*insert that Thomas the tank engine piano riff*

[ceradraws]

Friend got me really into Slay the Spire 2 and this dude is one of the main reasons. I cannot resist one eyed freaks, especially with star motifs??

Anyway some sort of design study / stylization experiment / just trying to figure out how to draw him. More notes abt everything going on under the cut.

Admittedly I took inspo for the star knees from another design I saw on tunglr, but apparently didn't reblog so I'll link it when I find it. Either way if I'm able to inject a little more blue in a design I will. So he gets to be a little blue. I'd like to imagine it kind of envelops him more when he's using Void Form since he's very blue in that card art.

Also for the legs I'm really intriqued by the apparent wedge/indent on the back of his knees, and whether or not it's really there or is just a stylistic thing I will give him weird legs in turn. Also had the idea of them being not designed to walk on bcs why have legs for walking when you have minions to lug you around. So, secondary reason for him to sit around all day. Primary reason being that he's a royal cunt, obviously. But for a little bit of ease of getting around if needed he's got shoes with an internal / hidden heel so that his weight is distributed on at least a little bit of a bigger area.

The cape is based on Cloak of Stars, because I think he'd look good with a cape. I think it's not something he wears all the time (possibly due to all the sitting down he does so it gets stuck when he's switching positions, because I also like to imagine he's not as stationary as he is ingame. He's rotating on that chair out of boredom for the hell of it and you can't convince me otherwise.

[weaselishmcdiesel]

would u be mad if i had 5 million orbs.... would u be mad if i had 1 million powers.......

[background-character-341]

For all its faults Tumblr has truly ruined all other social media for me because my friends all have Instagram and are all trying to get me on Instagram more but every time I open Instagram there are like fifteen things screaming for my attention and when I get over myself long enough to start scrolling it's like. Where is my chronological dash. Where is the following-only option. Who are these people. Why are there so many videos. Everyone is screaming at me. And then before I know it I'm thirty minutes into scrolling and I haven't seen a single thing that I actually care about. At least on Tumblr when I see stuff I don't care about I know someone I follow has found a new interest.

[animusbell]

celestia is such a funny character like she's constantly manipulating twilight and friends to do shit instead of just asking and you could arguably frame that as being bc she's a "god" and pushing fate to her design or whatever, except that she engages with the group like a normal and relatable person, which makes it more like villainous machinations, except 90% of this manipulation goes towards things like "I don't want my party to be boring shit again. put my little country girl blorbos in there with zero prep so they fuck it up bad"

[animusbell]

you think you've fucked anything up around princess celestia and she's like heh. no worries. all according to keikaku

[jukashi]

Celestia instantly makes more sense as a character when you ignore the princess stuff and remember that she's a 1000+ years old wizard. Of course she does manipulative trickster stuff to teach moral lessons and/or cause chaos to amuse herself, that's classic wizard behavior. Of course sometimes she's actually socially awkward and bad at personal relationships and has bad ideas that she thought were good that result in her eating shit embarrassing style, that's classic wizard behavior. Of course she lets the aristocrats and nobles run around being assholes she's still running on wizard advisor programming, she's basically trying to merlin the entire upper class of equestria instead of just a king and some knights. "Yeah uuhhh we'll release the incarnation of chaos himself from his ancient prison because we think this shy girl can be friends with him", terrible plan if you're thinking like a ruler, amazing plan if you're thinking like a wizard. Just look at Canterlot 'Castle' for five seconds and ask yourself if that's in any way a castle. No. Wizard tower, yes. Wizard.

[animusbell]

You are so right actually

[moonyistired]

tinyass alien finally reaches the architect after like two dozen tries. dies immediately.

[manuciruja]

awww the like button turns into a rainbow when you press it! that's so cute...hey staff what's with all the trans women you keep nuking?

[manuciruja]

i think we should be ridiculing them more for this. you don't get to try and go all "queer website" when your staff likes to go on nuking sprees targeting the trans fem users

[fox-on-the-moon]

Actually making your selfinsert overpowered and friends with all your faves and a hybrid of the coolest species and in a relationship with your crush and the long lost sibling of the villain is called having fun and its cool as fuck

[wholesomey-artist]

[sunflowersosa]

Nigerian Pride 🏳️‍🌈🇳🇬

I meant to have this out yesterday. Happy belated pride. :)

[calvenera0]

[bitchfitch]

Hey! Do you have any suggestions for a total newbie interested in fishkeeping? Equipment, type of fish, where to get it/the stuff? Feel free to wax as eloquent as you like!

Ok So this is a really big topic but here's the quick run down:

right off the top I'm grabbing you by the face and saying: Never ever ever ever ever put your hand in an aquarium if you have any kind of paper cut or scratch or hangnail or other open wound on the relevant appendage. Never put your hand in an aquarium and then touch your face/rub your eyes/ do anything near something that might need a bandaid. If you get nicked while aquarium water damp Go Wash that Immediately. 99 times out of 100 this will be overkill, the one time it's not will result in the worst infection in your life. We'll get to why later

Ok If you want to get into fish keeping asap and not have to think about Jack shit:

buy an Aqueon 10 gallon aquarium kit once you have it all you need is decor, food, a small siphon, chemicals, and a betta fish.

You can't buy the elements in a Aqueon 10g kit for less than the price of the kit. Try to get it on sale or online. Box pet stores mark up their prices big time to make their sales look like a good deal. You might be tempted to get the 5 gallon kit. or an even smaller kit marketed at bettas specifically. Do not do that those are traps. Tldr bigger water to fish ratios are Infinitely more forgiving and way easier to maintain.

The decor you'll need is about 5lbs of any substrate you like the look of, just get it from the aquarium section and rinse it off before adding it to the tank to reduce cloudiness. The substrate is Not skipable. It is absolutely vital to have some and I personally recommend sand. and Whatever fake plants or little statues you like. Avoid sharp bits and consider the humble and Cheap polyester flowers at your local craft store. As long as they are just regular fabric or plastic with nothing that can come off of them or be pokey then they're good. Make sure the fish still has places to swim and like, be a fish. Don't over crowd things.

Some fish food. You need to get simply the cheapest shit they have and also separately a small jar of something with a betta fish on it. Your jar will almost definitely out live your fish even if they live to a record age, so don't feel like you need to get anything big.

The chemicals you need depends entirely on where you live. Get some test strips and test the water straight out of your faucet. You want about a pH of 7 for a betta. if it is not 7 pick up something that will either raise or lower it to 7. You will also need a dechlorinator or "water conditioner" if you're on city water.

Don't buy the fish yet, just go home and get the tank set up. Substrate should go first, then tap water, don't bother doing anything with it besides checking the pH and adjusting as needed by following the directions on a bottle of pH 7 or something similar. Then add the heater and filter. plug everything in. Do Not add the decor.

Now dump some of the cheap shit fish food in, like a half tablespoon or the likes, just enough that the tank looks visibly dirty but not like, Covered you know? Ok now fuck off for a bit.

The tank water will get really cloudy and murky and it's going to be gross as fuck and maybe smell a Very specific kind of bad. Ok. Then it's going to clear up and you're going to add a little bit more, a bit more than a pinch. And you're going to do that twice a week for two weeks to three weeks. Until the water stops being foggy all the time. Once a week use the siphon to lightly suck up any big or especially gross pieces and drain away like 25-30% of the water. It doesn't have to be precise. Replace it with more water and check the pH to make sure it doesn't jump or drop too much.

This is because keeping aquariums is actually like 80% about keeping gallons of bacteria alive. Your fish will expell waste in a number of ways. Your filter will catch large particles and the carbon in it will remove certain chemicals. The rest of the filtration actually comes from the bacteria in the water eating and processing the waste which is why it's important to have it set up Before you bring home a fish. The store will have little jars called shit like "quick start" or "bacteria boost" or something else. These are almost always not worth the money, be patient and just cycle the tank as described.

Ok now use a test strip. There will be color coded squares and instructions on the bottle on how to read the strips. The only thing you care about right now are the ones corresponding to Ammonia, Nitrates, and Nitrites. These all need to be basically 0. If they are not just keep nurturing your bacteria water and test again next week.

Once you get them into the realm of good enough add your lovely decor to the tank, and go pick out your pretty betta fish. I recommend shopping at locally owned stores as much as possible but also it's your money. I recommend finding an individual who is alert and swimming around doing betta stuff even if the sickly looking ones are tugging at your heart strings. Depending on the shop someone might try to sell you a few females in a bundle deal as a sorority, this is also a trap. Do Not Do That. get 1(one) fish. Singular.

ok. Now go home

When you get home Do Not Dump Your Fish In The Tank. Take the bag or cup or whatever and set it in the tank so it is floating nicely. This will let the temperature the fish is at come up to match the aquariums instead of just shocking them. Ok. Now find a decently sized bowl. A bowl that you'd use to like eat soup out of. and gently transfer your fish and all the water in its packaging into the bowl. Your buddy might be freaked out so have something to loosely cover the bowl on hand. Ok. Now add some water from the aquarium to the bowl. Less than 1/4 of the amount currently in the bowl. now set a timer for like 10 mins and chill out. Ok now add a bit more water to the bowl and set another 10 min timer. And just keep doing that until there's more tank water in the bowl than original water. And Now you put the fish in the tank by gently dumping it and the water from the bowl into the tank.

Congratulations on your fish. Feed them every other day with the food that had the betta on it. Their stomach and mouth are very small so only feed them about a grain of rice worth of food. They won't mind if you leave for a weekend but try to not go more than three days without feeding them. Their life spans are wildly variable based on how well bred they were and how well taken care of they were before you bought them. This fucker might live a year, it might live 8. Cherish it either way.

Do those 25-30% water changes weekly, test with the strips and chemical appropriately, rinse the filter cartridge monthly, and replace it completely every 3 months. and replace the heater every year

If you want to actually understand the science of what any of that was about:

That stuff about keeping wounds out of the bacteria water (this is only one of the infections you can get, they all suck)

Why the bacteria water

That pH thing

How to clean an aquarium in detail

Why betta fish

More stuff in case that's your thing

How to do planted tanks/ how to pick plants for a tank

Stock recommendations for: 10g, 20g, 29g, 55g

Just the aquarium co-op website bc tbh I've linked it 1 million times for a reason

If you have any specific questions I'd be glad to answer them but yeah that's the run down.

[harbinger-of-silly]

All gays will go to hellsite

[king-of-oreo]

What if in hellsite but not gay

[punky-beaver-offical]

[king-of-oreo]

NO!

[avhira]

[hellsitegenetics]

String identified: A ga g t t at t t t ga T tag g a Ag agag Acctac ! T tag g a Ag agag Acctac

Closest match: Psylliodes chrysocephala genome assembly, chromosome: 4 Common name: Cabbage Stem Flea Beetle

(image source)

[graveexcitement]

[kebbopulos]

[spaghettihell]

[exeggcute]

lol I am in such a stressed-out blind rage today from insurance bullshit that I wrote up a glossary of health insurance terms (things like deductibles, premiums, and copays) because all the free guides online are unnecessarily complicated and the only way you can squeeze a dime out of these bullshit companies is to understand their overly-complicated policies. give em hell

[nerdlingwrites]

This is a GREAT guide folks - it’s simple, straightforward, and deals well with the overly complicated alphabet soup of medical insurance. Knowing this stuff can prove REALLY helpful, and the examples used are a great resource. 

[darlingofdots]

idk if I talked about this here but so much of writing decisions are just about, like, rhythm and flow and sound. i spent way longer agonising over a joke about "weird chip flavour in a gay bar" than the joke really warrants because it was like, okay so obviously it would be prawn cocktail but this is an American gay bar, so actually I think it's cheese-and-onion because that's smelly and you don't want your patrons to be eating smelly chips because then they won't want to make out, but again the US does sour-cream-and-onion which is pretty close but really wrecks the flow of what is supposed to be a fun, snappy exchange of jokes because the meter is terrible (SOUR cream and ONion) so I had to go with salt-and-vinegar (SALT and VINegar) instead and that's how just how writing is. the curtains are blue because even though this character would almost definitely have electric green curtains, they need to match the colour of the curséd amulet and maybe there are electric green precious stones? quickly duckduckgo "electric green jewels" "electric green gemstones" "gemstones green scale" hmm okay maybe. but do my readers know this? but we all know about sapphires and shit, right, that's a good classic colour for an amulet, so i guess the curtains are blue now

[azspot]

“Because the truth is, tech doesn’t have an image problem. It doesn’t have a message problem. It has an intention problem. What’s wrong with the axe murderer who broke into my house is not that he hasn’t successfully persuaded me to buy into his narrative. What’s wrong is that he’s trying to kill me with an axe. Similarly, when you launch a product that’s designed to put millions of people out of work, block access to sources of verifiable truth, replace human creativity with slop, and lower the barriers to every sort of atrocity, the problem isn’t that you haven’t told the public a good story about those things. The problem is that you are trying to do them.”

— The 40 Most Rage-Inducing Problems in Tech

[reading-writing-revolution]

[hyperlexichypatia]

I think one of the missing links in the "How can you be a psych abolitionist if you choose to use psych meds?" discussion (besides the obvious and fundamental consent/autonomy aspect) is reconceptualizing things like neurochemical medication as adaptive tools for a disability, tools to help the user do something xe has difficulty doing, rather than treatment for an illness.

I have difficulty managing the stresses of daily life without becoming overwhelmed and debilitated by anxiety. That is disabling. A drug that blunts my anxiety response is an adaptive tool I choose to use to manage my disability.

I don't have to use that tool. I didn't always use that tool. When I choose to forgo that tool or don't have access to it, I just Am More Anxious.

I also choose to wear eyeglasses to improve my eyesight. I could choose not to wear them, but then I wouldn't be able to see very well. It's okay not to see very well (plenty of people don't), but especially in a highly visually-oriented society, I would rather wear glasses and see things.

I don't think of my glasses or my duloxetine as treatments for illnesses. They're tools I choose to use to improve abilities I don't naturally possess much of (seeing past my nose, managing daily stress without panic).

[perverted-asexual]

I think a lot of people hear "Misandry/hating men isn't a constructive use of time and does harm to marginalised men." and hear instead "You have no reason to be wary of men, they're all victims too".

I, as a trans man, am still wary of cis men I don't know. I am still very aware that a lot of peri-cis white men have not only priviledge, but power over others, including me.

I am also aware that I don't feel safe around people who recite things like "Kill all men" or are self proclaimed misanderists. And this mindset can lead to dangerous ideals of bio-essentialism and even gender-essentialism that labels any man evil, any woman pure, and treats trans men as traitors.

And a lot of these takes lump all men in together when intersex, disabled, trans and men of colour, etc, do not inherintly carry all the same privilege as the white, able bodied, peri-cis man you all default to. In fact they are all oppressed in their own ways. (Money, education and upbringing can also play a part in this)

No one is saying that you can't or shouldn't be wary of men in general, or you can't of had bad experiences with them. But acting as if it is the default of all men does not help anyone but excuse it as something all men do and not an active choice some men make. And something our society does not correctly punish or call out.

The problem is the patriarchy, not a random disabled trans man implying that maybe he understands what oppression feels like.

Insisting on lumping in marginalised men, and the rise in hatred towards trans men lately, does not help anyone. Its not punching up. It's punching sideways.

[genderkoolaid]

just a pride month reminder:

if you are making something featuring multiple flags and you put in the asexual flag, you better put in the aromantic flag.

if you put in the aroace flag, you better put in the aroallo flag.

fighting aromantic erasure starts with YOU 🫵

[genderkoolaid]

for reference:

^ the aromantic flag

^ the aroallo (aromantic allosexual) flag

& just btw, aromantic erasure is so bad that on pubmed, many of the very few studies that have looked into aspec people specifically, categorize us as a type of asexuality. from this study:

Our findings highlight that aromantic people wish for aromanticism not to be considered a part of asexuality—a practice that has dominated contemporary literature (Antonsen et al. 2020; Carvalho & Rodrigues, 2022; Clark & Zimmerman, 2022; Hall & Knox, 2022; Zheng & Su, 2018). Many participants clarified the distinction between their sexual identity and romantic identity and highlighted that though they may be connected for some, they should be considered independently as unique contributors to an individual’s identity and experience. This aligns with a previous aromantic community survey that showed 72% of the sample did not identify with asexual terminology (AUREA, 2021a). In combination with our findings, this suggests that a tendency to conflate and describe these identities as the same or linked may be to the disadvantage of a significant portion of the aromantic community.

this is why it is so important to include aromantic people as our own group and to specifically include non-asexual aromantics. i hope y'all can understand how frustrating it is to be erased through a group that is already erased.

asexual representation is sparse? all aromantic rep is asexual and most of the time people don't even bother to remember that "aromantic" is its own thing. i can't count how many times i've seen a character talk about not experiencing romantic attraction, only for people to go "wow asexual rep!" even though sexual attraction was never brought up.

asexual community & resources are sparse? when i try to look up groups for aromantics, i get resources on "ace & aro groups" that are literally all asexual-focused. at best asexual-focused with a mention of aromantic people. which isn't really helpful when you are aroallo and don't really want or need a group that is clearly meant for alloro asexuals and aroaces.

asexual history is sparse? i've literally never seen anything even trying to talk about aromantic history. the most impactful thing on aro history is that one tumblr post talking about a woman at a nursing home who heard the term and realized her best friend was likely aro. see above with the character situation as well.

my point here is not "aros have it worse than aces" because we are both aspec and both get fucked over by the same forces and in fact, a LOT of asexual aromantics are also very frustrated by aromantic erasure! i've even heard some people talk about not identifying as strongly as asexual, even though it fits them, because they feel their aro identity is more important to them but gets constantly erased by their asexuality.

my point is that it is so fucking disheartening to be aro even in queer spaces that are trying to be asexual-inclusive, even in supposedly aspec spaces, because it swiftly becomes apparent that people see your entire identity as just a footnote for asexuality. so many people never even realize they are aro because they aren't asexual and don't realize that you can be aro but not ace. i dealt with some really intense arophobia as a teen after realizing i was aro, feeling broken and alone. it hit much harder than any internalized homophobia or transphobia did for me at the time. i did not meet another person who identified as aromantic irl until this year. any resources and community that i had as a queer teen, as a trans teen, did not exist for me as an aro teen and does not exist for me as an aro adult, really.

and big problem is that, because people think of aromanticism as just a footnote of asexuality, they implicitly assume that more asexual rep, more asexual resources, more asexual visibility will automatically serve aromantics too. and when it doesn't work like that, aro people continue to suffer as a result.

things have improved over the years and i hope will continue to! but i really need every queer person to become more aware of aromanticism & arophobia & how the queer community contributes to it & hurts aro people. hence why i am so testy about when people will include the ace flag but not the aro one. YOU 🫵 will care about your aromantic siblings and consider us this pride month!!!!!