Hodgepodge

28 years old. Asexual, Queer and Genderqueer. She/Her is fine. I am in many fandoms and I basically just reblog whatever I want. I also don't tag my reblogs unless they're extremely triggering. If there's something I've reblogged that's triggering,...

[emeraldcitynerdfighter]

Here's what I've realized from the Artemis II mission:

You cannot study STEM without the arts, and you cannot study humanities without the sciences. In that tiny capsule we sent to the moon, we sent physicists who are also photographers. We sent poets who are pilots.

We sent experts on exact scientific maneuvers who also express precise emotion and experience that will be quoted for decades. They play with a stuffed moon in the background of a broadcast and have Chappell Roan as their wakeup music. They drove around the far side of the moon.

We sent parents, partners...We sent humans, who are unabashedly showing their humanity and brilliance and vulnerability. They are smart and kind and generous and ambitious and silly and thoughtful and so damn good at what they do. And they want to share it all with us.

[chandra-telescope]

hope is a skill

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

hope is a weapon you are trained to wield

[chandra-telescope]

favourite additions

[chandra-telescope]

[tenaciouswritingdragon]

You cannot hide this in the tags, bestie. This is too lovely to keep a secret.

[wonderwyrm]

[scrmnviking]

Theodor would approve.

[nwmo]

NEW FISH JUST DROPPED

[cannibalcaprine-deactivated2024]

I KNOW that playing God is morally wrong, but holy HELL, it looks fun.

[ninjakittenarmy]

Why is it playing God? We aren’t violating any natural laws. God set the parameters of the universe to allow these things. There’s nothing wrong with it, there’s no hubris in learning more about how to manipulate the universe around us.

[cannibalcaprine-deactivated2024]

We made a whole-ass fish.

[ospreyonthemoon]

The reason this was accidental BTW is because they used paddlefish eggs as a negative control group for a breeding experiment on sturgeons because the scientists, quite naturally, assumed that they were SO unrelated it would be genetically impossible for them to mate. Like. I cannot stress enough to you how these creatures last related ancestors were

140 MILLION YEARS BACK.

If you don't know how far that is, that's basically the start of the cretaceous. Let me simplify that for you even further. Chimpanzees and humans seperated, what, 5 or 6 million years ago?

This is basically like if humans could hybridise with THESE THINGS.

This is the sort of thing that should be impossible. They used those eggs to be ABSOLUTELY 100% SURE NOTHING WOULD HAPPEN.

And then THEY GOT FISH OUT OF IT.

Like. You can quite clearly understand why they didn't think anything would happen. WE ARE MORE RELATED TO BLUE WHALES THAN THESE THINGS.

THE AMERICAN PADDLEFISH AND THE STURGEON ARE SO COMPLETELY UNRELATED THAT THIS IS NOT PLAYING GOD. IF ANYTHING THIS IS AN ACT OF GOD.

THE SCIENTISTS HAD NO BLAME IN THIS BECAUSE NOTHING LIKE THIS HAD EVER HAPPENED BEFORE

It sort of goes against the rules of genetics a bit.

[ospreyonthemoon]

Oh i forgot to add

THESE THINGS, FOR HYBRIDS, HAD A REALLY HIGH SURVIVAL RATING. LIKE 70% OF THEM SURVIVED.

To put that into perspective, getting a blue whale and a squirrel and trying to hybridise them is more sensible, and that wouldn't produce anything but getting you banned from science. Most animals that aren't plants can barely hybridise two degrees away from each other.

BUT THESE TWO ENTIRELY UNRELATED FISH create PERFECTLY HEALTHY HYBRIDS.

the scientists literally had to do the tests AGAIN just to be like "okay this is real right. This is actually like, not a fluke, this works right" and it worked again. They just Can!

[cipheramnesia]

It clearly wasn't a fluke. This is a fluke.

[chronicsymptomsyndrome]

yay water

time to drink water woo hoo yay

[zegalba]

Plastic Chair in Wood by Maarten Baas (2008)

[keynes-fetlife-mutual]

I'm obsessed with this chair. The artist takes a flimsy hunk of injection-molded plastic that's been cost-cut to hell and back, and insists that we look at it with fresh eyes and understand its beauty. And they went about it in the most labor-intensive way I can think of.

Absolutely nothing about this design is convenient to execute in wood. Every piece is curved, most have compound curves. This is artisan craftsmanship: it's inherently slow, manual, and skilled. Notice, also, that most features of this chair must be thicker and heavier than on the plastic chairs being imitated. Injection-molded chairs can be produced in this shape in a matter of minutes with far less material at very low cost.

If these flowing, organic curves are so beautiful in polished wood, perhaps they are also beautiful in the mass-produced chairs that are far more accessible. Perhaps we should remember to admire designs that succeed enough to become ubiquitous. I don't know about you, but I'll never see injection-molded chairs the same way again.

[turing-tested]

[turing-tested]

D:

[special-lucky-chosen-one]

this is a legitimate problem in robotics.

like, if you're a bomb disposal guy and your team has a cool bomb-disposal robot which you've given a cutesy name to, you may hesitate to put that robot in harm's way, which is NOT OPTIMAL in the bomb-disposing field.

it also doesn't help if you hold funerals for the robots after they get exploded (this happens pretty regularly).

anyway nobody has worked out how to stop humans from pack-bonding with literally inanimate objects and they probably never will. (like even knowing it's a problem, I *still* think those EOD robots deserve funerals).

[ronthedunedain]

In 2007, the US military rejected a multi-limbed anti-mine robot because it's demise was too inhumane.

[special-lucky-chosen-one]

oh perfect, this is EXACTLY what I was talking about

[aquilacalvitium]

Scientists in films: this alien/AI is not human and therefore undeserving of any kindness or sympathy

Scientists irl: This is my friend Robob he's five feet long, has ten legs and was built to explode mines and if anybody hurts him I will tear apart time and space to get revenge

[ltwilliammowett]

The Danish training ship “Georg Stage” (1934) dresses in rainbow colour, 2021 

[dragon-in-a-fez]

not the kind of gay ship I’m used to seeing on tumblr but cool

[dubiousculturalartifact]

ship georg is an outlier but SHOULD be counted

[chiaroscurolife]

In the 1950’s drug stores not only filled your prescription, but there was usually a food counter, ice cream and coffee. My Great Uncle Angelo worked as a soda clerk in the New York suburbs where a man named Bill would come in and flirt with him.

At a time when being gay could cause you to be arrested, Bill and Angelo, fell in love and began their lives together by renting a home in Fire Island where they could escape on weekends.

They soon built a home and life together as part of a migration of gay men from NYC that was beginning to happen. It was a quieter time, decades before Stonewall or the heyday of the "gay 70's".

As time passed, they helped to build a growing gay community there, where men were free to be, share, and discuss life. They would reminisce about the days when sharply dressed gay men went to the Bon Soir to hear a 20-something Barbra Streisand.

My great Uncles Angelo and Bill were never legally married. Bill died of cancer before he could see gay marriage legalized. But they lived together their whole lives, spending winters in Manhattan, and summers in Fire Island.

[naamahdarling]

I thought this was just going to be a fun pharmacy fact and was ready to make a bitter wisecrack about how that sounds so much better than ritually burning all of my prescriptions in front of me and then breaking my legs, but I started to ugly cry.

These men were so beautiful, and while bittersweet, the story is so beautiful. I can't get married (disabled, Obergefell missed me) but I can have what they had. A beautiful relationship to the very end, even if I don't live to see equality for myself. What wonderful people, what a lovely story, what beautiful photos.

And how great it is to share it with us when so many of our community can't believe they have a future.

You do. You do.

We find it in each other. Even at the worst of times, there's a place for you because there are always others like you, always have been, always will be. A world without queer love and queer survival never has, does not, and never will exist.

Persist.

[autistic-af]

In 1970, my mother's family adopted an intellectually disabled man named Horace. Horace was 56, and had been in an institution since 1921.

My uncle, who was 19, was working as an orderly at the institution where Horace lived. He only stayed a few months as the abuse he witnessed was too much for him. He had become friends with Horace and told him "I'll come back for you."

Horace replied "They all say that."

By that Christmas, Horace lived with my uncle and his family. My grandparents did the official adoption. Horace had never seen a Christmas tree, and that was his first real Christmas.

Horace died in 2010, at the age of 96. He laid down for a nap and just slipped away.

At least two generations of children grew up with him. He felt immortal to us. He loved Hot Wheels, pizza, cartoons and to talk to the portrait of my grandparents as he sat in his rocking chair.

He knew everyone's birthday. He loved unconditionally.

He had scars on his back from the institutions. If you asked him about that place, his face would screw up and he'd say "oh, it was a bad place. Bad place."

And for 40 years, he was safe, loved, and happy. He loved us in return.

No point to sharing this. But I still miss his laugh as he held a conversation with a portrait, whispering about his day to the people who had helped rescue him.

[autistic-af]

Memories of Horace:

He'd put anything in his pockets. This included pizza.

He would walk around the dining room table for hours, talking. The floor had shuffle marks.

I was forever called "the baby" because that's how he had met me.

We always joked that he would be the luckiest man in the world and would just die one day in his sleep. He did.

We also always joked that he had a free pass into heaven. He did.

[autistic-af]

Oh my god. 😭💕💕💕 The response to this in so little time is wonderful.

Horace deserved the world and I'm so happy his story moves people. Thank you for remembering him with me.

[humansofnewyork]

“My first end-of-life patient was a 97-year-old man. He had a much younger girlfriend; she was seventy-four. But they loved each other so much. Back when their spouses were still alive, the four of them had been great friends. They would double date together. And when their spouses passed away, the two of them became a thing. Every day she would come over for lunch. I’d always cook a little meal for them. I’d prepare the table; I’d lay out my little candles and my little flowers. As soon as she arrived I’d put on music and dim the lights, then I’d leave the room and go wait in the bedroom. They would cuddle and snuggle. And the beauty of it was, even though he couldn’t control his fluids at that point, she never minded the smell. Her love for him was so great that they would still kiss and all that good stuff. When the doctors said that it was time for him to go to hospice, he said he didn’t want to go. He told them that he wanted to come back home and die with me. I was with him in the end. My patients never die alone. Never, ever. One week after his passing I was hired by his girlfriend’s family. She had terminal Alzheimer’s, and I ended up staying with her for seven years. I fell in love with her. We were family, just family. She used to be a tap dancer. We’d sing together. And if she didn’t feel like singing, I’d sing. Even near the end, she always knew when something was wrong with me. When I wasn’t being the Gabby that she knew, she would always know. When the doctors said it was time for her to go to hospice, her children said: ‘We want her to die with Gabby.’ In the final days she wouldn’t eat, she’d lock her jaw. But she would always eat for me. One night I could see the fright in her eyes, and I knew it was time. My patients never die alone. Never, ever. So I climbed under the covers with her. And she passed away in my arms.”

[ampervadasz]

[klapollo]

the way sesame street, a pbs puppet show for literal babies, is pressing on with pride content despite vitriolic monsters descending on every post to insinuate they're pedophiles or demons while some of the biggest companies on the planet who could swim in olympic swimming pools of money like scrooge mcduck on steroids buckle and cave just emphasizes how completely and utterly pathetic these corporations are. they'd butcher a baby if it meant saving a penny.

[klapollo]

where Starbucks and Target and Budweiser will be bullied into submission with the slightest push, puppets and people in your neighborhood stand tall

[adobe-outdesign]

Sesame Workshop has been doing pride stuff since 2017. The Muppet Wiki has a nice list of stuff they've done:

LGBT culture

LGBT culture describes the social paradigm by which lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) individuals sometimes identify. C

[aquilathefighter]

Jim Henson supported his openly queer colleagues in the 1970s! The Muppet performer Richard Hunt was majorly influential on Sesame Street, the Muppet Show, and Fraggle Rock.

They also dumped Chick-fil-A in 2012 when CFA made their stance on gay marriage known.

It would be a dishonor to their memories for the Jim Henson Company to kowtow to queerphobic demands when their namesake always stood for diversity and acceptance of everyone, and it makes me proud to be a Muppet fan to see that insisted upon 💖🌈

[everythingfox]

The wolf is so done with the fox’s bs 😂

[evilkillerpoptarts]

Foxes are cat software being run on dog hardware.  Clearly this fox is operating on the Kitten OS.

[misselaineofoz]

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

[unfollovving]

Mozilla FireFox @ Internet Explorer

[deepestfirefun]

[x0401x]

So I just saw a post by a random personal blog that said “don’t follow me if we never even had a conversation before” and?????? Not to be rude but literally what the fuck??????????

I’ve had people (non-pornbots) try to strike conversation out of nowhere in my DMs recently, and now I’m wondering if they were doing that because they wanted to follow me and thought they needed to interact first. I feel compelled to say, just in case, that it’s totally okay to follow this blog (or my side blog, for that matter) even if we’ve never talked before.

Also, I’m legit confused. Is this how follow culture works right now? It was worded like it’s common sense but is that really a thing?

[x0401x]

Saw a sharp increase in my follower count after posting this. The legitimacy of it is driving me nuts so I also feel the need to say that you can follow anyone on here regardless of whether you’ve interacted with them or not. People like the above mentioned blog are exceptions. Perhaps they themselves think they aren’t and therefore will act like they aren’t, but they are, trust me.

Just follow anyone you wanna follow. The worst thing that can happen is maybe getting soft-blocked by the other person, but if they do soft-block you, then they were never that worth following in the first place.

[starfieldcanvas]

wow. really hope this isn't actually a norm taking hold with new users! this isn't facebook, you don't need to know people before following them

[westiec]

this is the '10 year mutuals you've never spoken to once' site

[likedaylighht]

[catchymemes]

[louwhose]