[karliahs]

obsessed with this photo of benji my housemate took

[constance-mcentee-deactivated20]

Without naming your job, tell me something you say over and over again at work.

"I can note your interest in that feature for future development."

[karliahs]

video on autism accommodations but it's all just things you can buy with affiliate links. video on sustainability but it's all just things you can buy with affiliate links. video critiquing other people's videos on things you can buy but it's the same 3 points repeated over and over in almost exactly the same words for 40 minutes bc then they can show you more ads. and there are 12 of them.

[tiktoks-i-enjoyed]

[glorious-spoon]

spent forty-five minutes today helping an 87yo woman who does not own a computer or a cell phone try to set up an email account so that she could then set up a second account in order to access benefits. went with protonmail, because they don't require 2fa, but it turns out that while you can still make a protonmail account without authentication you can no longer use it to create OTHER accounts without it, and the benefits page she needed to get to required both an email and a cell phone to create an account anyway. asked if she wanted to try going in person to see if someone there could help her, and she said that she had, and they'd directed her to the website. she tried signing up with her landline, but of course that didn't work because you can't do SMS authentication that way. finally ended up writing up detailed instructions for how to log in and authenticate her account so she can drive to her severely disabled daughter's house forty minutes away because that's the only person she knows and trusts who has both a cell phone and a computer.

anyway i fucking hate mandatory 2fa and i think the people responsible for it should have to spend a year navigating their lives with no cell phone and no internet access beyond the public library pcs. fuck.

[karliahs]

the effects of high stress on the body are obvs at times really debilitating and upsetting, but some of them are also just weird. why is my skin and hair so oily now. why does the body's stress response need to involve Grease

[nakakabaliw]

Im running out of captions..uh...this really deltas my runes?

[cenneidi]

do it grieving

[cenneidi]

do it while the ground falls out from under you; do it while everything you loved goes up in smoke; do it while the dream of your future is still burning embers around you; build anew on the hot ashes of everything you worked for; keep going, keep loving, keep living, even as all you want is to turn back (there is no turning back; it is gone already); do it through grief, which feels like fear in the body

do it grieving

[cenneidi]

The tag I have seen most often on this post is "I needed to hear this," and I am so, so grateful to have said something that was needed. These words came out of the depths of my own grief, and I am so grateful to have made this small connection with others in the midst of it. Grief is isolating and indescribable, but none of us are alone.

That said, these tags were what I needed to hear:

we're all gonna make it

it's okay if you can't see how yet. you don't have to believe in better. for now it is enough to just keep going, and eventually the path will emerge. you are not alone. you are not lost in the woods forever. keep going. I love you.

[spookyboywhump]

I do really love it when women write graphic and fucked up things. I feel like so often people react to fucked up fiction with “of course a disgusting man would write this 🙄” and it often carries an unspoken (honestly sometimes spoken) message of “a woman’s PURE and DELICATE and FEMININE mind could NEVER think of something this VILE”. Thank you women in fucked up fiction 🫡

[notebooks-and-laptops]

Fucked up fiction by women you should 100% read:

[ofgeography]

okay this is a list of exclusively bangers, not even counting the fact that WE HEXED THE MOON is on here which obviously makes me feel joyous. but kushiel's dart fuckin RULES as did on sundays she picked flowers and patricia wants to cuddle. 10/10 no notes

[localcoffeeshop]

“i have to listen to my body’s needs” secret boss fight written by person who has chronic and disabling wrist pain which has fundamentally changed his relationship to his hobbies and his job <- i care it as someone who has also had chronic pain in my wrist/hand for 5 years

[localcoffeeshop]

another thing i tend to think about with this. i also just think in chapter 5 there's a theme of care and dependency. the flowers have extreme guilt over being taken care of by asgore. flowery conceptualizes himself as weak and useless. in the dark world, his fantasy, he tries to return the care given to him to asgore to "make up for" asgore taking care of him when he should've died decades ago. it's an extreme example, but i also resonate with his feeling.

when your body or mind puts you in a situation where your reliance on other people becomes really explicit, you're trained by the world to see that as shameful or to see yourself as deficient. your efforts to ignore your needs just to avoid "being a burden," will leave you worse off. you punish yourself because of deeply internalized ableism.

regardless, even by virtue of being a living thing on this planet, you are already designed to need others. you have to listen to your body's needs even against a society that teaches you you shouldn't. you have to be okay with the fact that you have needs. sometimes your needs are different or are greater than the person next to you, and all you can do is listen to your body and turn to others when you need them. you're still a person when you need people.

when toby says this:

it's interesting to me how much he uses the language of deltarune to express this feeling. your hopes and dreams slipping away, and bitterness growing is literally the explanation we get for shadow crystals (and so wept the fallen star, making rivers with its tears. then, slowly, from the bitter water, something grew. it looked like glass). this is also the crushing feeling when you lose a sense of control when you're in pain, when you can't do things the way you want, the way you used to. but when you find yourself still able to fly, you do so because you've adapted. you've listened to your body. you've learned that listening to your body means changing the pace, letting yourself be cared for, letting yourself be helped.

as far as toby's said it, having to expand his team has made deltarune a better game. chapter 5 is so expansive because so many people helped to make it. Pink's fight has sprite work from guest artists, music with Camellia, bullets programmed by Toby's team. She is, to me, a love letter to Deltarune's development process as a whole and how it has shaped Toby, and a reflection of the kinds of thoughts Toby has shared with us about developing Deltarune alongside pain. I also think it's a beautiful follow-up to Gerson's themes of storytelling and authorship (letting go of "perfection" + accepting the contributions of others = both about rescinding control and embracing perseverance). Pink is also so much more than this, but I've been thinking about this a lot.

[orchidbreezefc]

this is great meta! it also ties really wonderfully into the more obvious theme of nostalgia and an attempt to recapture some idealized time long past, and lends additional insight to that being reinforced by the semi-metatextual return to undertale and chapter 1 of deltarune!

[meangirlnurse]

i'm trying to save money but oh my god. jesus christ

[pangur-and-grim]

I won't publish the ask (they asked me not to), but I thought I'd still answer it publicly!

no, royalties are not a significant source of income for most authors. if you wrote something like Project Hail Mary, then absolutely, the royalties would be substantial! but that's like winning the lottery. Ryan Gosling is not starring in the movie adaption of most books.

when you sell a book to a publisher, you get what's called 'an advance against royalties'. it's usually split into multiple parts, so you might get one third for the initial sale, one third for the final revised manuscript, and one third on the publishing date.

an advance against royalties is the publisher saying "we believe you will eventually make X amount in royalties, so here it is ahead of time." and then you don't actually see any money from royalties until the advance is paid off. most books do not make enough in royalties to pay off the advance (I have two children's books and one fiction book, and have yet to see royalties for any of them).

advances are still great, but you need to make them stretch! for instance, last year my net income was about 30k Canadian (21k USD), which is fantastic when you consider that I mostly made it through writing. but I'm definitely not a millionaire. I can live off my writing (not trying to undersell that!) but I'll probably remain in a low income bracket for the foreseeable future.

this isn't meant to discourage anyone from seeking out writing as a career! however, there is a reason that many authors have alternate jobs with writing on the side. or, you know, rich spouses.

[pangur-and-grim]

this isn't me making a fuss about pirating (I've pirated way too many shows to run my mouth on that lmao), but there IS actually a financial incentive to having people buy your books!

buying books shows the publisher that they can make money off you, which means they're more likely to give you advances for future books. and advances are what authors live off (if they don't have a side job). that's why I always push pre-orders so hard! you have to be a racehorse worth betting on, or else they send you to the glue factory....

if I can offer one alternative to pirating: asking your library to stock the book also helps authors, and doesn't cost anything. the only downside is the patience required.

[karliahs]

in the last week:

threw my back out twice

someone hit the wall at the front of my drive with their car and didn't own up or leave a note or anything so now I just have a broken wall I have to pay to get fixed

benji threw up a bunch of times in the middle of the night so I was up talking to the emergency vet and keeping an eye on him. he seems to be doing better this morning thankfully

rat infestation in the garden

spare break. anyone have a spare break I could catch

[confusedhostage]

[nyanletnest]

[herpsandbirds]

Let's Rename the Birds!!! (pt. 14)

As you may already know... ornithological authorities (such as the AOS and ABA) in North America have decided, for a variety of reasons, to rename all of the birds that have been named after people.

Some examples: Lewis's Woodpecker, Smith's Longspur, MacGillivray's Warbler...

I thought it would be fun for us to come up with some ideas for new common names here on Tumblr.

Here are some criteria for re-naming that might appeal to ornithologists and birdwatchers:

Habitat and geographical range

Physical characteristics

Call/song characteristics

Behavior

PLEASE MAKE YOUR NAMING SUGGESTIONS IN THE COMMENTS, REBLOG, OR TAGS.

We'll take the best ideas, and put them in a poll by the end of the week! (I and an esteemed panel of ornithological tumblererrsssres will make the decisions).

WEEK 14 - LeConte's Sparrow

LeConte's Sparrow (Ammospiza leconteii), family Passerellidae, order Passeriformes

Breeds/nests in the North central US, central Canada, as well as other various isolated areas of Canada.

Overwinters in the South-central US.

This species is usually found in grasslands, such as prairie, meadow, grassy wetlands, and agricultural fields.

They prefer moderately wet grassy areas with dense vegetation and open bare ground.

While the warm orangey-buff coloration of the bird often set it apart, there are other similar looking sparrows in the same grassland habitats. (Many sparrows may be hard to identify in the field unless the observer gets a really good look at the bird, which doesn't always occur).

This bird is particularly beloved by birdwatchers for its warmer colors (amongst sparrows).

They are relatively elusive/secretive, and are not seen often.

Length: 4.7 in/12 cm, Wingspan: 7.1 in/18 cm

The bird is usually seen feeding and foraging on the ground, but will occasionally perch up and move through tall grasses.

In the warmer months, they feed mainly on insects. In the winter they feed mainly on seeds (especially grass seeds).

Not sexually dimorphic.

Mother incubates eggs, both parents feed chicks.

Nests made with grasses and occasionally animal hair, attached to tall grasses and sedges.

Hear the calls here: LeConte's Sparrow Sounds, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

photograph by Laura Erickson & Jeff Timmons

SD, USA - photograph by Terry Sohl

photograph by Erin Prokopanko

MD, USA - photograph by Tim Frye

[herpsandbirds]

TIME TO VOTE!!!

We had so much input for this one, that we couldn’t possibly include all the great suggestions, but thanks to you all for your input.

I am not including sun oriented names, because we recieved so many sun oriented names for previous birds. We can't rename all orangey birds in north america sun something or other.

Okay, you made your suggestions, and our esteemed panel of judges has weighed in:

@passerinethehallway; @proton-wobbler, and I!!!

What should we rename the Leconte's Sparrow?

Flammulated Sparrow

Bittern-marked Sparrow

Bumblebee Sparrow

Tall Grass Sparrow

Buff-browed Sparrow

Prairie Fawn Sparrow

Voting ended onJul 21

[have-you-been-here]

Founder's Building, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, United Kingdom

Have you been here?

I have been here

I have not been here

Remaining time: 3 days 1 hour