Single and disinclined to mingle

no rhyme or reason to any of this - follow for big thoughts, bad puns, various fandoms and SO MANY BIRDS

[youthincare]

people should be allowed to have low ambition, and also be able to feed a family on the salary of a cashier at a convenience store.

[aetherograph]

And! We need cashiers. And convenience stores. And I think it's kind of broken that society says people who want to do stuff like that have "low" ambition (not you OP, I get you're using it illustratively because that's what society labels said jobs) and don't deserve to live at the same standard as people with "high" ambitions.

If we need someone to do a job, that job is a role in the community and deserves not just a salary but cultural respect for the role.

"high" ambition jobs are all jobs that involve domineering and controlling others. "low" ambition jobs are all jobs that involve service to others. Have you noticed? Because I have noticed.

But serving others is actually more needed than controlling them.

[eightyonekilograms]

ADHD treatment and the gatekeeping thereof is actually evidence against "capitalism rules everything around me", and a reminder that there are plenty of decisions being made based on personal biases, moral panics, self-interested groups, etc. People with ADHD are way more effective and useful to capitalism-in-the-abstract when they can just get their medication no questions asked, and yet.

[noah-wyles]

this is such a fantastic and reassuring response

[draconym]

he wants my rum milkshake so bad and he thinks if he's cute enough I'll give it to him

[herpsandbirds]

your blog is so amazing and i'm glad it exists as someone who loves sooo many animals. so since ive been having parrots on the brain lately i humbly request underrated parrot faves. some parrots that you think are really cool and interesting or have really unique patterns/coloration but you feel like not enough people know about or appreciate properly for whatever reason.

Thank you so much boo boo. I have some parrots right here that I think you will like...

Brown-hooded Parrot (Pyrilia haematotis), family Psittacidae, order Psittaciformes, Costa Rica

Photograph by Pieter-Jan D'Hondt

Bald Parrot (Pyrilia aurantiocephala), family Psittacidae, order Psittaciformes, Brazil

photograph by Source

Red-breasted Pygmy Parrot (Micropsitta bruijnii), male, family Psittaculidae, order Psittaciformes, New Guinea

These tiny parrots are only 8 cm (3 in) in length. (This measurement does not include the tail feathers).

photographs by Lev Frid

Maroon Shining Parrot (Prosopeia tabuensis), family Psittaculidae, order Psittaciformes, endemic to Fiji

photograph by Lars Peteersson

Ultramarine Lorikeets (Vini ultramarina), family Psittaculidae, endemic to the Marquesas Islands (South Pacific)

ENDANGERED.

photograph by peterodekerken

Night Parrot (Pezoporus occidentalis), family Psittaculidae, order Psittaciformes, found at various sites in arid regions of Australia

CRITICALLY ENDANGERED.

Once considered to be extinct, as there were no sightings of the bird between 1912 and 1979, since then the bird has only been seen very rarely.

The causes for the assumed decline of this bird are unknown.

Mainly terrestrial, nocturnal, feeds mostly on the seeds of Spinifex grasses.

photographs: John Young (QLD, 2013), Steve Murphy

[spiribia]

It probably is kind of fun to be a parent bird and find big fat bugs to put in your child’s goalpost mouth. And the more you do it the larger your baby gets, which shows your progress. Mine is reaally big, think I’m going to get a high score this time. It has a unique skin too, I’ve never even seen this one before. Has anyone gotten that one, dark brown and white belly with stripes? It’s not even in my Wrenpedia, it has to be a really special unlock

[spiribia]

I’d appreciate if you didn’t call my child a “parasite”, thank you very much! Typical r/childfree

[todaysbird]

a leucistic cedar waxwing was photographed by cory elowe in delta, michigan. leucism is a genetic mutation similar to albinism, but differs in that leucism is only a partial reduction in pigmentation, while albinism is a complete lack of melanin. some faint coloration and yellow markings are still visible on this leucistic bird; a typical cedar waxwing is brown overall with distinctive red and yellow markings, and a distinct black mask.

[simplified-birds]

Simplified bird #100 - great-tailed grackle

( requested by @birdadjacent )

[kat]

i had a dream last night that the entire world used a currency (?) called angrypennies which as the name implies are obtained by experiencing anger. the stronger and more intense your anger was, the more angrypennies you'd gain. an all-consuming rage would earn you more than a slight irritation, etc. so people were always searching for ways to fuel their anger and purposefully keeping themselves angry all the time because they wanted to earn angrypennies. unclear if angrypennies could be exchanged for goods and services, or if they were just a collectible.

anyway, as if this wasn't heavy-handed enough, at one point british comedian greg davies appeared and explained that angrypennies couldn't be worth feeling angry all the time. this was a real revelation to dream-me and i was finally able to break free of the angrypenny grind and allow myself to experience emotions other than anger.

[kat]

it goes without saying that i will be using the word angrypenny as if it was part of the common vernacular instead of a term that my dreaming brain conjured up i.e. "he's all about the angrypennies" (derogatory way to refer to a guy who searches for reasons to be angry and possibly lacks introspection)

[ri5k]

the replacement of websites with apps sounds so backwards when you actually describe it. like hmm you have to download an entire program onto your device each time you want access to a portal, where it takes up storage indefinitely. somebody should invent an app where you can "browse" any portal just by typing in its address... 🥴

[bakwaaas]

the true elation and dopamine hit I get when I have a friendly random conversation with a stranger in public needs to be studied

[bakwaaas]

no this is exactly it

[bixbythemartian]

the funny story about the cat with a Hispanic-sounding name being summoned for jury duty because the cat was mysteriously registered to vote (even though the owner has never registered to vote, which is the 'punchline' of the story) is asking you to swallow some basic (racist, incorrect, and conservative) assumptions about the way voter registration works in the United States of America in the guise of a funny story about 'bureaucracy'.

[chilewithcarnage]

when the treat you treated yourself to is mid

[pussyronin-deactivated20260120]

tomorrow i will ride an elephant sized isopod into a crowded public area and we will all find out what happens next together

[oniongarlic]

[draconym]

The kids on Tiktok were right actually

Making masks rules

[iusedtobecharming-deactivated20]

Do we have a franz kafka diary entry for july 1st, i want to know what he thinks!!!

[rehearsing]

happy too tired July everyone

[shithowdy]

i've decided i'm going to learn more about yellow-headed blackbirds than anyone else. this is a strange and almost juvenile-sounding goal but no one seems particularly interested in studying them. if you try to search for information on them or certain behaviors you get the generic field mark and blurb guides, a few paywalled academic articles, and... posts by me, funnily enough. i just made a separate blog for my bird photography, but expect another at some point specifically focused on my documenting the colony of these birds that i now visit weekly.

i'm not a spiritual person, nor do i believe in the prophetic power of dreams, but i do think they serve as important windows into our fears and motivations and i think it says something that the only time i have actively photographed a bird in my dreams it was indeed a yellow-headed blackbird.

[shithowdy]

look at my blackbirds boy

[shithowdy]

the more i read about these birds the more insane i feel. i think the isolation of this tiny marsh might actually be doing some galapagos shit to the blackbirds there because everything from their vocalizations to their nesting habits completely eschews known data.

did you know that they are capable of imitation? don't worry! apparently no one else does either, but i have personally overheard them doing terrible approximations of not only red-winged blackbird songs, but also rooster crowing, ring-necked pheasant squawking, and what i now believe to be an eastern meadowlark song (which i have captured on video, something about which no one gave a fuck!!)

they are supposed to be drawn to marshes with deep water, over which multiple females will weave nests in single male controlled territories of typically 1k to 6ksqft. the waters of this marsh are wading depth, and the males control micro-territories of what cannot be more than 500sqft each-- territories that they share neutrally with marsh wrens.

this marsh is the last surviving 50 acre oasis of wetland in what used to be hundreds of miles of it, now turned into farmland. yellow headed blackbirds have been migrating across this continent for over 100,000 years according to fossil records. how does one compromise with their instincts telling them to travel a specific, ancestral route that looks and feels nothing like what their genetic memory tells them? they adapt, or they disappear, and a bird like this could never accept silence. i don't think.

[headspace-hotel]

I don't know how or why, but sometimes a species reaches out to you to be its caretaker and you just gotta answer the call.

[shinyblackbird]

Everything about this is delightful, I'm so happy for and impressed by OP, adopting an entire colony of birds and sharing them with us all. Which makes my personal revelation here feel silly in comparison, but you just solved a mystery for me.

Recently I found a big cheap "canvas" print at the thrift store, the sort of thing that's mass produced to look good in online listing but is noticeably cheap in person. But I loved the colors and the anatomy was surprisingly good, so it came home with me. At a glance it seemed to be an oriole with questionable fidelity, bafflingly posed on some cattails. I didn't think much of it, birds in art are full of bad anatomy and species all smushed together. At least it isn't a macaw with a crest. But as soon as I saw the photos here, I realized it's actually extremely species accurate, I just didn't know this was a species to consider

Thanks OP I love my yelling bird even more now