Give me less "being kind requires zero effort" and more "being kind is worth the effort it takes."
we're not kids anymore.
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Kiana Khansmith

#extradirty
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Andulka
Mike Driver

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taylor price
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shark vs the universe
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Origami Around
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@golden-moose
Give me less "being kind requires zero effort" and more "being kind is worth the effort it takes."
Georges
Wizard tip: If you die before you write your stories down, they die with you. With no other hearts and minds to sustain them, their worlds collapse and fade. Never properly brought into a universe and existences of their own, they simply disappear.
You must write them down to save them. Spill them across the pages of our world to give them an anchor and a root. An outline is a tenuous thread that can be spun into the web of a new world!
You are the progenitor of new universes, will you make them rot inside you instead?
it’s fuck all friday btw. you need to be doing fuck all
Whoops forgot to post for a little bit. This was my first (and only so far!) project using lead came instead of copper foil. It was also my second stained glass project ever.
Pattern: Modern Hexagon by Glassy Rock Arts
A spiderweb I made as my last project in the stained glass class I took in 2023. I made it entirely out of glass I found in the scrap bin.
Pattern from Delphi
USAmericans and Canadians: can you confidently draw your state/province flag from memory?
USAmericans and Canadians: can you confidently draw your state/province flag from memory?
Yes
No
See results
these are my top faves but it’s so hard to choose, every character is excellent
An iris I made for my aunt back in 2023. That purple glass really does look yellow when the sun shines through it. It’s super cool, although it was miserable to cut.
This one was a Secret Santa gift for a friend. I was very pleased with the fact that I got good breaks on the blue glass that allowed me to keep the swirl intact. Plus, having bits of dichroic scrap that were the perfect texture for the moon and star. I need to buy a full size sheet of that clear iridized water glass, though. I swear I use it for every project.
Pattern by GlassPatternsbyC
Sockeye salmon I made for my sister for Christmas.
Pattern by Novarupta Designs
Fuck it *becomes an art blog*
Stained glass tulip suncatcher, made by me. Sending this one to my mother-in-law for her birthday.
Pattern: Alkmaar by Lucent Glass
Glass: pink/yellow/white by Fremont Antique Glass, iridized water glass and green wispy by Oceanside
Hey Dr. Tingle, got any parenting advice? I’m pretty sure we’ve already got the unconditional love and support bit down, but wow this is an intimidatingly high stakes job!
this is going to sound OVERLY SIMPLISTIC but in some ways i think that is the point, because the specifics will always vary but i think this part will remain the same:
your gift to your child is positive attention. it is simply to care
when they are young it is to take a moment and give them your time. to read to them. to play. to say 'hey what are you up to over there? wow thats pretty cool.'
when they are older they might start to push away and that is fine, you still just say 'hey what are you up to over there? wow thats pretty cool.'
when they are adults you will call them on the phone and say 'hey what are you up to over there? wow thats pretty cool.'
you are allowed to feel and choose
whenever folks talk about harry potter and separating artist from art they always have this indignant 'OH SO IM A BAD FOR BUYING THESE BOOKS?' but thats not the question. the reality is that many will BELIEVE you are bad, and that is VALID. its not your choice what others think of you
'AM I BAD?' is a grand and cosmic question that is well beyond our scope. fine. here on the ground, the DAY TO DAY effects are that your actions contribute to hurt and suffering in small or large ways, and those who hurt and suffer because of you are allowed to not like you because of it. SORRY BUD.
what is alternative? forcing folks to enjoy the art of those who hurt them? THEY DONT LIKE IT. someone saying 'your choices harm me so i dont like your creations and i dont like you' is not offensive, it is the most basic use of human autonomy and it is SO bizarre when folks argue otherwise
if you are a bigot or support bigotry or act in a movie built on the profits of hate, people are allowed to not like you 1. because bigotry is bad and 2. because people generally DONT LIKE THINGS THAT HURT THEM. like this is so obvious. it is not 'canceling' it is an exercise in basic human autonomy
i swear if we had social media in the past people would call the hippie and punk movements 'cancel culture' too. LARGE GROUPS OF PEOPLE MOBILIZING AGAINST THE THINGS THAT HURT THEM IS NOT NEW. SORRY BUD IT IS NOT SOME GEN Z FAD IF YOU SUPPORT HATEFUL THINGS AND FOLKS DONT WANT TO BUY YOUR STUFF ANYMORE
geckos in love
A lot of people don't know about why lawns are so disliked outside of how they are a waste of water, so here:
carbon emissions put out by lawn mowers (and other devices like leaf blowers). Lawn mowers produce significantly more greenhouse gases per hour of use than cars, and majorly contribute to smog.
Fertilizers get into bodies of water and cause algae blooms, converting all the diverse water plants to homogenous green slime.
Pesticides kill fireflies, bees, and all sorts of other beneficial insects, and many can kill or harm fish, birds and even humans.
Herbicides can have negative effects on the wrong targets too, but they are also causing common agricultural weeds to evolve resistance faster, increasing our dependence on pesticides.
Watering lawns does waste a lot of fresh water.
Lawns replace areas that once could have contained 100+ plant species with monocultures of frequently invasive species. Butterflies can't find host plants this way. Bees can't find food. Thousands of insect species rely on specific plants for food, and no other plant will do. A huge amount of the land is taken up by these wastelands.
Lawns also create dead, compacted, lifeless soil that is hard to grow other things in or near. The root systems of turf grasses are not robust enough to allow water to penetrate in. No matter how much nitrogen and phosphorous you dump on a lawn, it will still be lacking in the organic matter needed to create lush, absorbent dirt.
Dirt is supposed to be full of fungal mycelium. Scientists have discovered recently that the vast majority of all plant species are dependent on a network of symbiotic fungi attached to their roots for 80% of their phosphorous needs and 90% of their nitrogen needs.
Yes, this means that when you put a fungicide on your lawn, you've just nerfed that plant's ability to absorb nutrients by up to 90%. And you've also devastated its ability to absorb water, because plants are partly dependent on their fungi to get water out of dirt.
But fungicide isn't the only problem. Every plant in a natural environment is attached to multiple species of fungus, and most fungi are attached to multiple species of plant (though some are specialists). Trees literally use this system to send nutrients to other trees. We discovered recently that trees in deserts in California can survive extreme drought because they're attached to fungi that can break down rocks and extract water from the rocks.
If you don't have a good variety of plant species and rotting leaves and sticks and stuff, it doesn't matter how much fertilizer you put on it, your soil isn't "healthy" because it's not alive.
Vegetation that has been cropped extremely short doesn't hold in water, so a heavily maintained lawn is likely unnaturally dry for your climate, and a flower or bush in the middle of a lawn without tall grasses, shrubs and weeds nearby is getting pounded by the sun much harder than it's meant to handle.
Yeah, gardening isn't hard, most native plants are falling all over themselves to grow, it's just that the standard suburban backyard is ridiculously hostile to life.
Of course at this point you may be wondering
"What do I do instead?"
Well, here you go:
Stop weeding, spraying and fertilizing. Seriously. Stop it!! Stop it!! Chemical intervention in your lawn traps you in a vicious cycle of creating problems that need to be solved with more chemicals.
"Weeds" are a perfect example. Plants commonly considered "weeds" are adapted to take over areas that have been cleared out of other plants. Many "weeds" are actively harmed by the fungi that other plants depend on, meaning they can ONLY thrive in disturbed or devastated areas. The harder you work to eliminate biodiversity in your yard, the harder nature is going to bomb your yard with weeds.
By the way, google the "soil seed bank." Seeds can stay dormant in soil for years or even decades. If you want a "weed-free" lawn, get ready to apply herbicides for the rest of your life.
Mow less often. You really can't go wrong with this one.
Don't try to grow grass where grass doesn't want to grow. Lots of shade? Try moss. Extremely dry? Try drought-adapted plants. See what wants to grow there and let it do its thing.
It's fine to have a lawn area that you actually use. But if no one walks or plays on a stretch of your lawn, it should be something else. A wildflower patch, a stand of prairie grasses, some large shrubs, a grove of trees.
By the way, the idea that shrubs or flower beds are higher maintenance than lawns is wrong. The neat thing about native species is that once they've gotten settled, you literally just do nothing.
People think flower beds are high maintenance because people almost always underpopulate them. They think that there should be big spaces of mulch in between each plant. In a full sun flower bed that's actually filled to capacity, you shouldn't be able to see the ground. If your plants aren't babies anymore and there's still space, more plants.
if you live in an area that was once forest, PLEASE, plant some trees, and not just one tree. Trees are somewhat like guinea pigs, actually, they don't want to be alone. They send each other nutrients through their roots and screen each other from wind damage.
By the way, the "mature spread" of a tree as told on websites means when you plant it by itself. Trees can generally be planted 6-10 feet apart and be perfectly happy, they'll just grow taller and straighter instead of spreading out. (Look at pictures of forests.) HOWEVER large trees like large oaks should really be 25+ feet from structures and septic tanks
(Trees pop up by themselves in lawns. Constantly. Search for them in a woodland biome and you will likely find baby oaks and maples and other cool guys.)
Trees introduce competition for light into the areas you plant them, helping eliminate the "weeds." You know how fast your lawn grows up and gets weedy when you don't mow it? Yeah, that's partly because it's getting a CRAP TON of sunlight dumped on it with reckless abandon.
A shade garden gets "weedy" WAY slower, and unlocks all sorts of gorgeous flowers that don't thrive in a full sun garden. Fallen leaves serve both as compost and mulch. If you live in the right area for it and have room, you cannot go wrong with trees.
Also also:
Because lawns are such hard packed earth with a very thin layer of greenery and roots on, they are TERRIBLE at rain absorption and cumulatively a suburb full of lawns WILL flood more often and/or quickly than one with more 'natural' gardens like those derin has described
Lawns are also more prone to erosion because the root systems of turf grasses, as mentioned, are terrible at infiltrating deep into the soil, so don't hold it together the way a more robust and complex root system would
Trees are very good for biodiversity and wildlife AND can provide nice shade for a human on a hot day
shoutout to my middle school computer teacher Mr Fleetwood. sorry I insisted on calling you "Fleetwood iMac" but in my defense it was clearly funny