[robotmango]

when i forget to log into ao3 and i have to click proceed to see an adult fic, i actually get a kick out of it. like i am an old timey queen and my bard is apologetic: “gentle lady, dicks doth touch in this next ballad. would you prefer another?” and i give him a gesture of command like, “nay, you may proceed, minstrel. bring forth the tale of dicks”

[berlynn-wohl]

hope it’s not too late; I made this in Scriptorium

[toasthaste]

according to An Immense World, apparently giant squid eyes are, like, UNREASONABLY large, even for something their size living at those depths. the next largest eyes on earth, blue whale eyes, are less than half the size, and swordfish, who live at similar depths as giant squid and have the largest eyes of any fish, have eyes that could fit inside a giant squid's pupil.

eyes hit serious diminishing returns wrt resource costs vs vision quality as they get bigger, so the question became: what the FUCK do giant (and colossal) squid need to see so badly that they couldn't see with swordfish-sized eyes that's justifying that massive energy cost? that nothing else in the deep ocean needs to see so fucking badly??

turns out the one strength eyes that big really have over much smaller eyes is: seeing large glowing objects in water deeper than 500 meters from an appreciable distance.

sperm whales are the primary predator of giant squid. sperm whales don't glow. BUT! water that deep is full of bioluminescent creatures-- these creatures light up when bumped into. something a sperm whale's size is continuously bumping into those critters, it's just surrounded by a glowing field all the time when it's swimming at those depths, visible from a distance-- if you have the right eyes-- as a massive glowing shape. so basically the only reason to have eyes the size of soccer balls is if you live in the deep ocean and your life depends on having a heads up when a hungry sperm whale lurking around

and also I gotta say, the imagery... the huge lurking threat betrayed only by the ambiguous glowing shape of its movements through the water, is really evocative, if spooky deep-sea games aren't already using that to make things extremely ominous then they should really start

[voyage-of-the-porn-spreader]

tgis is so fucking funny to me. they accidentally Rock Lee'd a retired racehorse

[voyage-of-the-porn-spreader]

imagine youre a fat horse and your new neighbour is a personal trainer

[voyage-of-the-porn-spreader]

horse that reads Marcus Aurelius

[voyage-of-the-porn-spreader]

I was wrong. they didnt rock lee him. this horse is literally Gai. and i wish he was my dad

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[fruitcakebro]

Holy moly they're GOOD. The music is fucking FIRE, and the outfits??? They're all so PRETTY???

[snoodly-boop]

Does anybody know who these are??? Do they have albums!! 🤩🤩🤩

[raspberryslut]

I was so curious that I had to go find this band. They're called Fortress Dwellers and they have a website with all of their socials!

They released an album too! I don't think this song is on it but the rest of their stuff is SO GOOD !!

MUSIC | Fortress Dwellers

Step into the fantasy world of Fortress Dwellers. A fantasy Renaissance musical collective blending epic original music, immersive performan

[robustcornhusk]

i see people say "it's a marathon, not a sprint" a lot.

as i understand it, generally, after events that get described as "it's a marathon, not a sprint", you're hoping to remain upright afterwards. i want to be clear that, at the end of a marathon, you're wasted because you have run at 100% of the speed you can sustain over 26.2 miles.

thank you, nice volunteer at the last race who supported my entire bodyweight and respectfully dragged me out of the finisher's chute in a dignified way

you're looking for some other metaphor. perhaps "it's a hard run, not a race", or maybe "it's a randonnée, not a race". if it's really hard, maybe call it a barkley or a backyard ultra. let's get real into hair-splitting with metaphors because it entertains me, in specific.

---

pace percentages are a weird but very useful way to compare running paces. frex, what's called 90% of marathon pace is (2-.9) x marathon pace, 50% is (2-.5) x marathon pace, etc.

as a starting point, every 5% pace you drop, you can run ~2x as long, and the other way around too: every 5% faster, can hold it ~1/2 as long. so 105% MP is approximately half pace, 110% is approximately 10k pace, 115% is approx 5k... it really starts falling apart at distances shorter than a mile.

(note the symmetry isn't there; 80% x (120% MP) won't exactly equal MP. but it's close enough for a first approximation!)

one of the beefiest training runs i did in my last marathon training cycle was 20 miles @ 90% MP. it's neat, because before that run (...and for three or four weeks after...), i wouldn't have been able to run 26 @ MP. and uh, i still haven't run at that pace; i fucked around and found out on race day. but i did run very close to my planned pace.: 26.2 @ 99%! so my point stands. i was upright after that run! for an entire day! i was wrecked the next day, however.

... anyway, my point being. if you make me sprint -- i can't 'sprint'! i don't know how! usain bolt does a different sport from me that happens to use the same equipment! -- if you make me do something that approximates a sprint, it's at something a little faster than 5:00/mile pace. my marathon pace is about ~70% of that. my hardest training run was 60% of that. my daily pace is not even 20% of that.

---

five weeks post race and i'm finally getting back into fast running.

[tinyyellowflowers-blog]

No no no no I think you have something here — after doing something my job describes as “a marathon, not a sprint”, I should get to take five weeks off. For recovery.

[phantomrose96]

Personally? I would never deny Hiromu Arakawa her right to a short bratty braided blond character in a kickass red coat

[phantomrose96]

Invent a look this iconic and I think you should get to use it in every series.

[phantomrose96]

[kaban-bang]

It was actually her assistants conspiring lmao

[shantechni]

The funniest part to me is the way that she doesn't even believe her assistants are responsible for this. She 100% blames Edward "fictional character who can't directly affect the real world unless made to do so" Elric.

[teaboot]

Dear Teaboot, how does one cope with hating their parent(s)?

You should know that I've written and erased a number of answers before coming to this conclusion.

Anger is not an emotion unto itself. Anger is an expression of fear, of helplessness, of frustration, of grief. Where there is Anger, there is something deeper, like the roots of a vine that might strangle you. If you cannot reach the roots, you will not kill the vine.

Anger, though, serves a purpose- to inspire urgency, to act, to move in the defense of self or others, to call out injustice.

Anger is only an evil when it is acted on without discipline. When it is allowed to become a reflex motivator, when it skips higher thought and speaks directly through the teeth and the hands. This is anger without control.

This question has forced me to ask myself if there is a difference between anger and hatred.

Is hatred irrational? Anger may be as well. Is hatred directed to the innocent? Anger can be, too. Is hatred akin to cruelty? Anger, again, is not innocent of needless suffering.

So what purpose must hatred serve, in pursuit of a just world? What can hatred do that anger cannot? What does it mean to hate something?

I'm not a scholar. I haven't studied these things academically. But thinking of my own experiences, and remembering the exact circumstances and contexts and the nuance of every little piece on the board, I can tell you that there was revulsion, and there was myself, and there was forces beyond my control.

I think that Hate is when anger fears it cannot win. I think Hate is when you are faced with something that you want to believe you have possibility of overcoming while suspecting in some way that you cannot. I think that Hate is when you are afraid of the thing that enrages you.

Hate, if you ask my opinion, is a bit like being mauled by a bear, knowing that you will not survive, and going for the eyes regardless, because it doesn't get to grow old and happy if you can't either.

Good for the continued existence of your peers. Bad for everything else.

So I suppose, if you are in a position where a bear is mauling you- metaphorically- hate probably isn't your biggest obstacle right now.

But if the bear is out there somewhere, on the other side of the forest, and you are sitting in a hole somewhere in a stiff rigor of rage and spite and terror, then I think it may be best for you to tell yourself now:

The bear will kill. Killing is in the nature of the bear, and a bear is helpless to change its nature. Knowing the nature of the bear, I will stay away from it, and deter it, and stay away from its path, and I will pity it for the nature it cannot compel itself to resist, and for the wonderful things it will never experience.

I do not need to fear the bear, because I understand its nature. I do not need to hate the bear, because I needn't fear it. All I must accept is that there is a bear, and it is wise to stay away from it.

It's unfortunate that the bear must live this way. It's unfortunate that you share your forest with a bear and not something kinder. But if you cannot change it, and it cannot change itself, then all you can do is accept that it is a bear.

And knowing that: be loud, travel with friends, and carry a big stick.

[facts-i-just-made-up]

What is Tumblr?

Tumblr is the opiate of the very, very few.

[alanaisalive]

The other night husband and I were watching a documentary about the yeti where they were doing DNA analysis of samples of supposed yeti fur, and every one of them came back as bears.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

Bears. They’re everywhere. Be wary. Anyone or anything could be a bear.

[iguanamouth]

oh shit

[throughshadow-to-the-edgeofnight]

[alanaisalive]

As the OP of this post, I’m going to threaten that if this gets to one million notes by the 10 year anniversary on 1 June 2026, one year from today, I will get a lower back tattoo of the loch ness bear monster.

[sugaldean]

I know it feels like a lot but I really believe we can do it 20k notes per day isn’t that hard to do?

[owlet]

thank you scherz et al. for bringing us the frogs Mini ature, Mini mum and of course, the Mini scule

[owlet]

[wizardarchetypes]

i'm forever haunted by my inability to whistle because i truly tried. i watched youtube videos and practiced in the mirror again and again with no results,

until 2020 when i was living on a boat completely alone in quarantine during the heat of lockdown. i woke up at 1 am from a dream in which i was whistling. i sat up in bed and i thought, "oh my god, i get it now,"

and i whistled. i whistled a tune, even. i took a video of myself whistling just to prove it to everyone.

i went back to bed. in the morning, i couldn't whistle anymore. i only have the video as a reminder of the time i was briefly possessed by a whistling ghost who took pity on me.

[apatheticfluorescence]

some hyper famous artists like Van Gogh transcend overratedness and become underrated because they're so normalized. Like I'll look at a van Gogh and I'm like wait this really is amazing you guys don't get it

[headspace-hotel]

Shakespeare is like this

[insufferablepirate]

Every time I see a Van Gogh that’s not one of his better known pieces it absolutely blows me away

Have you seen this shit my liege? smh unreal

[theweirdwideweb]

[rimonoroni2]

unfortunately very true. Doing Better does not always mean never being upset or never being triggered or never having trouble. often Doing Better means experiencing those things and being able to keep going/cope healthily/move on. if you’re in a bubble with no sensation, if you’re numbing yourself out, that’s not what recovering really is. it won’t help you have a happier life it’ll just make your world smaller and smaller until you can’t fit anywhere anymore. gotta learn to make peace with the hard stuff too, that’s the only way to keep going

[ktempestbradford]

I did not come into Tumblr dot com to be called out in this way.

[spicymochi]

your month, your mini cat!

[clonerightsagenda]

When I was at the natural history museum, the fossil section had stickers on the glass to engage children - things like "Flap your arms like a pterodactyl" or "Measure your hand against the mosasaurus." However the first of these I encountered, which I found alarming and threatening without context, was a sticker reading "Struggle like you are stuck in a tar pit"

[clonerightsagenda]

I feel like more bright colors, an exclamation mark, or a more whimsical font choice would've also helped here to indicate that it is a Fun Activity For Children. Instead it felt like getting instructed in my inevitable fate by a road sign

[movementnudge]

Movement nudge, getting up off the floor!

X

[cat-mermaid]

real talk, i saw this other vid 7 years ago where a trainer like this lady gave some of the most important physical health advice I ever heard that changed my life:

#1. You should be able to lay down on the floor (face down or back) and be able to get up without your hands. If you can't? Spend a little bit every day just doing that, laying on the floor and getting up again no hands style, then laying down again (you'd be surprised how fast it wears you out after a few times)

#2. You should be able to get up out of a chair without using your hands or grabbing on to anything. Can't? Fucking start training mother fucker! Just a few uppies every day could save your damn life when you get older!

#3. You should be able to turn your neck to the side without twisting your upper body in the same direction, you should be able to turn your head freely without moving your shoulders, chest or torso! Start looking up loosy goosy neck exercises! It makes such a HUGE difference!

#4. You should be able to motherfucking stand on one foot and keep your balance for longer then 15 seconds. Haha sounds easy right? Thats what I thought when I tried after watching that vid, i was horrified to find how hard it was! I started doing "one leggy style" standing any chance I got, when I'm in line somewhere, when I'm watching a video... just do a few rounds of 10 seconds on each leg for like 5 min every day!

You get older and you think you still have all the same limberness as you did when you were 8, but whens the last fucking time you ran around and played like an 8 year old? You loose that flexibility so subtlety and then one day when you need it? BAM ITS GONE

Start getting into these habits now, i don't care if you're 18/25/30/45/50 OR WHATEVER JUST START YOU WON'T REGRET IT!

[kaiasky]

its terrible for any number of reasons, but i think if we invent immortality there should be an extreme sport called civilizational speedrunning where teams of 20 go into the wilderness somewhere and try and be the fastest build the first internal combustion engine. i bet you could get it down to like 3 years tops

[biggestzam]

The real trick is to eat seed heavy food before the speedrun starts so your first poops are halfway to agriculture already

[kaiasky]

i want you on my team holy shit