Inkblot @goodbyenumbers - Tumblr Blog

the problem with tumblr spells is all of you lil sluts are casting and not giving it time to charge so you're all casting cantrips and not 9th level death spells. everyone wants to be the one to take them down no one wants to be the one who assists

we're going to try again witha little but minimal casting

IT will happen in August of 2026. like to charge and reblog to cast but cast sparingly

Wait stop. everyone +like now and spread it a little but cast on the same day in August. lets try August 6th or something.

CAST NOW!!!

CAST MORE

I finally got the deeply underwhelming Mongolian inspired fantasy off my bedside table and picked up The Wolf And His King. I don’t know what I was expecting from the medieval gay werewolf book but it is a. Very medieval in tone but upfront about not being accurate in a way only a medievalist could be (“Brittany was a barony not a kingdom but it’s called a kingdom in the 12th century poem that inspired this so forgive me”) b. Has a very interesting PoV/chapter structure doing some fun stuff with tenses and so on and most importantly c. The handsome young king has met the scrungliest most pathetic wet man in existence and gone “god I want to climb him like a tree”

Bisclavret: hmmm I have been granted many of the things I wanted, am making friends and people seem to like me. Is this a sense of self worth???

The king: oh god oh Christ what now he’s totally unavailable I must to my chambers to pine

Ok I was going to liveblog this in more detail but instead I just uhhhhh finished it??? If nothing else convinces you to read this deeply strange (affectionate) medieval gay werewolf romance, let the fact that on top of wrangling an infant and working on a video I finished this in sub 24 hours guide you

#books #well I'm intrigued #im bored #to read

With a further 24 hours to marinate: fuck me that book is good. One PoV is third person and one is second person and one is in unstructured verse and reader, I even quite enjoyed the verse. Only one character in it is ever named and somehow it works. The whole thing, prose and dialogue and characterisation, is very passably medieval and yet it manages to have not one but two sassy side characters. Very evocative of textual medieval queerness while also leaning into being A Queer Retelling. Costume was accurate to the place and period it was inspired by, if that matters to you. Could maybe have benefited from more food descriptions, if that matters to you. The relationship was devastating (has a happy ending, if that matters). Apparently they’re doing the Mabinogion next, delicious

batmanisagatewaydrug

my notifications are once again devolving into a spirited debate about the ethics of actions that could potentially make someone uncomfortable, and at risk of sounding like someone about to get a lot of irate anons I think we're frankly giving way too to much moral weight to hypothetical discomfort

batmanisagatewaydrug

the thing about discomfort is that it's an extremely nebulous category that can be triggered by virtually anything and that's far too broad a category to have any inherent moral quality to it. like. my mom was mad uncomfortable when I stopped shaving. that didn't mean I was doing violence against my mom it just meant she needed to get over herself. many such cases it must be said.

batmanisagatewaydrug

there's not a single example I could give that's better than this

cloverchameleon

#txt it #important #racism

dragon-in-a-fez

genuinely wild to me when I go to someone's house and we watch TV or listen to music or something and there are ads. I haven't seen an ad in my home since 2005. what do you mean you haven't set up multiple layers of digital infrastructure to banish corporate messaging to oblivion before it manifests? listen, this is important. this is the 21st century version of carving sigils on the wall to deny entry to demons or wearing bells to ward off the Unseelie. come on give me your router admin password and I'll show you how to cast a protective spell of Get Thee Tae Fuck, Capital

bigmann-mclargehuge

Share the knowledge

dragon-in-a-fez

Okay, here we go! I'm gonna try and put this in order from least to most technical knowledge required. I'm not responsible if you accidentally create SkyNet etc.

Level 1: browser extensions

This one is basically impossible to get wrong, or at least to get wrong badly enough that it causes any problems.

Get Firefox, or a Firefox fork like Waterfox. If you use a fork, make sure it's one that will let you use add-ons. On a PC, pretty much any Firefox fork will take add-ons, but on mobile devices, many don't. Iceraven is one that does.

Get the add-ons uBlock Origin, YouTube Sponsorblock (if you use YouTube), and FBCleaner (if you use Facebook).

uBlock Origin comes with a built-in list of filters to block ads and trackers, but you can add your own filters to block any specific element of a website you don't like. You know those goddamn floating frames on fandom.com sites that block half the screen? Now you can zap 'em.

Sponsorblock uses crowdsourced timestamps to automatically skip sponsor spots and self-promotion in YouTube videos. Never listen to anyone say "hit like and subscribe" or "Raid Shadow Legends" again.

FBCleaner hides all content from your feed except posts from people, groups, and pages you've actually chosen to follow.

Level 2: leaving enshittified services

The software that's become standard over the years in a lot of fields is steadily selling more of your data, showing you more ads, and pushing you to buy more expensive subscriptions. Time to tell them to get fucked.

Dump Adobe apps for Affinity or Krita. Drop Microsoft for LibreOffice. Change your default search engine from Google to DuckDuckGo or Qwant. Use OpenStreetMaps instead of Google or Apple Maps.

Level 3: network-level DNS fuckery

DNS, or Domain Name Service, is the thing that tells your computer where www.website.com is actually located. By hacking your network's DNS you can force it to tell your devices that ad-hosting domains don't exist at all. Some of the steps on this one can get pretty technical, but because you're doing all the difficult stuff on a dedicated device, you can't really fuck up anything that seriously.

Get yourself a Raspberry Pi (a cheap older one like a model 3B will work just fine for this purpose), and follow a guide like this one to get it set up running AdGuard Home. AdGuard, like uBlock, has built-in filter lists, but you can also add your own if there are specific domains you want to block.

Once it's up and running, you'll need to change the DNS settings on your router to point to your AdGuard service. This is different for every router but will always start with logging into the admin panel with a password printed on a little sticker somewhere on the router.

With that done, every time a device on your home network looks for ads.website.com, it'll get back a message that says "sorry, can't find it", so it won't be able to load any ads.

Level 4: Android-specific DNS fuckery

Because AdGuard runs on your home network, it can't block ads on your phone when you're away from home - and what's worse, your phone will sometimes remember the addresses it got when you were out and about, and ads will get past your AdGuard wall even when you're home.

To avoid this, get AdAway for DNS-based ad-blocking directly on your phone. The easy, but less seamless, way of using AdAway is the "local VPN mode", which doesn't require you to do any mucking about with your phone's operating system.

Level 5: automated media piracy

The best way to stop seeing ads on all your streaming services is to stop using streaming services. There are loads of ways to do this, but the best ones involve setting up what's called an "arr stack" (Google that for setup guides) along with nzbget and a usenet account. Most of the time you'll want to set this stuff up on a dedicated device - an old laptop gathering dust in the closet is a great option, or you can grab something used from a charity shop or a local electronics recycler.

The great thing about usenet is that unlike with torrents, you don't have to do any sharing from your computer, so you're in a lot less legal jeopardy - legally speaking, distributing pirated content is waaayyy more serious than accessing it. I pay about £3 a month for a secure, high-bandwidth usenet service.

Once you start getting your own collection of media on your own computer, use the open-source media library manager Jellyfin to browse and play things from basically any device.

Oh, and don't be a dick. Pirate all you want from big corporations, but please pay independent small-time creators for their work.

Level 6: fucking with Android

Android phones are a lot more locked-down than they used to be, but depending on the device you own you can still do a lot of messing around under the hood. Note that if you get something wrong while doing this, there is always the possibility that it will turn your device into a paperweight.

Before you buy a device, check where it sits on the Bootloader Unlock Wall of Shame. Once you've bought it, check the xda-developer forums for guides on how to unlock it and "root" it (gain admin access) with Magisk.

Once Magisk is installed, you can add modules to do all sorts of cool stuff, including using AdAway in "root mode" which makes it basically invisible.

You can also install YouTube ReVanced, which will do all the ad- and sponsor blocking stuff we took care of in your Windows browser a few paragraphs ago. Be careful: there are a lot of fake sites out there pretending they're associated with the ReVanced project which might be injecting malware into their downloads. This Reddit post has the official instructions and links.

Also, try out the modded version of Facebook from APKmoddone, which will block most of the same shit as the FBcleaner add-on from earlier. There's always a possibility that modified apps like this are doing something dodgy, but I've never had any issues with this one personally.

Level 7: fucking with Windows

This one is scary because it can seriously fuck up your shit if something goes wrong, but some really cool people have actually made it very simple to strip all the bloat, ads, and spyware out of Windows. The tool I use is ReviOS. Start reading at https://www.revi.cc/docs. Basically, you'll need to download a tool called AME Wizard and the ReviOS "playbook" that tells AME what to do. Read the documentation before you do any of this.

Level 8: switching to Linux

I'm not going to pretend this is an option for everyone. Half the software I use on a weekly basis isn't available on Linux. But if you can switch? Do it. These days, Ubuntu - one of the most popular flavours of Linux - is built with people switching from Windows in mind, and a lot of things will be pretty intuitive. It also has great documentation and a huge community you can go to for help if you're confused about stuff.

And that, friends, is a comprehensive approach to banishing the demons of capitalism from your home!

klymilark

Something I want to add:

You don't even need a pihole for it anymore. You can throw "dns.adguard-dns.com" into your android phone under Network (or Connections) > Private DNS > Private DNS Provider Hostname in your Settings app. You can also set your router up to use it via the IPs:

94.140.14.14

94.140.14.15

Link to to source for that:

Create your ad-blocking DNS server that will protect your personal data, prevent tracking and allow you to control access to specific conten

That will depend on your router, just search "How to set up custom DNS for (router name & model)". You can usually find that info on a sticker on the router itself. The model name is often nonsense like CM1000.

For switching to Linux:

If you're worried about software not working, and the software isn't something with work-related requirements attached, you can usually find alternatives. Alternativeto.net is a good place to start with that.

AlternativeTo lets you find apps and software for Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, Android Tablets, Web Apps, Online, Windows Tab

If you're a gamer, protondb.com will let you see how well your specific game runs on Linux. Ranks are from:

Borked - Does Not Work At All, or works so poorly that you cannot play the game at all

Bronze - Sort of works, but with glitches that don't exist on Windows that affect gameplay

Silver - Works, but requires tinkering, and has glitches that don't affect gameplay, or requires heavy tinkering to get running

Gold - Works, requires mild tinkering (usually just selecting another proton version from the drop down)

Platinum - Works out of the box

Native - Is made for Linux

Other common alternatives:

Spotify: I've heard good things about Tidal, but haven't personally used it (I use a cloud storage service and local files for music)

Google drive: Nextcloud. You can find free servers on their website

Google office: OnlyOffice has a desktop/mobile app, and most of the features

Gmail: Free providers aren't common, but disroot is one of them. They also offer quite a few services. Personally I use mailbox.org, but they do cost $36 a year minimum

Google search: Disroot has a searx instance, startpage.com exists, and you'd be surprised at how far you can get by setting your default search engine to Wikipedia. Marginalia's also good, but selective about what they index (mostly indieweb stuff)

I, admittedly, run almost everything through Emacs nowadays, so there may be better alternatives now.

(Directed generally) Also remember that in most cases the problems are Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft. If you find a small project that isn't perfect, remember that those five companies are probably worse in every way imaginable. Look for an alternative, but for the love of whatever you hold dear, Google is *not* a better alternative.

#reference #security #technology

houndmother

in the early 21st-century, the “small business” was a sort of small temple run by a local warlord. Patrons could purchase small trinkets and be granted absolution for the sins of their empire. This was called “ethical consumption.”

#txt it #yes and #capitalism #colonialism

millenniallust4death

I’m paying to force seven thousand strangers to see a photo of my late husband having fun with his dog. Tumblr Blaze is totally worth it. XD

millenniallust4death

Thank-you to all of my new Internet stranger friends for being so gracious about having my post shoved onto your dashboards. I loved reading all of your kind tags and comments! Both Martin and Bosco have been gone for several years now but for 24 hours, they felt very present in my life. I greatly appreciate this gift. ❤️

psycorax

Reblog to have your dashboard be visited by the spirit of joy that death can end but not erase.

millenniallust4death

Thank you to everyone who commented in their tags or messaged me. Indeed, today is “Martin and Bosco Day”. I originally whimsically blazed this photo on 13 July 2022. I never expected Martin and Bosco to travel so far and make so many new friends. The experience has been such a gift for me.

#blessed day #img #pic

queer-as-in-fuck-12

drug addicts deserve housing, food, water, and healthcare btw

#txt it

kaibacorpintern

in the Egyptian wing of the museum and my boyfriend is like "what are all the time periods of ancient Egypt" and I'm like predynastic, early dynastic, old kingdom which is when the pyramids were built, first intermediate, middle kingdom, second intermediate, new kingdom which includes amarna period and yugioh, third intermediate, and then all the late period stuff and macedonian and roman eras. and he's like run that by me one more time

#yeah #ancient Egypt #history #txt it #yugioh

3liza

do you live in seattle (the american city)?

yes

Voting ended onJul 10

please reblog to get this poll out of my bubble, i want reach

3liza

so ive been meaning to do this poll for a while because my hypothesis is that seattle is the most Tumblr city, likely in the entire world. tumblr has a huge american majority userbase obviously, but just for comparison going forward, only 0.22% of the american population lives in seattle. as of this reblog, this poll is showing 4% of respondents are seattleites. given, this isnt scientific at all, because my blog just has a lot of seattle connections and seattle followers, but it's still an impressive bias

#huh #polls

nohoperadio

just saw a pigeon doing the puffed up courtship dance thing to another pigeon, and as he was strutting around he suddenly stopped for a split second to do a very brief preen-peck at his own side, then returned to the strutting around. and i surprised myself by instantly losing respect for the male pigeon in that moment, like come on man i appreciate you had an itch or whatever but how is she supposed to feel special when you're getting distracted by bullshit like that? which on reflection i don't endorse, i mean those are pretty harsh dating norms i'm imposing on these pigeons, from a total outsider perspective, for no reason. probably not all girl pigeons are as uptight about that sort of thing as i would apparently be if i was a girl pigeon, maybe she even found it endearing who knows, i don't know her. it's none of my business really. sorry pigeons.

#pigeons #birds #animals #txt it #story time

dingdongyouarewrong

i'm getting the sense some of you are not actually forklift certified.

dingdongyouarewrong

well damn . egg on my face

dingdongyouarewrong

THE PLOT THICKENS @averagejoey2000 explain yourself

I can't believe this is how I'm finding out that I got a scam forklift cert.

I took the cargo ops class at school but my teacher explained that it doesn't give a certification and I'd only be okay for ship's crane and the school forklifts. she said I could take an online exam and get my cert. I paid 60 bucks.

I'm googling and I'm seeing a lot of resources saying that the online programs cover the classroom part of the exam but not the in person practical aspect.

29 CFR 1910.178 (l)(2)(ii)

but I did the in person practical shit at school.

the back of the card even had fancy numbers on it. I couldn't have known that this isn't the one. this website sounded more official than certifyme.net, and there wasn't one with a .gov address.

so, I emailed OSHA, and they said that so long as I live and work in California, there's no such thing as forklift certification. I have to be told how to do it every time I get the job.

#good for her #forklifts #img #txt it

Update: I took a certification class in shipboard Material Handling Equipment at my federal job. *now* I'm forklift certified, but only on ships and piers and only for this company, but also rated to forklift explosives and hazardous materials. Also I'm a woman now.

Herding sheep, looking after kids, and playing healer in videogames: every day you're surprised of the sheer innovative genius of how they'll find the most inconvenient goddamn places just outside your reach to get hurt or put themselves in lethal danger.

drafty-castle

Isn’t this sheep in real life?

Children in real life also.

It. It literally did. That was literally precisely the point.

I have no idea how the hell I could possibly express myself more clearly.

flickering-leaves

The humble Oxford comma

#piss on the poor website #txt it

IT'S LITERALLY RIGHT THERE.

mylordshesacactus

#you can understand op by using your brain

byjove

ages 0-7: slowly gain sentience

ages 7-12: be an ‘old soul’

ages 12-16: allow the darkness to consume you

ages 16-19: be a kid for the first time ever

ages 19-30: develop dad lore

ages 30-35: court a beautiful lady

ages 35-40: get married, start a family

ages 40-55: promise to clean out the gutters and never do it again

ages 55-60: allow the darkness to consume you once more

ages 60-75: swinger cruises with your beautiful wife

ages 75-86: be an eccentric grandfather

age 86: mysteriously disappear

#txt it #yeah

klappersacks

(via File Photo)

mudwerks

WTF are those obelisks on the right?…

pricklylegs-deactivated20250727

Tasty obelisk fries..

memewhore

“It’s digestible” has got to be the laziest goal I’ve ever seen achieved by a food product.

gingerhaze

“It’s digestible”

rhea314

“It’s digestible” is pertinent!! Okay, for those of you who haven’t researched Crisco for writing fic about gay sex in the mid-late 60s:

The first-edition of The Joy of Gay Sex, published in 1977, declared, “Vegetable shortening may be the best lubricant, since it is not only greasy but also digestible”[4] Such a statement perhaps gives new meaning to the companies boastful declarations that “Its digestible” and “Crisco has been making life in the kitchen more delicious for years.” Similarly, in the 1978 sex manual The Advocate Guide to Gay Health, Crisco even earned an entry in the book’s index. Discussions of the shortening’s use as an anal lubricant indicate its popularity, with statements such as: “The lubricant, typically the cultic Crisco, must be copious.”[5] In fact, Crisco was so synonomus with gay sex that discos and bars around the world took on the name, such as Crisco Disco in New York City, which was one of the premiere clubs during the 1970s and early 1980s. Other clubs or bathhouses, such as Club Z in Seattle, even featured murals with Crisco. Thus, Crisco was conversely also one of many things that led to the formation of gay identities during the 20th century.

from this essay: http://www.columbia.edu/~sf2220/TT2007/web-content/Pages/drew2.html

The more you know! :D

nianeyna

I have learned a new thing today.

soupwife

Love this post for so many reasons but most especially because this is from all the way back in 2012 and and yet not a single blog in this thread is deactivated

nianeyna

I enjoy that not only does this have a link to an actual source, but the link still fucking works.

dancinbutterfly

but @rhea314 you didnt include a picture of the crisco disco! AND MY GOD THE DJ BOOTH WAS A GIANT CRISCO CAN!

Go dance and get fisted. Fucking iconic.

mr-elementle

Love the gay history, but i just wanna correct that the “it’s digestible” in the gay stuff was a reference to crisco’s tagline it had been using since 1911, the actual meaning of its digestible is because it’s main competition came from “enhanced” lards which were rendered pig fat mixed with non food thickeners that literally did not digest and caused people to basically just shit out pig cream, since crisco was veggie based the body digested it along with the food

papapastoral

And in case you were still wondering, @mudwerks.. Tuna Croquettes

elf7knight

This post is the opposite of net zero information. Not only did I learn several new facts about gay history but also we rounded our way back to the original question of the tag line and the mini obelisks.

It’s a net profit of information. 12/10 post

#food #science #history #what doesn't this post have

So I just simultaneously did, and possibly didn't lose my job today :)

Very much did in the sense that I literally do not know where my job is at the moment. But, for the time being I haven't been let go because nobody else including the store owner knows where it is either.

So, I don't wanna risk doxxing myself by posting pictures but goddamn am I tempted because this is not a believable event. This is a cartoon problem. For looneytoons.

But yeah, so, I work(ed?) at a kiosk selling boba tea, right? Freestanding kiosk in the mall with full water and electrical hookups and multiple fridges and sinks and a mini kitchen and the works. Fully functional tea shop. Very important to note that it was there last night, The work chat was discussing another issue last night at closing time. I'll get back to this.

It's been showing signs of being on the way out with how business is being handled lately and I've been considering other options, which is probably why I'm not as torn up about this as I should be, but maybe it just hasn't set in yet, but that's not the point. The point is there's been a lot of shit breaking and not being replaced and nobody mentioning anything about it until I walk into work in the morning and have to figure out why shit like the fucking cash register isn't there today. So I'm kinda used to having to ask questions about big things that nobody bothered to update me on. I was out for two weeks recovering from a surgery, so I came to work this morning assuming there'd be some kind of bullshit, yeah?

So, the question I had to ask the chat this morning was:

Not a text I ever thought I'd have to send in sincerity, but there it is. Because what I found instead was a fenced off patch of discolored tiles and a few holes in the floor where my entire place of employment used to be.

And the answer? Nobody knows! It was there last night when the mall closed, and every single trace of the structure and all its contents including drink making supplies and our safe and cashbox was gone when it opened again. And when I say nobody knows, I mean everyone from last night's closers to the actual (former?) owner of the store jad no fucking clue about this until getting that text from me this morning. For once I am actually the first to know. 🎉.

So. I guess I didn't so much lose my job as had it stolen. Not by AI, but good old fashioned hands-on human beings picking it up and carrying it away somehow. All mall security would tell me was that they were instructed not to tell me anything and have us contact our management. Who also don't know anything. And later on I came across some construction workers around the gravesite of the kiosk discussing filling in the holes, asked them about it, and was told that they "weren't at liberty to say".

So, not only is my job gone in the most literal physical sense of the word, but it was taken in some kind of super secret kiosk extraction in the dead of night without any warning or witnesses and nobody is allowed to speak of it. The store owner said she was gonna figure it out 10 hours ago and still no word back.

I don't know what else to say aside from I've been laughing all day and I'm gonna have a hell of a time explaining Schrodinger's Unemployment to the benefits office.

Update that is not an update because I'm basically certain this isn't what actually happened:

My mother in law thinks the FBI took it.

Not any of the other stores around the state. Just the one little kiosk.

Why? Because she loves a conspiracy and is just a little bit extra.

Also because she was around for the massive crackdown on Yakuza-owned businesses in Waikiki (in her homestate) that did actually involve the FBI seizing stores (no confirmation of making kiosks cleanly disappear in the middle of the night though).

Still no word from my job on what's actually going on, but the most likely theory so far is that maybe the kiosk was on lease and got repossessed? The mystery continues

(also shout out to the person who proposed Carmen Sandiego)

ACTUAL (partial) UPDATE:

According to the owner, based on what she's been able to find out, the kiosk was not removed legally and they're starting a potentially long process of legal action. I hope she gets to sue the shit out of whoever did it but for now at least I know for sure I'm unemployed.

Really hoping for more details in terms of who/why/how, so I'll keep updating if I learn anything.

For now the summary is: An unnamed entity that is most likely mall management (on account of mall security cooperating with them) stole an entire kiosk and all the contents including money and machinery with barely a trace in the middle of the night grinch-style, with zero warning or explanation, and ensured the silence of both security and the construction crew, in an action that was definitely preplanned and illegal, and as far as I know nobody knows its whereabouts.

So now I'm officially out of a job. Because my workplace was literally stolen in the night.

Actually fuck it let's share some photos cause I wouldn't be inclined to believe this myself. It's not like anyone can stalk me at my job now and I'm not gonna have to see any coworkers that might find my tumblr.

Enjoy the unintentionally funniest text I've ever sent in my life

Aaand a close-up:

The last remains of a once Very Much Solid And Immobile Workplace