Merry's Meta Musings

Personal blog for keeping tutorials and spiritual things. And artworks, when lucky. Merry may posts original writings, ruminations and random thoughts.

[ghsot]

everyones got that fic they chip away at like michaelangelo sculpting david. and brother? its penis month

[ghsot]

asked my friends if they knew what i was referencing and they said no. we all know that post where someone divided how long it took michelangelo to sculpt david by it's size and went "yuuuuup. whole month spent on penis" right. sure, my search history is full variations upon "michelangelo penis month tumblr" to no avail, but we all know it. right.

[itriedonce]

Hi, that was a MBMBAM bit. But i see you and i hear you and i dont know if someone already said something

[ghsot]

oh my god youre right.

[transformativeworks]

[ID: Screenshot of a transcript.

Travis: Yeah. It well--but it's seventeen feet tall divided by twenty-four months means that every month he crafted point seven--so like about three-quarters of a foot. Right? So, nine inches. So yes, I could say that just statistically speaking, there was a wiener month.

Griffin: Okay. "So how was your September, Michelangelo?" "It was, it was intense."

/ID]

[voidsetup1]

and out of the darkness - you you you you you

[lemondoddle]

[Description: a looping bouncy animation of grace and Rocky from project hail mary. Grace throws himself onto rocky for a hug, smiling and nuzzling his face to the top of Rocky's xenonite covered carapace. Rocky brings a claw up to ruffle Grace's hair and grace throws himself even more on top of rocky, rocky wrapping his arms around grace. End description.]

[cloudabserk]

it wants to be close to me. probably because it is so cold and soft & it knows i am strong and warm

[icecolddoot]

The Royal Protector

Been replaying the dishonored series and i felt like drawing Corvo. Tried something different with the backgrounds and the colors for this one.

[writersisland]

any ideas for a royal/political arranged marriage, but (against all expectations) both are into it?

Leading up to the ceremony ‣ knowing they would not be thrilled, the couple is not informed of the arrangement until it is set in stone and only few weeks away ‣ A had to be locked up and guarded in the days leading up to the wedding to make sure they don‘t run away ‣ B had to physically be dragged to A‘s kingdom

Right before the ceremony ‣ A threatens to stab their promised spouse upon meeting them at the altar ‣ B is threatened by their parents about making a scene during the wedding ‣ both expect the other to be much older than themself, arrogant, or otherwise undesireable ‣ “Is that a knife in your sleeve? Give me that, you are not killing your spouse before the vows are even read!”

During the ceremony ‣ the promised couple meets at the altar… and both wonder why their parents failed to mention that their promised spouse is H O T ‣ both relaxing as they make little comments during the ceremony, matching each other's freaks ‣ both only having prepared passive aggressively insulting vows and either reading them with matching smirks or improvising new ones

During the reception ‣ the newly weds ignore almost everyone else because conversation is so good between them ‣ intense chemistry, to a point that the new in-laws fear the couple will sneak into the bushes together ‣ “You're not gonna like this, but up until an hour ago I was sure I was gonna have to kill you to be able to escape.”     “Oh no, me too. But then I saw you, and… Well, I reconsidered.”      “Likewise.” ‣ bonding over their mutual distaste for their parents' overreach ‣ “Most dissappointing that my parents will get to gloat about finding me a good match.”      “I understand. We can always make them regret it by being horrible together.”      “Perfect.”

[writersisland]

any ideas for a royal/political arranged marriage, but (against all expectations) both are into it?

Leading up to the ceremony ‣ knowing they would not be thrilled, the couple is not informed of the arrangement until it is set in stone and only few weeks away ‣ A had to be locked up and guarded in the days leading up to the wedding to make sure they don‘t run away ‣ B had to physically be dragged to A‘s kingdom

Right before the ceremony ‣ A threatens to stab their promised spouse upon meeting them at the altar ‣ B is threatened by their parents about making a scene during the wedding ‣ both expect the other to be much older than themself, arrogant, or otherwise undesireable ‣ “Is that a knife in your sleeve? Give me that, you are not killing your spouse before the vows are even read!”

During the ceremony ‣ the promised couple meets at the altar… and both wonder why their parents failed to mention that their promised spouse is H O T ‣ both relaxing as they make little comments during the ceremony, matching each other's freaks ‣ both only having prepared passive aggressively insulting vows and either reading them with matching smirks or improvising new ones

During the reception ‣ the newly weds ignore almost everyone else because conversation is so good between them ‣ intense chemistry, to a point that the new in-laws fear the couple will sneak into the bushes together ‣ “You're not gonna like this, but up until an hour ago I was sure I was gonna have to kill you to be able to escape.”     “Oh no, me too. But then I saw you, and… Well, I reconsidered.”      “Likewise.” ‣ bonding over their mutual distaste for their parents' overreach ‣ “Most dissappointing that my parents will get to gloat about finding me a good match.”      “I understand. We can always make them regret it by being horrible together.”      “Perfect.”

[elodieunderglass]

You 🫵 person in Europe who’s finding it unseasonably hot and you suddenly don’t know what to wear on, like, a hot train.

You’re going to go on Vinted or eBay and put in “made in Italy”, “moda Italia” or (translation of same.) add the search term “silk top.”

What you want are tops that consist of these really thin jersey vest tops with a floaty pure silk layer over them. You’re looking to spend £8-20. You might need to specify “floaty” or “lagenlook.”

There will usually be a healthy secondhand collection of these online. Try to get a pure silk overlayer if you can - some of them are silk blended with viscose.

You’ll probably find the designs kinda mid or old-lady-ish. Don’t worry too much about this. They’ll actually look pretty cool on, and everyone will be jealous of your freedom from suffering.

These tops will keep you much cooler than skimpier ones.

[lolita-wardrobe]

I'm in charge here!

◆ Outfits >>> https://lolitawardrobe.com/princess-chronicles-oriental-warlord-ouji-military-lolita-cape-pants-blouse-and-accessories_p8891.html

[longreads]

Getting Unstuck with Ramona Ausubel

Writing well is hard! Today at Longreads, we’ve got an excerpt of episode 528 of The Creative Nonfiction Podcast, in which host Brendan O'Meara talks with author Ramona Ausubel about getting unstuck in your writing projects, developing your voice, and embracing friction.  

Students constantly ask, so what do you do about writer’s block? You keep writing, you find a specific and small entry point and you continue on. There is no moment when that stops happening to you. For the most part, most of us have to say, okay, I’m in this dark place, it’s all foggy, I can’t see anything. What do I have? I have a sense of who this character is. I have a sense of the space of the world, and there’s like, 100 flashlights hanging on the wall. Why? I don’t know. Let’s see what we can do with all of those things. It’s just that next little step, and the next little step opens it up a little bit further, and you might get to another stuck place that’s different than the one before. But again, you’re going to look at what you have and keep moving forward. There’s 101 ways of creating that one small step forward, so that it doesn’t feel like a giant impossible task. But it’s a continuous act of discovery, which is not only not a problem, but a good thing. It’s the fun part. So not knowing also means that you get to discover so much more. You just have to keep asking again: Where am I? What am I interested in? What would be the next most fun thing, and what do I have in front of me that I can work with?

Read the excerpt. Check out the full episode. 

[anna-antoshchenkova]

XIII - Death

[twiststreet]

She got the idea for the study while walking with her advisor at Stanford to discuss her thesis topic, and the paper she eventually published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology in 2014 is sharp enough that it should have ended the seated meeting on the day it came out.

She ran 4 experiments on 176 people. Same person tested twice. Once sitting, once walking. The creativity tasks were the standard ones psychologists have used for decades to measure how good a brain is at generating novel useful ideas.

81% of participants in the first experiment produced more creative ideas while walking than while sitting. In the second experiment, 88%. In the third, 100%. Every single person walked into a more creative version of themselves. On average, people generated 60% more novel useful ideas the moment their legs started moving.

The skeptical question is the obvious one. Maybe it was the fresh air. Maybe it was the scenery passing by. Maybe it was the change of environment doing the work, not the walking itself.

Oppezzo killed every one of those explanations with one experimental decision. She put people on a treadmill facing a blank wall. No scenery. No fresh air. No environmental change. Just legs moving in place while staring at white drywall. The 60% boost held.

Then she ran the experiment that closed the case completely. She took participants outside in two conditions. Half of them walked through a Stanford courtyard. The other half were pushed through the exact same courtyard in a wheelchair. Same outdoor stimulation. Same scenery passing at the same speed. The only difference was whether the legs were moving.

The walkers produced dramatically more novel high-quality ideas than the wheelchair group. The outdoors did almost nothing on its own. The walking did everything.

She also tested the opposite kind of thinking. Convergent thinking. The kind where there is one right answer and you have to narrow down to it. Word puzzles where 3 words share a hidden fourth word that connects them. The seated participants did slightly better on these. Walkers got slightly worse.

Walking is not a general intelligence enhancer. It does one specific thing. It opens up the divergent search inside your brain. The part that generates options. The part that produces unexpected connections. The part that takes a problem and finds five ways into it instead of one.

When you need to converge on the single right answer, sit down. When you need to find the answer in the first place, get up.

The mechanism is now well understood. Walking selectively activates what neuroscientists call the default mode network, the system inside your brain that runs when you are not consciously focused on anything. The DMN is where mind-wandering happens. Where memories cross-reference each other. Where ideas that have been sitting in separate folders inside your head finally bump into each other.

When you sit at a desk and force yourself to concentrate, you suppress the DMN. When you walk at a natural pace, the executive part of your brain gets just busy enough handling the walking that the DMN comes online and starts doing the work that focus was blocking.

The most useful finding in the entire paper is the one almost nobody quotes. The boost did not turn off the moment people stopped walking. Participants who walked first and then sat back down stayed elevated. Their next round of seated creativity work was still significantly better than people who had been sitting the whole time. The rest lingered for at least several minutes after the legs stopped moving.

You do not need to do creative work while walking. You need to walk before the creative work. The brain holds the state.

Edited down a long tweet. (x)

[aroace-ryland-grace]

Hi guys! I thought I should just share my whole mini little library of Project Hail Mary-related things so they're all in one place:

It includes:

A digital copy of the movie (with subtitles in 30+ languages via download)

My transcript of the movie (more on that here)

Audio recordings of the movie

A PDF of the book

An EPUB of the book (for e-readers)

The full audiobook

A copy of Andy Weir's doc on Eridians

A copy of Andy Weir's spreadsheet on Astrophage physics (among many other things!)

A draft of the screenplay for the film from 2022

An audio recording of the director's commentary

My transcript of the director's commentary

There is also a UHD copy (that's too big to fit in the drive) here!:

Proton Drive

Securely store, share, and access your important files and photos. Anytime, anywhere.

Please note that because of the way that google drive works, some of the subtitles only work if you download the file yourself.

The audiobook, audio recordings, and commentary all have their properties programmed so they (should) work just like songs with a track number, album cover, artist, and so on if you download them.

There are two audios of the movie, one is the entire film untouched and one is that same audio cut up and broken down into separate scenes for convenience.

Additionally, there are two versions of the movie transcript, one with time stamps that match the audio recording and one without. The time stamps (+ their titles from the audio) are outlined in that version, so if you double-click on that tab or click "show outline," they'll all show up and you can pick a specific scene.

Similiarly, there are two different versions of the director's commentary transcript. The first is made to listen along to the commentary, while the second is more intended to be read on its own. The first is a direct transcription of everything that's said (an attempt, at least), while the second is slightly cleaned up for easier reading, meaning things like jumbled sentences and stuttering were removed or reorganised, but nothing has been actually paraphrased. Both are broken down into different scenes based on how their conversation goes, and the listening version includes timestamps. 

The first few seconds of the commentary are missing unfortunately as my US friend who was kind enough to record it for me had some technical difficulties at the start, but the she paraphrased the part that was missed. The commentary starts at that first red shot of Ryland Grace's face in the coma suit 32 seconds into the digital copy.

There's also a google doc with some instructions to follow if any of the files aren't working, which usually happens when too many people try to access or download something at the same time.

As always, if anything's not working right or you notice any mistakes in anything, please let me know and I'll fix it as soon as I can!

[swords-n-spindles]

MONPE PANTS

EASILY MADE

FULLY ADJUSTABLE

WARM and SOFT (if you make them from wool and linen) and STYLISH (if you care about that kind of thing)

If you're worried about the openings on the side exposing your naked thighs to the world just stick some fabric in there.

MONPE PANTS

(With gratitude to tumblr user @prince-rosalium for introducing monpe to us.)

(I can do a little write-up of how I made these if anybody's interested.)

[bucketofdeltav]

So my beta reader for the Big Fics is an astrophysicist, right. Who is currently also writing a hard sci-fi novel about the exploration of Phobos (more power to them, I cannot with the physics required for that, best I can do is soft sci-fi/fantasy and that reminds me I should finish that story).

Anyway I was bitching about how hard it is to come up with feasible planets in Star Wars because sometimes you need a new planet from scratch and sometimes you need to know more about a planet than the 'has jungles, is probably a moon technically' than Wookieepedia will give you, and they're like 'oh yeah I can do something about that'.

So they've written (in Matlab but they swear it will run as a .exe as well and I may be conscripted to embed it as a web tool at some point) a star system generator.

You input what you know about the planet (ecosystem, population, sun colour, does it have liquid water, does it have a moon or moons, is it a moon or moons, temperature averages, atmosphere, you get me) and it will give you the... everything else about the star system, in obedience to real-universe physics. And if you input nothing you get a randomly generated star system.

And I’m like oh I know people who will be into this with a vengeance, and they're not on Tumblr, so this is me seeing who exactly would be keen on, and I cannot stress this enough, a real-physics comprehensive star system generator.

It's still in the debugging phase (last error fixed: every planet wants to have a population of exactly 5000 regardless of other factors, turned out to be a missing equals sign somewhere), but I'm psyched for this and trying to gauge interest for how high a priority 'make this an accessible web tool' needs to be.

[melyzard]

[elodieunderglass]

@bucketofdeltav says the URL is here: http://tumblr.com/star-system-generator

okay it has its own blog now (@star-system-generator) on Tumblr

Follow @star-system-generator and get more of the good stuff by joining Tumblr today. Dive in!

[the-punforgiven]

I'm just saying, if you're going to worldbuild magic being a "raw, primal force, akin to and interweaving with nature itself" you gotta explain to me why animals don't use it

[the-punforgiven]

I know the normal answer is "they just aren't smart enough for it" but idk I've seen enough media where a character uses a spell in a moment of brain-off panic ilI feel like animals could probably stumble into a spell or two like, accidentally

[the-punforgiven]

Also how funny would it be to see a completely normal regular bear cast magic missile outta nowhere

[the-punforgiven]

Also there is no way ravens wouldn't figure out spells, tbh

They're smart fuckin birds, I believe in them

Either through observing or just figuring shit out ravens could 100% learn how to cast spells I'm sure of it

[the-punforgiven]

Dogs can also cast Magic Missile but every time they do the projectile is shaped like a bone or a stick and they chase after it

[drakensberg-blog]

The reading comprehension and overall common sense on this website is piss poor.

[poupon]

how dare you say we piss on the poor

[targetedknowledge]