A Collector of Things

Hey, I'm Laura. I'm a huge nerd who likes all the things that show up on this blog

[kaylmao]

10000 YEAR OLD ROCK ART OF GIRAFFES FOUND IN LIBYA LET'S GO

[kaylmao]

YES!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[lilacchao]

of note: 95% of libya is desert, and giraffes are not found there! but this predates not just the libyan desert, but the entire sahara desert it's a part of! giraffes aren't found there any more and this is a memory of a time when things were giraffier

also apparently this rock art dates across multiple periods spanning thousands of years? but i couldn't find much detail on that so i can't give specifics

but yeah, this isn't just a memory of giraffes, but of giraffes now absent encountered by people just 2000 years (the difference between the late roman republic and today) out of the ice age, in a climate unfamiliar to any of the hundred billion people born since the desertification of the sahara drove the ancient egyptians to the nile, near the start of the agricultural revolution

the time between this and the birth of the sahara was nearly as long as the time between the birth of the sahara and now, in which all recorded history is contained, and all languages we can recognise at all - the language and culture of these people would be totally alien to current libyans, twice the difference between the oldest european language and english, predating all but libya's mountains!

and we have pictures of giraffes of the time! what a beautiful gift from such a distant past

[huckleberryhal]

Grandma Ferret. (X)

[huckleberryhal]

Today’s Grandma Ferret

[ittybittytatertot]

The reasons young girls are more likely to enjoy the romance parts of a superhero show more than the action parts are because the romance most of the time 1. Involves a girl or woman actually doing something and being important on screen 2. Is propelled by character personality/dynamics/motivation rather than plot

[ittybittytatertot]

This post is brought to you by me remembering the creators of Green Lantern The Animated Series talking about when the series was in testing and they had this screening with girls and boys watching an episode and each kid had a button they would press when they liked something. They found the girls liked the romance and the boys liked the action.

An uncritical read of that would lead you to believe this is an attribute of gender but I disagree. The show has exactly one (1) female protagonist. Because of this, and because of heteronormativity, romance scenes automatically include her and her motivations where action scenes are just as if not more likely to focus on Hal or Kilowog or Razor. So it probably isn’t really that the audience of little girls overwhelmingly hated action and loved romance. They probably just liked it better when someone they related to was on screen. Likewise the boys probably didn’t hate romance, but they’ve been told from a young age, through authority figures, social cues, and often narrative structures themselves, that girl characters are for girls and they’re not supposed to relate. But that’s just my two cents.

[imalreadydashingthroughtheno]

[yurimom]

We, as non-transfeminine lgbt people, have really really fucking failed trans women in acknowledging the weight of their oppression. We never should have let the word “TERF” get watered down this far. We never should have exposed trans women to transmisogyny for the sake of trying to seem progressive or woke.

Trans women deserve better. Stop making their existence about “pissing off TERFs.” The existence of trans women themselves should be enough for them to deserve to be loved and cared about in our community.

The fact that it took their oppressors making asses of themselves for us to give a shit shows some selfish and apathetic intentions.

Just some food for thought cuz I’ve seen a lot of non-transfems like, reblogging a trans womans selfies with “rb this to piss off a TERF.” You should be reblogging it because you think trans women are beings worthy of love and recognition, not to get some dumbass internet clout.

Protect trans women, love trans women, keep trans women safe. Don’t let yourself become one of the people exposing them to transmisogyny that they don’t need to see.

We need to do better. Trans women deserve better.

This is coming from someone who doesn’t experience transmisogyny. Transfems please feel free to correct or add on.

[misogynistcatgirl]

I think this is the first time I’ve seen a non-transfem talk about transmisogyny and transmisogynistic anti-terfs, good on you op, you’re a legit ally

[date-a-jew-suggestions]

If you would report an undocumented immigrant to ICE you would have reported me to the Nazis and I don’t fucking trust you

[prismatic-bell]

A note:

I live in a state where you “have to” report anyone you suspect of being undocumented (that wonderful hellhole of Arizona). Now in practice this law has fallen far short, thank goodness. But if you live in such a place and they start enforcing it, here is how you get around it:

Assume everyone who doesn’t speak English is visiting.

Never ask about their job, because if they tell you they work here then you know they’re not visiting. You see them a lot for several weeks or months? Hm. Someone in the family must be ill. That’s terribly tough. They always dress in old, ratty laborers’ clothes? I feel you, my dude, I can’t afford new clothes either, and my dad has the fashion sense of an aardvark, so sometimes it’s not even about “affording” them. They say they’ve been here for years? You must have misunderstood. Spanish isn’t your first language, after all. First and last name? It never came up, or you don’t recall–you meet a lot of people.

And then, if you’re asked: no, you haven’t seen anyone residing illegally in the United States. Just people visiting.

[date-a-jew-suggestions]

Very good very important addition

[appropriately-inappropriate]

Essentially, this is the civil society version of a work-to-rule strike.

Don’t do more than is expressly asked of you, and do what you are asked with such an intense attention to protocol that not asking you at all becomes more effective than even bothering.

In this case:

“Have you seen an illegal immigrant?”

“Could you describe an illegal immigrant, officer?”

*officer describes a person who is in the country without appropriate paperwork, or who has crossed the border illegally*

“No, sir, I haven’t seen any illegal immigrant.”

And this is correct. You have NOT seen an illegal immigrant, because you have no way of knowing if Jose Fulano is here legally or not. And since you can’t see his paperwork (or lack thereof), and did not personally see him cross the border illegally, you are only answering precisely the question asked.

[dancingwiththelostboys]

I’m not American, and I have like, three followers, but this is important.

[thelawfulchaotic]

So, I’m a lawyer, who deals with immigration though does not specialize in it. But here’s the thing(s): 

1) Even someone who’s working could be here on a migrant (or other sort of) visa (hey, there are a few thousand per year, and *someone*’s got to get them, right?) or could be waiting for their case to resolve in immigration court, after having come to America to join a born or naturalized American family member. 

2) Even people who are working improperly could have come into the country legally – and just overstayed their visa or be violating the conditions of their visa, and you have no idea what the niggly little regulations that govern that might be. 

3) If a law enforcement officer asks you about a neighbor/friend/etc., take this moment to remind them that, unlike them, you cannot ask a random person off the street for their ID and be entitled to a response. 

4) Even if someone has told you that they are undocumented, you still don’t know, do you? Humans lie all the time. How could you know for sure? You can’t, because they can’t prove that they have a lack of papers. Just because you haven’t seen papers doesn’t mean they don’t exist! 

5) Don’t ever talk to cops in general. Why are you talking to a cop? Stop that, as soon as it is safe and feasible. 

Love,

a very tired public defender

[kedreeva]

In college, my criminology professor told us something I will never ever forget: you have three very important, extremely useful words at your disposal.

“I don’t remember.”

No one can do anything about “I don’t remember.” They might be able to disprove “I don’t know” but not “I don’t remember.” If ICE/cops start asking you questions about folks, gosh. You don’t remember a goddamn thing. They’ll have to ask someone with a better memory, sorry.

And if you happen to accidentally remember anything later, well. Memory is a funny old thing, innit. Nothing to do about it.

[zennistrad]

Real talk it annoys me how swords have become the default “hero weapon” in every single narrative medium ever. It’s always “legendary sword this” and “master swordsman” that, even though a sword is like. THE absolute shittiest thing to choose as a main weapon.

“Oh, look at me, I’m gonna save the world!” Not with a dinky little sidearm you’re not. Any generic henchman with a decent polearm could skewer you before you even got halfway into hitting range.

A sword is the melee equivalent of that useless little stun gun Samus has without her power armor. It’s like playing touch football when the opposing team is playing rugby. You want a real primary weapon? Get yourself a spear.

[writing-in-the-grave]

Don’t be afraid to give your hero a cool weapon

[we-are-knight]

I think OP has no idea WHY swords have become iconic hero weapons. There’s a few reasons.

Swords are side arms. OP addressed this, but didn’t appreciate this well enough. A sword is PORTABLE. It is easy to carry, it can be kept on your person in situations where spears or poleaxes cannot. It is your backup weapon and last line of defence. It is less a stinging than it is an officer’s pistol. Which leads me to point 2.

Swords are status symbols. They are not cheap to produce (dependent on time and place) and while portable, are usually restricted on who can or cannot carry them in public. In the medieval period(s), you needed to be wealthy or a noble to get away with carrying a sword in public without harassment.

Swords have a higher skill level. They are (in historic fighting traditions in Europe particularly) used as a foundation for larger weapons like spears and axes. If you can use a sword, chances are, you can use a spear or axe better than a regular peasant, because the mechanics carry across. It’s still not easy to defeat a spear user, but the skills transfer enough that a swordsman now has a chance to defeat someone with a primary weapon.

Swords do not excel at anything, aside from ease of carry. An axe is better at delivering force to a small area and cutting it with combined energy transfer and sharpness levels. A spear is longer and better and penetrating joints in armour. A hammer deals percussive force damage like nothing else. However, a sword can do ALL of these things without excelling. It’s the jack of all trades, and usable for all situations as a result.

While your heroic sword weapon is not the BEST tool for open combat scenarios, it’s good (or at least passable) in all of them. It’s a flashy status symbol that makes your hero stand out. And it shows a level of skill they need to refine to possess.

This all said: more weapons are never a bad thing. A hero in a war heavy setting might benefit more from the sword as a backup, and a spear or axe as a primary weapon.

[iratusmagus]

Yes, finally, thank you! I hear that complaint and I just… die a little inside. I prefer maces as a side weapon because I’m a fumbling peasant and simply want to bash you and be done.

[we-are-knight]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but a mace against plate armour is not likely to kill a knight. If they are held still for you hammer their head in, maybe yes, but maces against a moving, unwilling opponent are not fun toys.

Simply put,you can’t get enough purcussive force with a single handed weapon, on foot, to smash a breastplate in. Even if you hit a limb or breast plate, the layers of padding beneath, chain shirt, etc, means your mace will give someone a few dents or bruises, but not much chance of killing your plate armoured man at arms.

Ignore the above if you are mounted and hurtling past at 30+mph astride a war horse.

[we-are-dread-commando]

I’m partial to a (proper, historically-accurate) warhammer…that spike at the back seems like it would be great against plate and flesh alike.

[user0987654321876543]

Ophelia: I’m leaving you. There’s nothing more I can say.

Hamlet:

[dafuqbruv]

[feeshies]

imagine if quentin didn’t kill leandra at the end of da2 act 2, and he was just some weird blood mage dating your mom and you just had to deal with that

[big-ass-magnet]

The whole plot is he keeps making really weird comments about her skin and her eyes and Hawke is convinced he’s the serial killer he 100% sounds like, but nothing ever comes of it and no one else sees it. 

It’s the one joke about what if Hannibal Lecter actually was a normal psychologist, except it’s your mom’s boyfriend. 

[mayordog-deactivated20160926]

a warning

[dietaryfiber-deactivated2018092]

we have Ten Days

[cactusjubilee]

T O M O R R O W

[etct-deactivated20240208]

self diagnosed with lavender town syndrome

[sprachtraeume]

rb to make a trans person feel loved 💕

[rockyrocksrox]

Oh my god I really hope y'all know what’s going on here

[leviathan-supersystem]

a “do you love the color of the sky” edit which is exactly as long but is just blank the whole way through

[leviathan-supersystem]

contemplate how easy it would be to actually make this post and then meditate on how infinitely merciful i am for choosing to describe it instead

[one-time-i-dreamt]

how the fuxk

[icecoldorangejuice]

Having a sibling or three really like….gave you interpersonal skills and moral exercises from an early age that people who were only children had to learn later on, because nothing makes your brain work overtime than having a ride or die relationship with someone who you would suplex through the dining room table in a second if they touched your shit, but you’d also stand up and take the blame for some shit if you knew it wasn’t their fault or stepping in and swinging if they were being bullied by someone else

[ariaste]

Also gives you a keenly honed ability to lie, wide-eyed and plausibly and at the drop of a hat, because you definitely had Nothing To Do With This Situation, How Could You Even Think This Of Me, Papá