kawuli

mo, cranky old lady, Minnesota

[deoxymoronic]

There are many reasons that research into male birth control has been slow. Some of this has to do with the complications around testing: Any medical device or procedure that potentially involves pregnancy comes with increased ethical considerations, but it’s especially complicated when the person using the method isn’t the patient who could end up pregnant if it doesn’t work, so the risk-benefit is a less clear. The risks for taking contraception as a woman—like blood clots and mood swings—are greatly outweighed by the risk of getting pregnant, Nickels says. “Pregnancy is more of a health risk [than those potential side effects] so therefore it is ethical to administer contraceptives to women because we mitigate the health risk of pregnancy,” he explains. “Men don’t get pregnant. There is no health risk for men in pregnancy.” Sure, you could argue that the man is mitigating the health risk for their partner, but that’s not something we currently have a regulatory framework for. 

"The DIY Male Birth Control Taking Over Reddit", Kara McGrath, June 23, 2026.

interesting article in Playboy, of all places, on a collection of practices called thermal male contraception that involves elevating the temperature of the testes to lower viable sperm count.

posting this paragraph in particular because it wasn't something I'd thought about before; I've seen a lot of posts and stuff over the years arguing that research on long acting reversible contraception for men is stalled because research participants (and presumably eventual consumers) will not tolerate the range of side effects considered acceptable for female contraception methods, but it hadn't occurred to me that there are ethical regulatory hurdles here too.

[jewish-joy]

Last year, I befriended a Catholic seminarian. We've gotten to be pretty decent friends. Seeing as he was staying in town for the summer and I wasn't, I entrusted him with caring for my plant.

He did a wonderful job, but as he was returning my plant to my custody, he explained "I watered her every other day, I gave her new dirt, moved her into the sunshine, prayed the rosary-"

"What?"

He looked at me, confused. "Isn't she a plant you pray with?"

"No," I said slowly. "She's a prayer plant. That's the... colloquial name of the plant."

Upon seeing his stricken face, I realized something went wrong. Turns out, this entire time, he's been including my plant in on his prayers and leaving her near icons.

Listen, totally cool. My plant becoming Catholic is a great deal for her not dying over the summer. But now I must navigate this interfaith household. Keep me in your thoughts.

[vincentbriggs]

For the second time in 2 years I've been given a gunky old treadle. This one's a Bernina KL 105, which I hadn't heard of, and it's very interesting! It's a rotary machine with backstitch and drop feed, which is much more modern than any treadle I'd ever encountered before.

The model was first introduced in 1932, but this particular one was sold in 1945 to someone named Karl Seebacher, as can be seen in the manual which it still has! It was made in Switzerland and evidently sold there, as all the writing is in German and the markings are Metric. I'm very happy about the Metric markings! Someone must have moved to Canada with it somewhere along the line. I've read that these machines are more common in Europe than they are over here.

There are several different feet, and It came with a fantastic little hoop for darning socks, which I'm quite excited to try.

The machine itself is quite gunky, and has some rust spots, so I'll disassemble and clean as much as I reasonably can. I think it'll be alright. The wheel was turning very stiffly and jerkily when it arrived, and oiling everything didn't help much, but after it sat there for a couple weeks the new oil seems to have soaked in and softened things up and it's spinning quite smoothly now.

It came with two new drive belts that someone appears to have bought fairly recently, and as far as I can tell the only thing that's missing is the pair of set screws that hold the machine head to the hinges. Very odd, I can't imagine them ever falling out by themselves. Hopefully I can find replacements, but for now it's sitting in place well enough without them.

The cabinet needs a lot of work, but once the machine head is cleaned up it should be useable even before doing anything to the cabinet.

This does bring my current machine total up to 7 (5 electric, 2 treadles) but it was free and the poor thing had nowhere else to go so it's not my fault! It needed me! (Thank you @leegoguen for driving it to my place and helping me carry it upstairs!)

[skogsskratti]

The warranty paper actually says that it was sold by the provider (Lieferant) Karl Seebacher in Appenzell, and it was sold to Frau (Mrs. /Ms.) Dr. Hardegger. The word after that I'm not sure about. Could be "Sanat." (Sanatorium, i.e. working in a specialized hospital) but could also be "Saisal" or "Saisont" or whatever, maybe a placename, maybe a first name or other note written in warranty, idk. The "Fr. Dr." could either mean she was the wife of a doctor or that she was a doctor herself. In fact there is a nonzero chance this was the sewing machine of Dr. Bertha Hardegger, a famous Swiss missionary doctor in Africa. She might have ordered it with other supplies from Africa, since it would definitely have been hard to find a good sewing machine there and there were other missionaries there who later worked in Canada, so this could well be the way this machine took.

[vincentbriggs]

Oh dang, thank you for correcting my mistake! That's fascinating!

[power-chords]

This Dan Piraro comic always makes me cry.

[tuttle-did-it]

When I lived in London there was a murder of crows that lived near me. I fed them often, they brought me presents (shiny rubbish and cigarette butts they found on the floor to thank me.)

When I moved, I’m certain they understood I was leaving because I had all my stuff and gave them lots of food and compliments.

But, they chased down my friend who lived in the next burrough over. They had recognised that friend with me several times and followed them to their house when they couldn’t find me.

They adopted my friend and it was now my friend’s job to bring them snacks and receive the presents.

This was maybe 6-7 years ago.

I visited London last year. Went to see my friend. The crows all not only recognised me, they tracked me down. We got into my friend’s flat and not twenty minutes later there was chaos on the balcony.

We open the curtains, the entire fucking murder is there shouting because they wanted to see me.

Crows are the very best birds.

[homunculus-argument]

"If you accept any food from the fae, they shall never let you go" is a human belief. The fair folk stand by the principle that if you feed 'em, you gotta keep 'em. If wildlife learns to rely on you for food, you have already fucked up, and you can't just stop feeding them cold turkey. That human is your responsibility now. Because you left your peach cobbler unsupervised.

[mysharona1987]

[kawuli]

he could give every least developed country a billion dollars and still be the richest man in the world.

literal definition of evil

[siryouarebeingmocked]

It's kind of ironic that you think the real problem with those countries is a lack of money.

Especially given that several countries already spend more than six billion dollars on world hunger every year.

But thanks for admitting you don't actually care what happens to the money you just think he should give it to people.

[kawuli]

since "least developed countries" is a designation based on GDP per capita, by definition one of the problems with least developed countries is a lack of money.

I actually DON'T think that giving a billion dollars to every least developed country would solve world hunger.

But I think that a system where we have (had? haven't checked the stock market today) a trillionaire, and also a large number of people who can't afford to buy food? is immoral to the extent that I'm comfortable calling it evil.

I think that if Elon Musk gave a billion dollars to each of the least developed countries - EVEN GRANTED that a lot of that money would disappear into war and corruption - his life would not noticeably change, and the lives of millions of people would improve significantly. I'm not suggesting we send the cops to his door to take his cash, but if he gave any fucks about people who aren't him he'd be giving it away on his own. He could ask MacKenzie Scott for some pointers.

And let's not even start on the amount of my professional life I've spent researching and advocating for more effective ways of doing international development, because - thanks in large part to Mr. Musk - my country no longer gives a fuck about the places the dude in the white house calls "shithole countries" so there's no point in talking about how best to spend the approximately $0 available

[hometoursandotherstuff]

[katjohnadams]

Okay, I need to add some clarification and correction to this.

This photo is known as The Pale Blue Dot. It was taken by Voyager 1, a space probe meant to explore the outer reaches of the solar system. Far from dying, she's still out there doing her job and is the furthest human made object from Earth.

In the mid 80's, they knew Voyager 1 would soon pass beyond where her cameras would matter and she needed to save power, so the question became: what's the last thing she should take a picture of?

Carl Sagan and Carolyn Porco both independently had the same thought: take a picture of Earth. Us. Yes, it would be essentially just one pixel. It wouldn't be scientifically useful. It might even damage the camera because of how intense the sun is, even forty times as far from Earth as Earth is from the Sun. But they got it sorted because it's NASA.

3.7 million (not billion) miles away, that's Earth. Caught in bands of light, artifacts of the Sun's incredible power even 4 million miles away. We are an island in a sea of radiation and vacuum and it's all we have.

I can't say it better than Sagan did, so I'll let you alone with his words:

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar", every "supreme leader", every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

— Carl Sagan

I think the truth is just a lot better.

[helenvaughans]

[helenvaughans]

it's interesting to see some conservatives in the replies of this tweet be like "but not all conservatives!!!!!!!!!!" and like while there may have at one point been a place in the academy for the center right, the conservative movement, at least in the united states, has swung so incredibly far to the right over the last 10+ years that the very precepts upon which academic enquiry and the pursuit of new knowledge are based run directly counter to it.

[iesika]

“Pratchett went back to older throwaway jokes (like dwarves being apparently unisex) and used them as metaphors to discuss social change, racial assimilation, and other complex issues, while reexamining the species he’d thrown in at the margins of his world simply because they existed at the margins of every other fantasy universe. If goblins and orcs and trolls could think, then why were they always just there to be slaughtered by the heroes? And if the heroes slaughtered sentient beings en masse, how heroic exactly were they? It was a long overdue start on redressing issues long swept under the rug by a parade of Tolkien successors who never thought of anyone green and slimy as anything but a notch on the protagonist’s sword, and much of the urgency in Pratchett’s last few books seemed to be related to them. ‘There’s only one true evil in the world,’ he said through his characters. ‘And that’s treating people like they were things.’ And in the last of his ‘grown-up’ Discworld books, that idea is shouted with the ferocity of those who have only a few words left and want to make them count. Goblins are people. Golems are people. Dwarves are people, and they do not become any less people because they decide to go by the gender they know themselves to be instead of the one society forces on them. Even trains might be people, and you’ll never know one way or the other unless you ask them, because treating someone like they’re a person and not a thing should be your default. And the only people who cling to tradition at the expense of real people are sad, angry dwellers in the darkness who don’t even understand how pathetic they are, clutching and grasping at the things they remember without ever understanding that the world was never that simple to begin with. The future is bright, it is shining, and it belongs to everyone.”

— John Seavey, The Evolution of the Disc (via liquidlightandrunningtrees)

[pmamtraveller]

The life cycle of a cherry.

[museum-of-artifacts]

The only taxidermied blue whale in the world, 1865 CE, now housed at the Natural History Museum in Sweden. The public was allowed to enter it up until a couple was found having sex inside it; now its jaws are opened only for special occasions like Swedish election days

More

[a-bit-obsessively]

It's in my town!

The whale is opened on election day because election in swedish is val, and whale is ... val.

It's also open on Walpurgis night, because that is called Valborg in swedish...

There is also a persistent rumor that there used to be a café inside of the whale, but there never were.

[herewithinthevoid]

every so often something nice happens on the other hellsite 𖹭

[anotherpapercut]

apparently my boss who is a professor at my school doesn’t have a cell phone and his coworkers were upset by this so they bought him a childs toy phone and labeled it “David’s jitterbug” (for those of you that don’t know jitterbugs are phones made for old people that have like massive buttons and shit) so the other day I walked into his office to ask him a question and he pressed a button on it which made it start loudly playing the ABCs and he said “excuse me I have to take this” and then started singing along to the ABCs while shooing me out of his office

[anotherpapercut]

this is the phone. he apparently was in the middle of a meeting with the department the other day and got annoyed so he pressed a button, said “I have to take this” and left

[beka-tiddalik]

David’s co-workers probably: “This is a valid tactic to embarrass him into buying a mobile phone, right?”

David: “Bold of you to assume that I get embarrassed.”

[no-one-offical]

‎

[1five1two]

[despazito]

i’ll be honest learning about behaviour modification and canine psychology has really helped me process my own feelings and emotional responses

i find so much therapy talk aimed at humans has too much flowery abstract prose about mindfulness or whatever but for myself I really prefer an approach focused on hard science and what biochemical processes are responsible for me feeling this way, especially anxiety. Also why i prefer listening to lectures given by psychologists or counselors made for other fellow psychs and counselors.

But yeah I feel like there’s lessons anxious humans can take home from anxious dogs

reactiveness is usually the product of fear and unconfidence

when something becomes too overwhelming slow down, add more distance

every time you practice an avoidant behaviour it gets more ingrained and will take more effort to beak the habit once it has been well established.

try refocusing on something else when you feel yourself starting to get worked up over something

progress is slow and if you think you can fix things overnight you are setting yourself up for disappointment

don’t only correct mistakes, actively give praise as well

Physical exercise

[kaity--did]

The problem with having a child with an attorney that has spoken to the child like an adult since birth is that she's 4 years old and she's negotiating the order in which we're going to complete tasks as a family to best suit her idea of an ideal day.

[kaity--did]

Penny: We go home, we play the mirror game, we have dessert, we play more games, we have fun deal?

Me: Okay well actually we're going to go home, have dinner, then dessert, then we can play your video game, then tubby then bed

Penny: Okay no tubby, games first, deal?

Me: This is not - what is happening right now?

Penny: Dada?

Dada: Arbitration?

Penny: DEALS!

[kaity--did]

Every single thing in our lives has become a negotiation and it is frankly ridiculous as it is hilarious.

Penny: I want to use bare foot when we go outside

Me: I didn't know we were going outside but you have to wear shoes girl

Penny: okay but what about I use bare foot's but at Penny's house? This deal?

Me: you know what yeah fine if you agree to not fight about shoes when we leave the house you can be barefoot in the back yard, deal.

Penny: -sticks her hand out expectantly- we deal?

I think I just made a verbal contract with a 4 year old.

[kaity--did]

She's attempting to establish evidence I think

Penny: but I want to go shool pwease

Dada: okay well it is 8pm, so you have to go to sleep now

Penny: okay but I see my fwiends at shool now please, deal?

Dada: Darling no one is at school, all your friends are asleep as well.

Penny: all Penny's fwiends are sweep? What about we... get in Dadas car and check to see watch them sweep, yes deal?

Dada: I cannot begin to explain to you why that can not happen

[kaity--did]

The great thing about being beholden to Penny the Deals Warlock is that she is also beholden to the art of the deal

Me: (watching Penny scoot her step stool over to where we keep the candy jar): hey honey we're literally walking out the door to go get dinner, maybe we wait on the candy okay?

Penny: Oh but I will have some candy?

Me: Why don't you come have some mac and cheese and then when we get home you can have some candy, deal?

Penny: (running out the door) oh, yes this is deals!

[kaity--did]

We are visiting my family and Papa has quickly had to pay patronage to Penny the Deals Warlock

Papa: (yesterday morning, when Penny was a little grumpy) What about you come downstairs and we'll have some waffles and then tomorrow Papa will take you to the Diner in town for breakfast?

Penny: (extending her tiny hand to a VERY confused man) this is deal?

Papa: (not knowing hes entering a literal contract) uhm yeah deal.

-smash cut to 6:30 AM this morning-

Penny (running down the hallway in bare feet) 👹BREAKFAST DEALS👹

[kaity--did]

Penny has a canker sore to end all canker sores, to the point where she hasn't been able to eat so we had to make some deals surrounding getting some medicine on it because a hungry Penny Rose is like a angry demon queen

Me: Okay baby this is going to suck. This is going to hurt real bad for a second and then it's going to feel weird and then it's going to feel good. You're going to hate it. But if you let Mama get these three medicines in and on you [Listerine, Antacid, Tylenol] you can scream it out and then we'll go get some ice cream! Deal?

Penny: (obviously not thrilled with this idea) okay, three big shreams, three medicines, ice cream ... it will suck... ice cream ... deal. (Sticks out hand and we shake on it)

Me: okay let's do this I'm so sorry (starts the process)

Penny: ( In between her big screams ) IM GONNA GET LOTS OF FRINKLES

[kaity--did]

My husband is trying to make a deal with Penny to get upstairs and get in the bath tub

Penny: I will go upstairs and get my body clean but you hafta titch me, deal?

Dada: I would love to make this deal with you kid but I literally have no idea what you are saying- I don't know what the terms are, you're speaking a language I don't speak

Penny: you have to titch me like mama does okay DEAL!? (Sticks tiny hand out aggressively)

Dada: (looks at me bewildered for help)

Me: ( starts making a quick tick tick tick sound imitating a stop watch like I'm timing her, while penny jumps around yelling YES TITCH ME LIKE THAT)

Dada: In what world was I ever going to figure that out, thank you for acting as our legal interpreter yes deal let's go!

and off she sprints.

[kaity--did]

Penny does not want to go to bed, but man is it time for her to go to bed

Penny: But I don't want to be sleeping, I want to stay up now! I want to see Grampy and Cozy and Guppie and Papa!

Mama: What if we video call all the grands and say good night to everyone? If we do that will you then go to bed no fussing?

Penny: Oh yes, this is deals! -sticks her hand out to shake-

** we make the rounds and video call all her grandparents, they are all already in bed and say good night and penny hangs up the last video call and toddles into bed with minimal fussing **

Penny : (after a few minutes of silence, over the video monitor, to herself in her dark bedroom) I hafta respect da deals.

[kaity--did]

Every morning Penny wakes up, and she asks if we have decorated her house with "Halloween every where" and every morning I have had to tell her not yet baby but soon. This last morning Penny had to go to pre k a little earlier then she is used to cause Daddy had court and I had a dentist appointment, which made her a little bummed out... or so I thought

Me: Hey baby do you want to make a deal about school?

Penny: (immediately sticks out her hand, literally no hesitation, her entire demeanor changing in an instant) yes let's deals, I will be big and brave and go to school no fussing, and you will put Halloween every where all over my house, okay this is deals Mama??

I think I just got hustled by a 4 year old...

[kaity--did]

A tangentially related update :

Penny: (is doing some strange interpretive dance to let us know she's not a fan of the cup we've chosen to put her juice in, mind you this is the only clean cup at this moment. She is hopping up and down, and swinging her arm like an elephant trunk, she is pirouetting, her hands are on her hips. Shes is completely silent)

Husband: (exasperated) okay but DID you make a deal with SOMETHING while you were pregnant ? It's the only explanation I can come up with.

[kaity--did]

sometimes people will ask me if penny is still making deals and here is an update for you to let you know:

Husband: okay, you can not leave your room until someone comes and gets you okay? You're getting up way too early and we're guests in Papa and Guppies house so you stay and play in your room and someone will come get you when you can come out of your room tomorrow morning, deal?

Penny: (hand extended, plotting) deal

-smash cut to the next morning, penny is NOT in her room at the allotted 7:30 AM retrieve Penny Rose Time, we find her in bed cuddled up with my mom and dad watching a movie-

Penny: (hands out in a "calm down" gesture) LISTEN LISTEN I DIDNT LEAVE! I DIDNT- I didn't break da deals! I just knocked on the door until Papa came and got me.

Papa: (laughing hysterically) WELL DONT SNITCH!

Penny: I DIDNT DO NOTHING I KEPT MY DEALS! YOU JUS SAID SOMEONE HAD TO COME GET ME! PAPA COME GET ME!

(so we have to be insanely detailed in our deals because she did knock on her bed room door and yell PAPA! PAPA! PAPA! At 4:30 in the morning until my dad came and got her and you know what that's on us 🤣)

[kaity--did]

Yes she's still at it folks

Penny: can we watch a Pokémon?

Me: I'll make a deal with you?

Penny: -sits down at the dining room table like she's on literal trial- Listening

Me: if you can do bath time and get around for bed with literally NO FUSSING you and I can watch ONE POKÉMON in mama and dadas bed before you go to bed! IF I HEAR ONE BIT OF FUSSING POKÉMON IS OFF THE TABLE!

Penny: -folding her hands ready to counter, speaking to me like I'm losing my faculties- uhm, no deal Mama, I want Pokémon on the TV not on the table.

Me: -trying not to die- that's ...no I just mean the deal is if you fuss at all there will be NO POKÉMON TONIGHT

Penny: oh! Yes! This is deals!

[bagool-the-wizard]

One sec adding "This Is Deals" to my personal vocabulary.

[retiredmahoushoujo]

a war thunder player got so mad about the inaccuracy of an ingame tank they leaked classified british military secrets to prove it’s wrong

[jonthefuzz]

[catgirlforeskin]

Happened AGAIN with China this time

[nottolerationbutliberation]

[findingfeather]

This. This is why any time a conspiracy theory asks you to believe any proposition that requires more than around, oh, call it at MAXIMUM fifty people to maintain perfect secrecy to pull it off, or even SIGNIFICANT secrecy to pull it off, you should be Dubious As Fuck of it. 

OpsSec is very difficult actually because humans are fucking ridiculous.