Alan || pronouns: surprise me || Tell me about your OCs/special interest/cool projects! || I can't reliably tag most triggers || all posts are okay to reblog unless I specifically say otherwise
"under the present brutal and primitive conditions on this planet, every moose you meet should be regarded as one of the walking wounded. we have never seen a moose not slightly deranged by either anxiety or grief. we have never seen a totally sane moose"
from the fascinatingly depressing section on moose social organization from E. O. Wilson's Sociobiology, which I occasionally open for random animal facts
A young moose passes through two crises during the period of declining dependence on its mother. The first is in the spring, when it is one year old and its mother has just given birth to a new calf. The dam suddenly turns hostile and drives the yearling from her territory. The young moose lingers in the immediate vicinity and repeatedly attempts to return to the dam.
to be clear I'm aware many species do something like this, it's not just moose. but this hit me through the charismatic megafauna backdoor in the brain, and I became mildly distraught about a species where ¿severe attachment trauma? is a universal part of their life cycle. your mom who was previously fine and took care of you suddenly kicks you out of the house and fights you when you try to come back in through the door
when I infodumped to 81k about this he said "what if moose are really nice but we've never observed their true untraumatized personality"
I spent a lot of time looking up a pdf so I could read about the second crisis of the young moose and stumbled across this from the same publication:
Sexual pair bonding is strong in the tree shrew, and the male marks both the cage and his mate with scent. The male and female sleep together in a nest that is constructed mostly by the male.When the female becomes pregnant she builds a second nest, in which she later bears her young. The litter size is typically two. The mother soon leaves the helpless infants and returns to the first nest to rejoin the male. Thereafter, she visits the nursery only every 48 hours. The infants move Tree shrewfrom one of her six nipples to another in an unsystematic way. After a few minutes the mother shakes them off and runs away. The young are left to groom themselves and, presumably, to clean out their own feces. The adults do not retrieve them when they are left outside the nest, and the infants do not utter distress calls. Parents forced to remain too close to their young often kill and eat them. When they are about 33 days old, the young tree shrews start emerging from their nest for short foraging trips, and the rhythm of maternal visits begins gradually to break down. At first the young return to their own nest at night and whenever they are frightened, but after 3 days they shift to the parental nest. Sexual maturity is reached at about 90 days of age. Afterward the young evidently scatter to find mates and territories of their own.
I'm kind of obsessed with Hal being a D-list celebrity in Dol Makjar like that man cannot go anywhere without being clocked. Strangers at the club ask him to sing karaoke for them. The literal king of a foreign country knows who he is. Even the fucking mobsters he's fighting in the sewers are like "wait a minute, is that-"
The AI encyclical doesn't yet have a Latin translation, because even though the Latin version is "official", it takes six to twelve months longer to prepare than all the others, an issue exacerbated by the use of terms that don't already have established neolatin translations. Since the timing is important and they don't want to rush the Latinists, they seem to have decided a few years back to move the Latin versions "off the critical path", even though this adds a layer of absurdity to the whole business.
Since the encyclicals are still issued simultaneously in like ten other languages, this leaves it uncertain which version should be considered official -- it's likely that it was first written in Italian or perhaps English, then translated, but when the Latin version finally comes out like a year from now, it will retroactively be considered the official copy, and all the others will be considered vernacular translations of it. Which is already a funny story about where pragmatism meets tradition, but in reading about this I found some commentary from someone formerly of the Vatican's Latin office, who mentioned something even better: that one benefit of this process was that the Vatican got to see the public discourse about the document while translating it, which gave them a chance to tailor it to any controversies or confusion that might arise, so that, for instance, if there were competing readings of a passage based on subtle differences between translations, they could pick which one to favour after the fact. This means that this is sort of like Steam Early Access for papal encyclicals.
med people are so annoying "This family's 8 year old child who was about to go through a major surgery and kept crying that she was hungry so they pitied her and gave her food, she then had a heart attack in the surgery. They're so stupid 😒" girl they didn't know that could happen or why it happens. it takes so little time to explain to them that will happen instead of telling them "no food" with no explanation 10 times
"Before surgery, your body’s reflexes that protect your airway are relaxed by anesthesia. If there’s food or liquid in your stomach, it will near certainly come back up and go into your lungs, which can cause choking, a severe lung / heart infection or even a heart attack. That’s called aspiration, and it is life-threatening. It's hard, but it's only a single day to prevent near certain death. Not eating or drinking beforehand massively lowers the risk and helps prevent these life threatening situations under anesthesia." <- TIP: patients have brains which allows them to receive information just like you
I have four kids. I’ve had one or another of them need some kind of surgical procedure that requires anesthesia four or five times over the past 15 years.
This Tumblr post is the first time someone has explained to me *why* I couldn’t feed them before those instances.
I’m not stupid. I understood that just fine. Hell, my kids would have understood that just fine. But no one bothered to tell us.
i did know this before having kids (i have six). we have a kid that's needed multiple procedures requiring anesthesia. and every single time, i am asked multiple times if i'm sure he was not given any food or water after a certain point.
every single time i have had to say, "i understand that if he had food or water, he could aspirate it into his lungs under anesthesia. i am not lying to you." THEN someone would make a little note and i would stop being repeatedly asked.
not a single time was that risk explained to me. the only reason it came up was because i already knew. i still don't understand why it isn't standard pre-op counseling or pre-op check information, when me as a parent acknowledging the actual risk also put THE MEDICAL STAFF at ease because i conveyed that i had informed understanding as reason to not lie about giving my kid food.
"maybe some people will get nervous and refuse surgery" okay so they need more counseling about risks and anxiety, not less information in a way that actually does endanger their child or themselves!
In Japan (and less commonly in China), there’s a concept of a 30-hour day.
Not in the sense that two days would be 60 hours, but more that the days overlap between midnight and 6 AM. So, for instance, it something happened 2 AM on Sunday, you could say “2 o’clock on Sunday”, but you could also say “26 o’clock on Saturday”.
Which MAKES SO MUCH SENSE. When you talk about things happening “last night”, it doesn’t suddenly stop being “last night” the instant the clock strikes midnight because I’m not Cinderella.
In conclusion, I wish America had this so I could throw it in the face of every smug friend who says “DON’T YOU MEAN LATER TODAY????” when I tell them “see you tomorrow” at two minutes past midnight.
Anime aired from around 11 p.m. until the wee hours of the morning, occasionally indicated by the odd-looking “22:00-27:00” notation. […]
The trope name refers to the odd way of noting when the shows start airing; it’s common to see a show aired at 1:00 am listed at “25:00”. This is largely done to align the schedule with that of the previous day; many Japanese TV networks still sign off in the middle of the night, and those who don’t will only switch to “the next day”’s programming at 4 am or so.
Times past midnight can also be counted past the 24 hour mark, usually when the associated activity spans across midnight. For example, bars or clubs may advertise as being open until “26時” (i.e. 2 am). This is partly to avoid any ambiguity (2 am versus 2 pm), partly because the closing time is considered part of the previous business day, and perhaps also due to cultural perceptions that the hours of darkness are counted as part of the previous day, rather than dividing the night between one day and the next. Television stations will also frequently use this notation in their late-night scheduling. This form is rarely used in conversation.
cultural perceptions that the hours of darkness are counted as part of the previous day
idk about you, but I have the same cultural perceptions. Let’s get this popularized in the US!
In some cultures the day changes over when the Sun sets, in others when the Sun rises. Midnight is a pretty unintuitive convention, but I can see its value for some purposes.
But relaxing the requirement that ‘every moment can only be referred to by a single time’ is a very elegant solution, and very obvious in retrospect.
You should take some time to read @3liza's post documenting the Phantom Report Bug (which she deserves praise for doing, thank you eliza) and see how fucking broken Tumblr's report tool is.
I also want to reiterate something she is once again correct about: no one files bug reports. I have first hand experience working at Tumblr and I remember having to tell web devs on Staff "i saw a post about someone talking about a bug" and they were unaware because no one followed through to file a bug. I have fixed bugs that I saw people posting about that were in my domain (I'm a mobile dev) but were not in the system.
No this is not an endorsement of "complain about it enough and eventually someone will see it", this is an endorsement of "file a bug report directly to computer companies and people will most likely read it and probably fix it". I mean it this is not a Tumblr-only thing. I've seen this at every company I've worked for. Just fucking file a bug report please I beg you, software gets complicated and the devs are just unaware that there's a bug until you bring it to your attention. And they want to fix the bug! I promise!
WHAT AM I ALWAYS SAYING TO YOU PEOPLE. COMPLAINING GETS THE GOODS. YOURE NOT ALLOWED TO GET MAD UNTIL YOUVE COMPLAINED ABOUT THE PROBLEM TO SOMEONE WHOSE JOB IT IS TO FIX IT
#LITERALLY though#all of the personal stuff in the analects is like#yeah he got really weird about straightening his mat before he sat#and he would always want his meat sliced really really thin#and he would get so absorbed in studying that he would forget to eat and sleep#and made an entire philosophy dedicated to understanding social roles and ritual propriety#which could mean anything! (@apricops)
Here's some of the notes, starting with the things multiple people brought up:
SHRIMP COCKTAIL:
banahbanah: #flashback to that one fic where Peter Parker frets about drinking shrimp cocktail because of the alcohol
generaldeliciousness: adding: what a prawn/shrimp cocktail is
#why is your character turning it down because they're under 21 #do you think prawn cocktail is a cocktail #this lives in my brain rent-free constantly #the rest of the fic was so normal #and good enough that i'll still re-read it #but bro
And then many, MANY, people wondering if this was actually authour mistake, since Peter really would do this!
POMEGRANATES:
zhajhassa: #haha where's that post that was like someone describing someone eating a pomegranate but they ate it like an apple
thornhands: #once someone wrote persephone biting into a whole Pomegranate #had to stop and stare at a wall for a minute
sungsingsanguine: I once saw someone very confidently write about a character eating slices of pomegranate.
FRUIT TREES:
zagreuses-toast: #given a very endearing glimpse into a writers blindspots by seeing them describe someone sitting under a ''pineapple tree''
salatrash: I remember something about picking watermelons... OF A FUCKING TREE
baander: #cranberry trees
DOUGH/BATTER:
maycelium: #I'm a chef so I'm really used to people not accurately describing how to cook food #But I was surprisingly flabbergasted when someone was writing making a cake and was kneading it. Which uh #Not necessary for cake. It was interesting for sure but just bizarre
livebloggingmydescentintomadness: #the one that drove me nuts was when a character set aside a batch of PASTA DOUGH 'to rise' #pasta doesn't have yeast!! #it does need to REST but it will never RISE #you do not want an airy crumb on your noodles
lovesodeepandwideandwell: #THE ONE WHERE THEY MADE COOKIES BY LADLING BATTER INTO A TRAY
Some other topics:
ANIMALS:
catenarwhal: #mandatory 'how cows produce milk' mention#i'll never recover from that one I fear
piromantic: #one time i saw someone fake their way through describing how spiders behave
pluto-lichen: horses
misskittypotter: #stardew valley faking its way through what fresh fish smell like
pa-pa-plasma: #saw someone faking their way through knowing what a seal is once #i still am fucked up over that one to this day. they just straight up did not know #& they were NOT good at guessing it either like it was clear they had never googled that animal ever #& was only just now realizing via answering questions from anons that seals are not!! what they assumed. initially
SEX:
dykevandyke: #what a prostate is #and where it is located #as in. external.
dreamyeyedrose: #I remember back in the ff.net days reading an Ichigo/Renji fic where the writer assumed the penises go inside each other #and I was like “I mean I don't know how it works for sure I don't have one but idk if that's how it works”
SOME OTHER FOOD STUFF:
thetrekkiehasthephonebox: #add another one to the list bloggers#this character is cooking a salad
shosta: #still baffled about the published work that didn't know food could freeze
sun-dari: #once i read a fic where the author didn't understand cinnamon
alto-tenure: #read something recently where the author was just. blatantly wrong about spices
dramatic-dolphin: #i saw someone try to fake their way through what ramen is once. like 14 years ago.#but i remember.#i was very confused about ramen for a few months. they were writing it so authoritatively.
the-celery-stalks-at-midnight: #i will never ever forget someone putting leftover fries in the microwave to reheat them and setting the timer for five minutes
typeghost: #this sparked a memory of a hannibal fic where the author had to fake their way through writing about gravy
draculin: #the one fanfic where the author knows about coffee only as a concept wrote a character as a coffee drinker#was very interesting#I don't remember the fandom or the plot but I was mesmerized by the coffee actions and choices
11235811235811: #there's a lot of faking their way thru congee in the svsss fandom i'll also note
fishali3n: #read one where the person clearly didnt know what tofu is
emmy-everafter: #in the aftermath of shadow and bone s2 i saw a lot of people pretending to know what stroopwafels are #babes they are more like cookies than breakfast waffles #like yes there is a waffle pattern but you're not gonna cut into a stack of them with syrup and sugar#🤣🤣🤣
NON-FOOD STUFF:
red-umbrella-811: Shoutout to Dame Agatha Christie for faking her way through what a wrench is in a very popular published work.
bluebeetle: #once saw someone have a character put an entire phone book in their pocket
nonametis: #- sex talk in languages other than english #<- or just the petnames in a different language other than English
sadisticpony: #the fanfiction i saw this week where op DIDNT KNOW HOW AUTOMATIC DOORS WORKED #and that they arent in peoples homes!!! of course. also opening the automatic door for someone is unironically very funny but its not #its not like. grabbing the door handle to let someone in. helpppp
danmeichael: #reminds me of the fic with the figure drawing class where the character started with the feet. #i love you feet first figure drawing author
meowmix1100blr: #me watching this one fic absolutely obliterate what the board of directors does
vexedhexes: #one time i read an architect character making a doorway bigger by building a bigger door #what a beautiful world. #OH. also gravity falls fic where they go 'oh piedmont is in california so its warm all year round'
leveragehunters: #characters going to a beer garden #And it's literally a garden outside the pub#It was a very cute mistake
fitofpique: #yes! #grown men do not get blind drunk off two beers #but i am possibly guilty of the hypothermia one #assuming it does not make you very horny?
dadvans-likes: #always thinking abt the soup kitchen fic #the entire setting of the fic was 'soup kitchen' #and i very quickly realized #the author did not know what a soup kitchen was #and they thought that soup kitchens only served soup #fic
msmargaretmurry: #i love fanfiction #once read a fic where the characters played 20 questions #but the author seemed to not know how to play 20 questions and was just kind of winging it........ #immaculate
shakespeareaddict: #Look I know not all of us are hockey experts #But it takes about ten seconds of research or any attention paid to the show to realize #That the Stanley cup playoffs are not in fucking September
baejax-the-great: #the funniest one i saw #was someone faking what church is like #like 1. they really didn't have to write an entire church experience for their fic #and 2. they had clearly never even watched a show where people went to church #it was bonkers weird
twosunson: #things ive seen authors faking #knowing how to unclog a drain #knowing. literally any history #knowing what ketamine looks like (apparently- oregano) #(you know who you are)
waterhorseyblues-ao3: #beltane being celebrated in winter #wales being portrayed as a completely separated land from england (i wish) #characters getting up after weeks of bedrest like that dosnt completely fuck you up
violetfairydust: #i once read a fic where the flight time from london to seattle was 3 hours
purekesseltrash: One time, in a fic set specifically in Des Moines, IA, two of the characters casually drove 20 minutes to the ocean. The memory continues to delight me. I want to know where that author thought that Iowa was.
Hate it when people complain about the ultrarich eating babies as if the cost of baby meat hasn't come down by like 95% relative to median wages over the last decade. And most of the rest is regulatory hurdles
janainaart
stormborns
blakekathryn
annaxmalina
