My Nerdom

Victoria, she/her/hers, cis/bi mixed POC.I'm a proud Nerd with many fandoms, and it is a magical life I live. Unfortunately I am physically surrounded by people who do not also enjoy this lifestyle. The solution for any Nerd's problems? TO THE...

[aster-is-confused]

my favorite genre of bird picture

[dailymanners]

I am about going to gripe about something that's been really annoying me lately.

First let me start with a disclaimer that I am speaking generally here. Of course both the U.S. and Europe are both massive and diverse places containing hundreds of millions of people, and a lot of regional differences. Neither the U.S. or Europe are a monolith (although a lot of people on the internet speak of both places as a monolith, which I wish people would stop doing, since neither are).

I could be wrong about this, since I don't live in the U.S., and haven't visited everywhere in Europe. But between where I have visited in the U.S., and where I have visited / lived in Europe, and from what I know from my friends in the U.S. and friends in other European countries, I get the feeling that overall the U.S. has stricter disability access laws than a lot of places in Europe do, especially in regard to building codes.

Of course there are exceptions, I know New York city is abhorrently hostile in its design towards anyone elderly and/or disabled. Although when I visited New York city it really just felt on par with a lot of major European cities with how abhorrently inaccessible it was.

One example of this is that recently I saw a Reddit discussion where a USAmerican vacationing in France was surprised at how many staircases didn't have handrails, because according to this man handrails are required by law in the U.S.

The comments were all Europeans having an absolute field day with this. Pretty much all of the comments were some variation of "I can't believe Americans are too stupid and lazy to use the stairs without a handrail 🤣🤣🤣 what's wrong with you fat lazy stupid Americans that you can't even use stairs without a handrail 🤣🤣🤣 thank GOD I was born in Europe where I was just taught how to walk up and down the stairs on my own and don't need a handrail like a lazy fat stupid American 🤣🤣🤣"

A few people tried to gently point out that this was about accessibility for elderly and disabled people, and it's not cool to laugh at building codes that are about accessibility, but those commenters were usually shut down with some variation of "yeah well in MY European country if someone is disabled or becomes elderly we either move to a more accessible building or we modify our home to be more accessible, we don't sit around whining like a bunch of Americans that our building isn't already accessible 🙄"

Which is, such a cruel way to talk about accessibility. Why wouldn't disabled and elderly people deserve the same access to a building as anyone else? Are elderly and disabled people not allowed to visit friends and family? Anyone could get hit by a car today, and after that struggle with going up and down stairs without the use of a handrail for the next several months, years, possibly the rest of your life. It's so easy to feel smug when you can easily trot up and down the stairs without a handrail, but so cruel to be unwilling to consider anyone who struggles with stairs should maybe be allowed access to the same places as you.

Honestly when I go on vacation abroad with my elderly + disabled mother, it's often easier to go to the U.S. with her than other places in Europe, because the U.S. does tend to be more accessible (in my experience, and except for New York city ofc) making going around to different public places with my mom generally a lot easier than somewhere like France or the Netherlands.

Out of all the things you could clown on the U.S. about, why you gotta go for accessibility of all things? It's disgustingly ableist and ageist, and I have to wonder if these people actually just hate disabled people / accessible design, and are using the U.S. as an excuse to hate on disabled people and accessible design.

[raincitygirl76]

I’m a Canadian. Our disability access is probably better than much of Europe (although I haven’t visited a lot of different European countries). But it’s definitely worse than the USA.

The USA has something called the Americans With Disabilites Act (ADA), and apparently it works fairly well. An American in my WhatsApp group went to a figure skating championship in Toronto a while back and was stunned that the arena didn’t have wheelchair access for spectators. Because an American arena would have.

Not everything about the USA is awful. Not everything about Canada and Europe is great.

Also, I live in Vancouver. We didn’t have a subway system until 1986, that’s when the Skytrain was finally built. Several of the Skytrain stations were originally built with no elevators. People with wheelchairs were expected to enter or exit the system at a different station that did have wheelchair access. In 1986.

The system wasn’t built in 1896 or 1926, when wheelchairs were a newfangled idea. It was built in 1986. British Columbian Rick Hansen’s Man In Motion world wheelchair tour started in 1985 (in Vancouver).

Or well, the Skytrain was opened in 1986. Let’s say the plans for it were finalized by 1983, since it would’ve taken a few years to build. In 1983, there was already a substantial disability rights movement in Canada, but several Skytrain stations didn’t have elevators anyway, presumably because it was cheaper.

Naturally, it eventually became politically unacceptable to make wheelchair users (and people with strollers, and people with canes or walkers, and people with suitcases) skip a station because they hadn’t bothered to put an elevator in that station.

So those stations had to be retrofitted at vast expense to make them wheelchair-accessible. It probably would’ve been cheaper to just build them accessible from the start, in retrospect. But we didn’t have a Made In Canada version of the ADA, so it didn’t happen.

Also, wheelchair accessibility does not only help wheelchair users. It also helps people with babies or toddlers in strollers, people using walkers, crutches, or canes, travellers with heavy suitcases, elderly people, etc, etc. I take the Skytrain several days a week, and I see all those people taking the elevator instead of the stairs or escalators.

Rick Hansen - Wikipedia

Rick Hansen - Wikipedia

[solar-cycle]

Anyone who wants to know why America/The USA has the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act), PLEASE look up "The Capitol Crawl." I saw a video of it at a disability centric school I went to. Hundreds of disabled people that couldn't walk dragged themselves up the Capitol steps- a famously giant staircase that leads to the places our legislation gets made. People were crawling up, risking their health, and lives to become visible. And while accessibility still isn't perfect (people on Disability have their income capped at $16,200 monthly, or about $19,440 yearly, any cent over, and you get no benefits and might as well die) we have some stuff. It was hard fought for, and people just fied out of sight beforehand. But we refused to let it keep happening. If anything, that is the opposite of lazy.

[badboneszone]

There’s also a fantastic documentary called Crip Camp that really beautifully tells the story of how the ADA came to be, it is a WILD story and I strongly recommend checking it out

[dailymanners]

I've gotten several dozens of notes at this point that just say something along the lines of "well you see, buildings in Europe are older than buildings in the U.S." as if that's a huge revelation no one had considered. Despite, again, several dozen people pointing out this exact same thing already, and also this is something most of us were already well aware of.

The point of this post (at least my original post, I can't control what other people say in the notes) isn't that buildings in Europe tend to be older than buildings in the U.S., the point is that a U.S.American can't politely point out that he's curious and surprised to see a lack of handrails without dozens and dozens of Europeans gleefully jumping at the chance to spew the most rancidly ableist garbage.

That's it, that's all I was trying to talk about. Before you want to comment "well actually, buildings in Europe tend to be older than buildings in the U.S." please consider if that actually matters or is relevant to a post trying to talk about how disgustingly eager Europeans are to get rancidly ableist in order to dunk on da yanks

ALSO: this doesn't even apply to all of Europe, because surprise, Europe isn't a monolith. Just because your buildings are old down in Italy and France doesn't mean that applies to all of us. Iceland was the poorest country in Europe for hundreds of years, and this only changed about a hundred years ago. One hundred years ago the population in Iceland was not only less than a third of what it is today, but it was also a lot of poor farmers and poor fisherman living in flimsy wooden houses that are no longer standing today. We had no palaces or castles. So given the very recent boom in wealth and population, the majority of our buildings were built in the past few decades. Despite this, accessibility is still often laughably piss poor. Europe isn't a monolith. And building age isn't always the full reason for the lack of accessibility.

[fagstaynight]

(getting a taste of my own medicine) actually this is okay. Is this what you guys have bene whining about? Jesus christ

[shroomshroomm]

[fandumb-thoughts]

Really funny hellaverse concept, considering that sinners are functionally immortal (barring angelic steel, Alastor eating them, etc.) it’s be really funny if imps/other “mortal” hellborns viewed some of the sinners as same old same old.

Like, I can perfectly envision a scene where Blitzø calls Angel “that ancient porn star” because Angel HAS been at bare minimum owned by Valentino for a decade or two longer than Blitzø has even been alive. Not mentioning whatever Angel got up to in the like 25ish years he was dead prior to Val dying.

[camelidae]

Today's cow, brought to you by crayons~

[apolladay]

What’s the best part about having a kitty cat?

The baby meows

Rubbing their little kitty ears

Delicate nose sniffs

Kissing their little apple-shaped head

Listening to their soft purrs as they fall asleep

Snuggling together under a blanket

Squishy toe beans

Slow blinking at each other

Insatiable bloodlust

Baby teeth crunching cardboard sounds

Softest fur for petting

My cat is bald/Results

Voting ended onDec 2, 2025

[dailymanners]

Be mindful of the sounds you make that might trigger misophonia, sensory issues, or honestly are just going to be gross/unpleasant/annoying for people to hear.

Chewing with your mouth open might not be considered rude in every culture, but if you're in a culture where chewing with your mouth closed is the norm then most people are going to find chewing / mouth smacking sounds to be really unpleasant and disgusting. It's also common for people with misophonia and/or other sensory issues to find loud chewing / smacking sounds to be upsetting. When in doubt, always keep your mouth closed when eating and try to keep chewing sounds quiet.

Sounds made from sucking your teeth, made from hocking/spitting, and loudly playing music/videos on phone speakers are also sounds that are common for people to find really unpleasant and commonly trigger misophonia and other sensory issues.

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 5% of the year 2025

10% will be completed at noon on the 6th of February

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 10% of 2025

25% will be completed at 7am on the 2nd of April

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 25% of 2025

50% will be completed at 1pm on the 2nd of July

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 50% of 2025

69% will be completed at 9:24pm on the 9th of September (nice)

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 69% of 2025 (nice)

75% will be completed at 7pm on the 1st of October

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 75% of 2025

90% will be completed at noon on the 25th of November

[unashamedly-enthusiastic]

We have now completed 90% of 2025

95% will be completed at 6pm on the 13th of December

[identitty-dickruption]

I’m not gonna say that moving out of an abusive home solved all of my problems. and I am still very much a disabled person. but almost a year on from moving out, it is crazy to think of how many of my disabilities and mental illnesses have either dramatically decreased in severity or disappeared entirely over the past year. I used to have about monthly psychotic episodes. I have had one psychotic break since moving out of home. I no longer have insomnia at all. fluctuations in my chronic pain levels are significantly less frequent, even if other factors have meant that my baseline pain is higher than it once was. I have flare-ups less often in general. my autism is also significantly more manageable (I got diagnosed as level two, I would now almost certainly be categorised as level one)

this is not to say that those disabling experiences were any less real. my symptoms were real and incredibly disabling. it’s more just to note that environmental influences can be more dramatic than people seem to believe. trauma can wreck havoc on a body and a mind in a million ways, and some of those ways can look the same as a permanently bad disability. especially when it comes to psychosis, there seems to be the sentiment that it’s solely this pathological and individual phenomenon that exists because your brain is inherently structured a certain way. but things are more complex than that, and being in a safe environment really can make all the difference. anyway. that’s my ramble I hope you liked it

[the-badger-mole]

So we all know that that there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, and to a certain extent, we have to acknowledge that our way of life is dependent on the suffering of others. Fortunately, it seems there are people who are pushing against that. If you're in the market for a new phone, I urge you to check out the Fairphone 4. It's made using ethically sourced materials and designed to be modular, so you can make repairs at home- which means if you crack your screen, or the battery stops working, you don't have to buy a whole new phone. I know the world is becoming more and more aware of the horrific conditions being suffered by people in places like DRC to make our smart devices. You can use your buying power to make a change.

I am personally not in the market for a new phone just yet, but if you are looking to get a new phone, I encourage you to look into ethically sourced phones and other tech. If you already have a Fairphone, please reblog this and talk about your experience. Be honest. Give the pros and cons so people can make informed decisions. We can't immediately stop all of the horrors that capitalism has brought on the world, but we have the power to make smaller choices where we can to mitigate the harm done.

Fairphone's main company seems to operate in Europe (website here), but if you are looking to buy in the US and Canada, check out their partner site, Murena (website here).

[kooldewd123]

actually the craziest impact animorphs has had on me is that i never really got an urge to eat cinnamon buns from reading them BUT the phrase "the refreshing beverage known as vinegar" has forced its way into my head every other week for years to try and convince me it would be a good idea to chug a whole glass of it

[kooldewd123]

tyhe voices in my head are gettinh louder

[sarifel-corrisafid-ilxhel]

Vinegar is what we used to use as the acid in our sodas before we switched to Carbonated Water in the 19th century, and vinegar-based sodas trace their roots all the way back to the Bronze Age Meditteranean! The Romans called it Posca! The Ottomans adopted it from the Romans and called it Sharab, which means "Drink", and then American colonists acquired the recipe from the Ottomans in the 17th century and changed the name to Shrub!

There's a famous example of Posca that most people misremember because we don't drink Vinegar much anymore. If you're familiar with the Crucifixion of Jesus in the Bible, you probably remember the bit about the Roman soldier offering Jesus a sponge full of vinegar to drink. Most people think the Roman dude was mocking Jesus, but that's wrong. That was a sponge full of Posca. The Roman dude was like "Well this sucks. Want a Sprite?"

...Fun fact, I know this because the phrase "Refreshing Beverage known as Vinegar" got stuck in my head one night at work, and I started googling "Does anybody drink vinegar". I had to know. It turns out the answer is yes! And you can still find vinegar-based soft drinks today! Switchel is a vinegar-and-ginger drink you can find at some bars in the US, and it goes back to pre-carbonated soft drinks.

Also, I know several people who drink pickle juice regularly, and white vinegar is a key component of pickle juice! So that's also where vinegar as a drink can pop up in your day to day life.

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

There's also a trendy New Age beverage called fire cider that's literally just vinegar, cinnamon, spice, and pretensions. RIP Ax, you would've loved the fire cider craze.

[kooldewd123]

op here. imagine how i feel. i've been dealing with this propaganda in my notifications all week.

[foldingfittedsheets]

Alright so one of my past jobs was working at an on tap place called Oil and Vinegar store. It’s supposed to be for salad dressings and stuff. People would bring in their bottles and we’d fill them up.

Vinegar is basically just made from fruit sugars so we had. The most. Amazing vinegars. There’s this one made with mango pulp that I straight up would have just drunk but if you add it to soda water it was truly the most decadent beverage imaginable. So there’s like passion fruit, raspberry, elderflower- just every wonderful sharp flavor imaginable.

We had pregnant ladies who’d buy several bottles at a time because it’s really great for nausea.

What I’m saying here is that Ax wasn’t wrong at all, that dude knew what was up even if he was probably chugging boring household white vinegar.

[rubinaito-inactive]

The things I learn on this godforsaken website.

[epistleii]

idk man. i just think itd be really cool if sign language classes were mandatory throughout primary school. yeah because it would make communication with deaf kids and autistic/nonverbal kids much easier. and those kids would be accessible to the others so they could make friends and have healthy relationships. yeah. and kids would eat that shit up man. like their own little secret language? they love that.

[vampirejuno]

Having a much older, much more experienced person tell you you're doing well in your shared hobby is better than crack, especially when the hobby tends to be 80% retired ppl. Like, hell yeah I'm gonna get a good grade in birdwatching and I'm not even 50. Child prodigy moment

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

OP: so this is the ‘intense regional downpour’ on the weather forecast

[heroineimages]

I love when the weather says 'fuck you, get soaked,' to a single mile-wide or square-mile piece of land.

[catchymemes]

[blondejaneblonde]

Okay, but I would pay extra for this driveway.

[naamahdarling]

Um, can I please get every neighborhood kid and animal to come walk across my driveway? Can I get a cat to just run around on there? This flock of ducks did such an amazing job!

[goddamnshinyrock]

I was 18 months old when my parents built their house. After pouring the concrete slab for the foundation, my father, world’s most sentimental man, carried me down into the hole so he could preserve a single imprint of my little baby foot in the house he was building for me to grow up in.

Naturally, I wriggled loose, so what is actually preserved for posterity in my parents’ basement floor is my mad dash through this glorious new mud pit, followed by my father’s footprints in hot pursuit, a visible scuffle where the fugitive was captured, and then my father’s prints returning to the ladder.

[gallusrostromegalus]

I hope some future archeologist finds your parent’s basement floor because they’re going to lie down on the ground and cry about it.

[david-goldrock]

It's quick, it's easy, and it's free, tell someone that you love them today

[someoneiwasnt]

[ID: tags that read “taking this as a sign to pour river water in my socks” followed by two saluting emojis.]

[dark-magician-girl-meets-world]

One of the machines broke down at the hyperbole factory. The situation is frustrating, but ultimately manageable.

[dark-magician-girl-meets-world]

It just started working again! This is the best day ever!