alice thx

bless the present / trust the self / expect the best

[only-tiktoks]

[thedailybullshit]

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

brush stroke control practice for chinese painting(guohua) by 仙豆

[penny-anna]

honestly kinda unfortunate that the only spooky library aesthetic is the victorian fancy bookshelves dark academia one bcos like. ok here's some library stories.

while i was at the university the library was undergoing a major refurbishment so for a little while the print journals were being stored temporarily down in the basement.

basically nobody ever consulted the print journals bcos 99% of stuff undergrads would be looking up is online these days so every time i went down there it was dead fucking silent & empty. you had to walk through what felt like several miles of empty basement to reach the collection, which was in a room w a photocopier shoved in the corner and a bunch of these:

u turn the handles to move these around (saves space) and every time you had to go and check the aisles first on the offchance that someone was in there so they wouldn't get u know. Compacted.

many years ago i did a week's work experience with the National Library of Scotland. here it is:

but that's just the tip of the iceberg. it keeps going down the side of the bridge, like so:

i got a tour of the stacks while i was there. it's floor after floor of this:

the bookshelves are made of metal & i was treated to the 'fun fact' that the shelves are, bizarrely, load bearing. for this reason they have to be constantly vigilant about fire hazards because even a relatively small fire could cause a bookcase to buckle from the heat, which in turn could cause the whole building to collapse in on itself like a house of cards.

this has haunted me ever since!! thank you.

[amazoogle]

[thatssomanda]

My brother saved this document and everytime he gets angry at our neighbours for being loud he prints it to their wireless printer and you can hear the wife shout “Why the fuck would you print this AGAIN?!” to her son.

[auntytimblr-deactivated20150403]

every time we serve chicken at work i think of this post

[gallusrostromegalus]

1.  If you were wondering, you can type the numbers in the works cited into google and they appear to be medical journal articles about using medical imaging to detect and diagnose a rare form of Gastritis.

2. Please enjoy the offical powerpoint presentation of this paper at an academic conference by the original author, complete with Q&A:

[zillyirk32]

THIS IS GOLD

[aprillikesthings]

oh m god please watch the video it’s some of the most contagious laughter on the planet

[artikgato]

When I saw this cross my dash tonight, I smiled and thought “yess, the chicken chicken chicken post, I get to reblog it again and inflict it on all of the people that have followed me since last time”, and then I scrolled down more and to my utter delight there was A VIDEO, needless to say my night has been made

[eliciaforever-deactivated201906]

I HAVE NOT SEEN THE CHICKEN VIDEO IN TEN DAMN YEARS HOLY SHIT

STILL FUNNY

[ruelukas22]

The bell

The last question

The woman howling in laughter 90% of the time

It’s all beautiful

It’s all

So beautiful

[explorerrowan]

I love that he was absolutely 100% prepared for a question in chickenese.

[hideout-for-raccoons]

best thing I’ve come across today

[rongzhi]

Making a Chinese lacquerware bracelet

song: 兰亭序 - 周杰伦

English added by me :)

[guerrillatech]

[ravenkane]

As someone who has mispronounced so many words because I never actually heard them. I appreciate this post

[alexaloraetheris]

As someone who still does that today because I learned English almost exclusively by reading, I also appreciate this post.

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[gogomrbrown]

I learned in a Latin Studies class (with a chill white dude professor) that when the Europeans first saw Aztec cities they were stunned by the grid. The Aztecs had city planning and that there was no rational lay out to European cities at the time. No organization.

[punkrockradio]

When the Spanish first arrived in Tenochtitlan (now downtown mexico city) they thought they were dreaming. They had arrived from incredibly unsanitary medieval Europe to a city five times the size of that century’s london with a working sewage system, artificial “floating gardens” (chinampas), a grid system, and aqueducts providing fresh water. Which wasn’t even for drinking! Water from the aqueducts was used for washing and bathing- they preferred using nearby mountain springs for drinking. Hygiene was a huge part if their culture, most people bathed twice a day while the king bathed at least four times a day. Located on an island in the middle of a lake, they used advanced causeways to allow access to the mainland that could be cut off to let canoes through or to defend the city. The Spanish saw their buildings and towers and thought they were rising out of the water. The city was one of the most advanced societies at the time.

Anyone who thinks that Native Americans were the savages instead of the filthy, disease ridden colonizers who appeared on their land is a damn fool.

[robotsandfrippary]

They’ve also recently discovered a lost Native American city in Kansas called Etzanoa It rivals the size of Cahokia, which was very large as well.

[fullmetalquest-deactivated20211]

Makes me happy to see people learn about the culture of my country :D

[fieldbears]

Also, please remember that the idea of a nomadic or semi-nomadic culture being “less intelligent”, “less civilized” (and please unpack that word) was invented by people who wanted to make a graph where they were on the top.

Societies that functioned without 1) staying exclusively in one location or 2) having to make complicated, difficult-to-construct tools to go about their daily lives… were not somehow less valid than others.

[taonpest]

Sometimes being an artist is feeling like a baker seeing a chemist making the deadliest liquid in the world and wishing you could make the deadliest liquid as well but you're a baker, not a chemist, and then you feel like your bread is worthless

[lancrewizzard]

If it helps, as a writer with artist friends often feels like being a chemist surrounded by bakers. I'll spend ages coming up with a hypothesis and then lock myself away for weeks or months only to emerge with a small vial of glowing liquid. Yes it took a lot of work, and yes I'm proud that I've created it, but it pales when I look across at the bakers. In the same time, they've made so many delicious things that make living a delight. Chances are they've fed me and kept me from despair while I was locked in my lab. And I envy their wonderful craft.

[taonpest]

[nestingdollset]

pics from the cat pages in the world book encyclopedia 2007

[divine-mystic-princess]

[woolandflax]

Ha I wonder how many strokes the most complex Chinese character has like maybe eightee-

[woolandflax]

Has a Chinese son, names him bèng-dá, and he hates me

[woolandflax]

My beloved son 䨻龘 just trying to write his name in kindergarten

[inthefallofasparrow]

[datasoong47]

According to Wikipedia, the characters with the most strokes (tied) are

and

Both with a total of 64 strokes. Both of these consist of a single 16-stroke radical repeated 4 times. There's another 58-stroke character which uses multiple radicals

Meaning biangbiang noodles

However, in Japanese, there is a very rare kokuji (kanji created in Japan) with 84 strokes

also written as

[linghxr]

Chinese characters to use when naming your kid so that they get a cramp writing their name: 16 strokes and up only, non-exhaustive, taken from real names.

燕 yàn - swallow (bird) / 16

蕾 lěi - bud / 16

凝 níng - to congeal, to concentrate attention, to stare / 16

霏 fēi - fall of snow / 16

霖 lín - continued rain / 16

腾 téng - to gallop, to prance, to soar, to hover, to make room, to clear out, to vacate, verb suffix indicating repeated action / 16

儒 rú - scholar, Confucian / 16

赟 yūn - good appearance / 16

熹 xī - bright, warm / 16

臻 zhēn - to arrive, to reach (esp. perfection), utmost / 16

薇 wēi - Osmunda regalis (a species of fern) / 16

璐 lù - beautiful jade / 17

翼 yì - wing, area surrounding the bullseye of a target, to assist, one of the 28 constellations of Chinese astronomy / 17

霞 xiá - rose-tinted sky or clouds at sunrise or sunset / 17

繁 fán - complicated, many, in great numbers / 17

濠 háo - trench / 17

鹭 lù - heron / 18

麒 qí - mythical male unicorn / 19

瀚 hàn - ocean, vastness / 19

馨 xīn - fragrant / 20

耀 yào - brilliant, glorious / 20

巍 wēi - lofty, towering / 20

曦 xī - sunlight (usu. in early morning) / 20

露 lù - dew, syrup, nectar, outdoors (not under cover), to show, to reveal, to betray, to expose / 21

灏 hào - vast (of water) / 21

懿 yì - exemplary, virtuous / 22

麟 lín - female unicorn / 23

鑫 xīn - used in names of people and shops, symbolizing prosperity / 24

Plus some "exclusive" characters for all those who use traditional characters: These do not meet the criteria in their simplified forms.

穎 yǐng - head of grain, husk, tip, point, clever, gifted, outstanding / 16

龍 lóng - dragon, imperial / 16

興 xīng - to rise, to flourish, to become popular, to start, to encourage, to get up / 16

鴻 hóng - eastern bean goose, great, large / 17

禮 lǐ - gift, rite, ceremony, propriety, etiquette, courtesy / 17

瀅 yíng - clear, limpid (of water) / 18

藝 yì - skill, art / 18

豐 fēng - abundant, plentiful, fertile, plump, great / 18

懷 huái - bosom, heart, mind, to think of, to harbor in one's mind, to conceive (a child) / 19

鵬 péng - Peng, large fabulous bird / 19

麗 lì - beautiful / 19

瀟 xiāo - (of water) deep and clear, (of wind and rain) howling and pounding, (of light rain) pattering / 19

寶 bǎo - jewel, gem, treasure, precious / 20

蘭 lán orchid, elegant, graceful / 20

鶴 hè - crane / 21

權 quán - authority, power, right, to weigh, expedient, temporary / 21

艷 yàn - colorful, splendid, gaudy, amorous, romantic, to envy / 24

And as a bonus, consider changing your last name to a surname such as:

薛 Xuē, 霍 Huò, 戴 Dài, 魏 Wèi

盧 Lú, 賴 Lài, 閻 Yán, 錢 Qián, 韓 Hán, 鍾 Zhōng, 謝 Xiè, 簡 Jiǎn, 蕭 Xiāo, 顏 Yán, 龐 Páng, 譚 Tán, 關 Guān, 嚴 Yán, 羅 Luó, 顧 Gù, 蘇 Sū, 龔 Gōng

(Definitions adapted from MDBG.)

[catcrumb]

fruit parade fruit parade a sight that i would never trade all citizens of the land come here hand in hand to see a sight which makes them smile fruit after fruit mile after mile

[jaubaius]

Diver convince octopus to trade his plastic cup for a seashell

[waffilicious]

imagine if a fuckin……. giant alien just showed up and stuck a huge hand in front of your face and then proceeded to offer you three different houses and wouldn’t stop until you moved out of your old shitty apartment and then helped you fuckin move

and then just left

[blackgirlsreverything]

[ceekari]

All things that you should not have to be rich in order to do

[eldritchsandwich]

#those things shouldn’t be fucking pipe dreams!

[zohbugg]

[catasters]

[ampervadasz]

I kill you

[thornsilver]

Unmute for full effect.