Also @sleepie-goose - Tumblr Blog

Today I start my ninth decade on earth. It’s astounding and distressing, but I suppose it’s better than the alternative. In his latter years, my father would always answer my weekly phone question, “How are you, Dad?” with a brisk “Still here!” Several of my joints ache, I can’t remember shit, I can no longer do 20 pushups at a clip, several good friends have passed, my bald spot is claiming more territory, and I can’t hear very well (especially in restaurants). But, hey, I’m still here. And hardly alone. All 1946 boomers still here are turning 80. More babies were born in 1946 than in any other year of American history up to then. Dolly Parton is one. She has been 80 since January 19 of this year. I still haven’t met her. Meeting her has been on my bucket list for six decades. She’s my height. We have similar values. I’ve been in love with her since I was 15, but so far, zilch. When I was a small boy, my grandma Frances was courted by a man named Jack Hirsch, who was then 80. I had never before encountered someone as old as Jack. I was scared to speak loudly in his presence, or sneeze, or cough, for fear he’d fall over and die. I remember thinking he could be Methuselah (who, according to the Bible, lived until the ripe old age of 969). What happens after you hit a ripe old age? Do you ripen until you rot? Three score and ten is the number of years of life set out in the Bible. Modern technology and Big Pharma add at least a decade, bringing us 1946 boomers to where we are now. Yesterday I ran into a former student who upon seeing me exclaimed, “You look great!” I thanked her even though she was probably just being polite. An elderly friend once told me there were four ages to life: youth, middle age, old age, and “You look great.” I’m now in the fourth stage. My wish for you is that you have a long lifespan and a long health-span, that you relish every day you have, spend time with people you love and value, let go of all the petty crap, wish no one ill (except perhaps Trump), and continue to fight for what’s good and noble and important. And regardless of your age, my thanks to you for joining me on this journey. (By the way, you look great.)

prokopetz

You wouldn’t think that flamingoes are extremophiles just from looking at them. It’s like somebody tried to build the vertebrate equivalent of that fungus that lives inside nuclear reactors, and ended up with a gangly pink dinosaur with a spoon for a face.

calloutnevvegas

For everyone in the comments asking how flamingos are extremophiles:

Flamingos can survive in low oxygen, high altitude, high temperatures, low temperatures, high alkaline, they can and will drink boiling water and they can be completely frozen at night and still get up the next morning

Don’t fuck with flamingos

revretch

….. Didn’t know most of that

iamthekaijuking

Huh… so that’s why zoos don’t put them somewhere warm during winter.

revretch

Oh yeah, this leaves out what I *did* know about them–they can also survive hypersalinity. That is, water so salty it kills practically everything else–water so salty it burns your skin.

American flamingos just drink that shit

bogleech

(animal death) this is a real undoctored photograph (*though the body was stood up for the shot) of a dead flamingo on the surface of lake natron, a lake so salty and so alkaline that it’s naturally carbonated like soda and would eat through your stomach lining if you drank from it.

When this photo went viral years ago, most people assumed this poor flamingo must have been killed by the lake.

It is actually the lake where 75% of its global population are hatched. This is a photo from the same lake:

assuming-dinosaur

Some species of flamingo actually subsist almost entirely on a diet of bacteria! In other words, there is a species of dinosaur that eats only bacteria and lives in lakes so toxic they would kill almost anything else—and it is best known to the average person as a kitschy lawn decoration.

is-the-post-reliable

requested by anonymous:

RATING: RELIABLE

Flamingos can survive in high altitudes, hypersaline conditions, and caustic lakes.

Source: ‘All flamingo species have evolved to live in some of the planet’s most extreme wetlands, like caustic “soda lakes”, hypersaline lagoons or high-altitude salt flats.’

They can survive water so alkaline it burns human skin.

Source: ‘More than a million lesser flamingos breed in Tanzania’s Lake Natron, for instance, a lake fed by hot springs with water so alkaline that it can strip away human skin (one pioneering flamingo researcher named Leslie Brown spent months in Nairobi General Hospital after burning his legs wading out to observe where the birds nested).’

They can drink water at near-boiling temperatures.

Source: ‘They can drink water at near boiling point to collect freshwater from springs and geysers at lake edges. If no freshwater is available, flamingos can use glands in their head that remove salt, draining it out from their nasal cavity.’

The lakes they inhabit can freeze overnight, and the flamingos can survive once it thaws in the morning.

Source: ‘The birds may seem to epitomize the tropics, but they also live in the Andes, 15,000 feet above sea level, where they rest on lakes that freeze around them overnight.

“You’ll see them sitting there like snowballs, frozen on ice,” Dr. Arengo said. “And as the temperature warms up, they thaw out, fluff themselves up and go about their business.”’

The photo is indeed from Lake Natron, taken by photographer Nick Brandt. The content of the lake chemically preserves animal corpses that die there. You can see more photos of this here.

It is also true that 75% of Lesser Flamingos are hatches on Lake Natron.

Source: ‘The lake’s landscape is surreal and deadly—and made even more bizarre by the fact that it’s the place where nearly 75 percent of the world’s lesser flamingos are born.’

Some species of Flamingo eat cyanobacteria or algae.

Source: ‘Flamingos have very specialised diets. And their food is responsible for their famous pink colouration. The two species in Planet Earth II eat a lot of floating microscopic algae, which contains carotenoid pigments, the same types of chemical that make carrots orange. These pigments turn their feathers pink, orange and red – without them, flamingos would be white.’

adaginy

… @todaysbird ??

todaysbird

yeah they’re just like that

juney-blues

information that is also important

whoreiaki-kakyoin

I am a silly goose, yes, but I am also full of sooo much love, it’s just how I operate.

crafty-butch

anyone else notice how when "digital assistants" were just supposed to do specific tasks when you asked for them we had Alexa and Siri and Cortana, but now that they're being marketed as smart enough to take actions and make decisions on their own they've got names like Claude and Devin

sophsun1

Happy Pride 🌈 | The Golden Girls (1985-1992)

olderthannetfic

No, no, and NO.

AO3 does not live in “the cloud” because that is other people’s computers, and other people’s computers are vulnerable to censorship.

AO3 is on its own computers. It does still have to be housed somewhere, and I suppose a determined enough hater could try to find that place and go after it, but it’s a lot harder than sending spurious complaints to Amazon or whomever going “BadWrong things are hosted on your cloud service!”

Owning the servers is a core tenet of OTW/AO3.

zz9pzza

Warming up a new database server….

elfwreck

When people involved with AO3 talk about “the cost of servers” they don’t mean “the cost to pay Amazon for space on their servers.” They mean, like, the cost to physically own them, and eventually replace them with new ones. And the operating costs to run them.

AO3 is not “in the cloud.” AO3 is stored on physical machines that the OTW owns.

While this is not a solution that can work for everyone who wants to deal with controversial content, it is why AO3ple sneer at alt-righters who complain about getting thrown off hosting platforms.

crowns-of-violets-and-roses

I Want Us to Own the Goddamned Servers

Because I want us to own the goddamned servers, ok? Because I want a place where we can’t be TOSed and where no one can turn the lights off or try to dictate to us what kind of stories we can tell each other.

lierdumoa

AO3 is what a website looks like when you seize the means of production.

alex51324

Exactly. When I was growing up, pre-internet, they used to say, “Freedom of the press is for those that own one.”

The early internet was like everyone owned a press. Those days are gone; owning the servers is the new owning the press.

olderthannetfic

TBH, I kind of want to get a printing press.

#for my ode to ao3

shithowdy

i thought my laptop was on its last leg because it was running at six billion degrees and using 100% disk space at all times and then i turned off shadows and some other windows effects and it was immediately cured. i just did the same to my roommate's computer and its performance issues were also immediately cured. okay. i guess.

so i guess if you have creaky freezy windows 10/11 try searching "advanced system settings", go to performance settings, and uncheck "show shadows under windows" and anything else you don't want. hope that helps someone else.

shithowdy

hey this is apparently helping a lot of people! adding that on top of this you can also go to settings > personalization > colors and turn off transparency to also boost performance. this wasn't the Big Fix for me but might as well do that too if you're trying to optimize.

shithowdy

past a certain note threshold on tumblr posts you unlock a bloodborne-esque insight and the strange lives of this site's users become visible to you

flipocrite

(x)

theothin

we fucking found them?

prof-grace-aspen

Ok I know we joke about this but I just went to the settings and first clicked "adjust for best performance" and then re-checked only 1 box:

"Smooth edges of screen fonts"

My computer was running hot before I turned everything off; the office I'm in is very warm, I could feel the heat of my CPU through the keyboard. The fans were going, not as loud as they usually get, but they were still blasting.

Y'all.

I can barely feel the warmth through the keyboard now. It's been like 2 minutes. The fan is nearly silent.

Click the Windows key and start typing "System settings", and "View Advanced system settings" will pop up. Then click "Settings" under Performance:

Then you'll see this:

TURN IT ALL OFF.

I turned "Show window contents while dragging" and then turned that off again. It's up to you.

khashanakalashtar

My computer is so quiet and reasonably-temperatured now and I barely notice a difference in utility, why is windows like this

maybe I can even play computer games again

paintpencilink

The second best thing you can do for a Win10 computer is turn off whatever unnecessary services it's decided it needs to run in the background always. Some services it does need, but others are useless. Here's an article that goes into step by steps.

10AppsManager lets you uninstall bloatware. Winaero Tweaker lets you disable crap like Cortana/Copilot, ads, telemetry, internet search results when you search from the taskbar, and all kinds of other stuff, plus it gives you lots of other little options that are just nice to have (like, it can restore the old MS Paint program in place of Paint 3D). Both are totally free.

Oh, and check your startup programs in the Task Manager tab to make sure your computer isn't automatically starting eight million programs every time it boots. But I think people mostly know about that. (Unless this is me going "they only know one or two feldspars... and quartz of course.")

The first best thing you can do for a Windows computer is install Linux Mint. But some of us do need a few pesky Windows-specific programs. Bleh. Still, if you're up for a project, you can have both (and it's awesome). Here's an article about setting up a dual boot Windows/Mint system.

#computers #things that are useful to me to remember

gaybichon

i think i found my new favorite artist on twitter

(source)

gaybichon

👆 me

takeariskao3

6 & 68 :)

6. What’s the last line you wrote?

“Yes,” Robards interjected, swiping the scrolls from her outstretched hands. “I’m well aware of the procedures.”

LOL

68. Are there any fics that influenced you to write the way you do?

yes ABSOLUTELY. @annerbhp and the changeling series was wildly life changing because it totally shifted my worldview and made me realize that ginny had so much depth to explore and so many complexities to flesh out and that she had the BIGGEST MAIN CHARACTER ENERGY EVER. i'd always loved ginny for a multitude of reasons, but watching how annerb's ginny grew and evolved and developed was an incredible experience and honestly quite formative.

also @isthisselfcare and DMATMOOBIL more recently helped me find my own voice and style because draco has so much personality in his exposition that every sentence is catastrophically entertaining. i feel like i can attribute a lot of what i get complimented on (i.e putting huge amounts of character into such little words) directly to following that work so closely and enjoying the h*ck out of it

fic writer asks!!

#for later reading #deep in the fanfic mines with a shovel and hammer

roseharpermaxwell

Hello there, lovely! 8, 12, and/or 15 for the ask game please ❤

I should have known better than to think I could ever pick just one answer to any of these. 😂 I'll answer all three, with Drarry, Dramione, and Rare Pair selections for each. 💚

8. A fic that gives you warm fuzzy feelings.

Drarry:

Still Warm, Still Warm by @tsauergrass. G, 4.8k. Beekeeper roommates, oblivious Draco.

home is wherever i'm with you by @softlystarstruck. T, 6.1k. More roommates! Harry wants Draco to feel at home.

Sourdough by @academicdisaster24. M, 17k. Agoraphobic author Draco and baker Harry.

Nice Things by aideomai. M, 22k. Eighth Year, touch starved and loosened up.

Open for Repairs by @drarrytrash. M, 34k. Draco works at an electronics repair shop and Harry keeps breaking things for an excuse to see him.

Follow the Water by @xanthippe74. T, 38k. Harry spends summer outdoors with Luna and Slytherins.

Dramione:

us alive, right here, feeling lucky by @malfxys. T, 11.4k. Eighth year, gifts from a secret admirer.

Innocent Monsters by @itscometothis. T, 50k. Eighth year, with adorable firsties that take a liking to Draco.

Apple Pie and Other Amends by ToEatAPeach. M, 76k. Quintessential Dramione; Hermione's baked good PTSD tour leads to more.

Rare Pairs/Triads:

Remembrall by p. stone. M, 2.3k. (Nevmione). Tattooed Neville 😍 goes to therapy. There's art by @avendell not to be missed.

Prom Kings by @scullymurphy. M, 4.6k (NottPott). Harry and Theo ditch prom and get high.

12. A fic you couldn't stop reading once you started.

Drarry:

Take These Lies by @pennygalleon. E, 19k. There’s a portrait of his godfather in Draco Malfoy’s potions shop and Harry needs to know why. But that’s not why he keeps coming back.

Stop All The Clocks (this is the last time I'm leaving without you) by @firethesound. E, 44k. MCD. Nonlinear; it hurts so much but it's worth it.

Modern Love by @tackytigerfic. E, 61k. Harry's feeling lost when he finds Draco's living in the Muggle world. (Funny you should ask this question, tacky, when I wrecked myself finishing this one night 😂)

Harry Potter and the Elusive Day Off by @fuckyoupbk. E, 71k. Harry puts himself into a magical coma and only Draco can help.

Among Ancient Pines by @graymatters. M, 73k. Draco's training as a Healer in rural Alaska, where he finds reclusive wandmaker Harry.

Loverboys by @corvuscrowned. E, 84k. Fake dating (one of my fave tropes) with feelings. Just read this one last night.

Dramione:

Looking by @dreamsofdramione. E, 8.1k. Eighth year head boy/head girl; makes my voyeuristic heart happy.

A Study on Successful Bipartisanship by Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger by holydot. M, 8.3k. High School AU; Hermione is president of Student Democrats and Draco is President of Student Republicans. 🤣

Well Said, Hermione by @mightbewriting. E, 8.5k. Draco POV, coworkers. Hermione has a voice kink.

Movements, Contrived and Improvised by @heyjude19-writing. E, 14.3k. Deliciously bantery fake dating.

The Watergaw by @smokybaltic (art by @ectoheart). E, 39k. Stranded, survival enemies to friends to lovers.

for the best by @hawthornewhisperer. E, 49k. Marriage of convenience, protective Draco.

Looking Glass by @kyonomiko. M, 99k. Draco went missing after the battle and Hermione presumes he died when he shows up in a portrait, but everything isn't quite as it seems.

Tremble & Depart by @darkofthemoonfic. E, 139k. Investigating Theo's abandoned manor, which isn't exactly welcoming.

Contradictions by @ambpersand. E, 173k. Hermione looks for anonymous help in the bedroom; finds what she needs (and a mystery) in Draco.

Rare Pair or Triad:

Grey Sweatpants Season by scullymurphy, M, 9.7k. (Blaise/Penelope). Penelope is a journalist who needs an interview with the star quarterback.

The Secretary by @pacific-rimbaud. 45k, E. (ParkWeasel). Dom Percy, sub Pansy, inspired by the movie.

Licurici by @lou-isfake. E, 133k. (Draco/Harry/Charlie). Charlie's in Romania, but there's always been something there with Harry. Even if Harry's with Draco.

15. A fic you wish you could display

Drarry:

Right Hand Red by @lqtraintracks. E, 73k. Eighth year, party games, secret relationship, all with lqt's perfect mix of feelings and heat.

The Claiming of Grimmauld Place by @bixgirl1. E, 74k. Harry needs Draco's help with house magic, as Grimmauld is acting up. Draco comes with a pet tortoise named Francis.

Knead by laughingd0g. E, 83k. I'm biased because it's set in Oregon, but Draco has a coffee shop and bakes, which Harry discovers when he visits Luna/Ginny at their farm outside of Portland. What's not to love?

All Life is Yours to Miss by saras_girl. M, 114k. Rival professors; Harry falls into a coma after they fight, and Draco talks to him. Draco's giant pet beetle Stanley is not to be missed.

The Man Who Lived by SebastianL. E, 253k. Draco lives in NYC and mentors at-risk youth; after he's cursed, he and Harry spend dream states together. Brilliant character study of Draco.

Dramione:

Knee Socks by @purplesugarquills. M, 9.8k. Muggle High School Teacher AU; Draco is the chemistry teacher I always wanted.

Unexpected Best Night Ever by scullymurphy. E, 11.2k. Musician Draco!

Love me in the Dark by Nightmare_Prince. T, 42k. In Azkaban together.

Boardwalk by @indreamsink. E, 68k. Daphne takes Hermione on a trip to the California coast, where she runs into Draco, working on the pier and surfing.

Draco Malfoy and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being in Love by @isthisselfcare. E, 199k. Hermione straddles the Muggle and Magical worlds as a medical researcher and Healer about to make a big discovery. Draco is an Auror assigned to protect her from forces unknown – to both of their displeasure.

Rare Pair:

Putting Out Fires (with gasoline) by lq_traintracks. E, 13k. (Harry/Teddy). Teddy stays with Harry for the summer and tries to figure his life out. This ship is an indulgence for me.

Every Rare Pair Summer Camp piece. Interconnected rare pairs in a Muggle-AU summer camp setting, by @grangerdangerfics, @provocative-envy, pacific-rimbaud and scullymurphy. (Narcissa/Percy, Millie/Oliver, Hermione/Charlie, Draco/Scabior, Neville/Pansy, Fleur/Remus, Cho/Cormac, Daphne/Padma).

Here is the list to request more recs 💚

#for later reading #deep in the fanfic mines with a shovel and hammer

bidotorg

an-ruraiocht

actually I think if you tell (non-climate-denying) people who complain about the heat that it's just gonna get worse forever now that you ARE being an arsehole and that's not helpful at all. cos they fucking know. we fucking know. what does that help. if you want to redirect conversations about extreme weather into climate action have you considered something like "god I know right? that's why I'm doing XYZ* to see if I can improve things locally so it doesn't get worse, want to join me?"

*local action, campaigning, planting trees, targeted politician lobbying, whatever: something CONCRETE and achievable with measurable results

otherwise all you're doing is making powerless and despairing people feel more powerless and despairing and that isn't helping shit

bizarrelittlemew

Are you frustrated you can't leave second kudos on AO3? or third kudos? or whatever-who's-counting kudos?

Well, have I got the html for you!

Plop any of these in a comment (by copy&pasting the code) to make an author's day and show your appreciation!

Second kudos: <img src="https://i.ibb.co/tHMjbb6/second-kudos.png" alt="second kudos">

Third kudos: <img src="https://i.ibb.co/52bggQH/third-kudos.png" alt="third kudos">

nth kudos: <img src="https://i.ibb.co/6y7qGtC/nth-kudos.png" alt="nth kudos">

yet another kudos: <img src="https://i.ibb.co/wKtcj0s/yet-another-kudos.png" alt="yet another kudos">

It will look something like this (and will be transparent with white outline on dark backgrounds):

Feel free to spread and use these as much as you like! (and if you have ideas for other variations, let me know ✌️)

bizarrelittlemew

So happy to see people enjoying these and spreading the love 💖

UPDATE with some suggestions from the replies! And bonus: cookie kudos.

HTML codes under the cut.

gingersnapwolves

let me tell you, I got a ‘kisses your forehead’ kudos and it absolutely made my day

todaysbird

fun fact about me: When I was 6 years old I sent so much hate mail to the president (the second Bush) that the mail carrier had to tell my mom I needed to stop before we got FBI’d

todaysbird

I was COMPLETELY unaware of the US political scene or why the adults in my life hated Bush, but I knew I hated him because he let people shoot wolves from helicopters and that’s mean and shitty

todaysbird

I also had a poor grasp on how stamps worked, so given that I wasn’t allowed to continually throw money away by putting stamps on my presidential hate mail, a lot of the times I just drew squares with little pictures inside on the corner.

fantasticait

Love, love, love reading more proof that everyone should encourage the children in their lives to write to elected officials--it teaches them about citizenship and can also be very funny.

When I taught second grade, one of the options for students who had finished their work was to write a letter to the president. I would send all of the letters in a big envelope at the end of every month.

Watching my students get more and more frustrated with him (and concerned about his wellbeing) was not the result I'd hoped for when I came up with the idea, but it was kind of hilarious.

See, Obama had a standard packet with information and activities about his dog he'd send in response to letters from very young citizens...and of course his office sent one back to our class every single time we sent mail.

So eventually all of the letters looked something like this:

Dear President Obama, I am writing about the environment. I am sad that the Great Barrier Reef is hurt. Also the Amazon Rainforest. Can you help? PLEASE DON'T WRITE BACK TO TELL ME ABOUT YOUR DOG AGAIN. WE ALREADY KNOW ALL ABOUT BO. WE COMPLETED THE MAZE AND COLORED HIM IN. It is good that you love your pet a lot. But try to remember the environment. It is also important.