

[dianxiacantastemolecules]

The question is why the fuck is a thirty year old hanging out with a 13 year old if not in their family?? The only other relation that could have them interact is through teacher/student and bring friends like that would be weird as fuck

[creelson]

found family? the kid not feeling safe in their house? the adult wanting to help? family / teacher / school isn't always a guaranteed safe place. should the kid and adult each have friends that are their own age too? sure. but if their friendship is genuinely innocent then I think the problem isn't them but people who project their weird and predatory thoughts onto them

[the-bar-sinister]

Don't forget shared hobbies?

A 13 year old and a 30 year old could reasonably meet at a tabletop gaming store, a fiber arts group, a book club....