izzy's playlists!
hello vonnie
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todays bird
Product Placement
ojovivo
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if i look back, i am lost
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
The Stonewall Inn
š©µ avery cochrane š©µ
Mike Driver
titsay
cherry valley forever
Noah Kahan
The Bowery Presents
Love Begins
Claire Keane
RMH
seen from United States
seen from Colombia
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Iraq
seen from Bangladesh
seen from United States
seen from Oman
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Pakistan
seen from United States
seen from Canada
seen from United States
@spadeprince1313
If you add two pounds of sugar to literally one ton of concrete it will ruin the concrete and make it unable to set properly which is good to know if you wanna resist something being built, French anarchists used this to resist prison construction in the 80s
Iām just gonna go ahead and reblog this for purely educational purposes.
MY FAVORITE POST EVER
So while doing some pirate research for the play Iām writing I stumbled upon one of the most amazing things Iāve ever read. In the 5th century A.D. there was a Scandinavian princess called Alwilda whoās father tried to set her up to marry Alf, the Prince of Denmark. Alwilda wasnāt cool with this so she and some female companions dressed as men, stole a ship, and sailed away. Eventually they met a company of pirates who were in need of a new captain and they were so captivated by her that they elected her as their new leader. Her crew became so infamous that Prince Alf was sent out to stop them. When their ships met he took Alwilda prisoner and she was so impressed by Alfās skill that she agreed to marry him after all and eventually became the Queen of Denmark.
I stopped caring whether this was factually accurate about halfway through because itās completely AWESOME.
Medievalist here for triumphant fact-checking: this story is, if not true, at least true according to the history of the Danes (Gesta Danorum) written in the 12th century by Saxo Grammaticus. You can read his account of Alwildaās story in the original Latin here, or in English translation here. Highlights include:
She exchanged womanās for manās attire, and, no longer the most modest of maidens, began the life of a warlike rover. Enrolling in her service many maidens who were of the same mind, she happened to come to a spot where a band of rovers were lamenting the death of their captain, who had been lost in war; they made her their rover captain.
I love the implication that there were lots of Danish maidens just WAITING for the opportunity of a life of piracyā¦
Reblogging my old post for this A+ addition to it
Come on Pixar, whereās her movie?
Kentucky Superstitions, 1920
Folk-lore from Adams County, Illinois, 1935:
A Genie offers you one wish, and you modestly wish to have a very productive 2017. The genie misunderstands, and for the rest of your life, every 20:17 you become impossibly productive for just 60 seconds.
āWell, it was a nice day.ā You kiss your sweetheart gently on the forehead and sigh as the last remaining seconds of 20:16 tick away.Ā āSee you at 8:18,ā you say.Ā
Then it happens. Every ounce of fatigue or hunger leaves your body. The face of your beloved is perfectly still, their expression exactly the same. The ticking of the clock on the wall has stopped. Once again, itās 20:17.Ā
You stretch your arms and walk to the table with the homework for the three doctorates youāre working on. The work is mentally stimulating and enjoyable, but itās finished far too quickly. You check your pocket watch and see that not even one hundredth of a second has passed.Ā
You knew it was too soon to be able to see any movement on the watch, but you can never quite help yourself from looking early on every 20:17. Time to move on.Ā
You clean your home, do your budget, then go outside and fix a noise that your car was making earlier that afternoon. (Oh how you already miss afternoons.) Then you go back inside, boot up your computer (which magically speeds up to keep pace with you as long as youāre in contact with it) and check for any new orders.Ā
Youāve set up a website for the small business you started calledĀ āMagic Elf Services.ā People in your area can pay a modest fee on your site to have different tasks and odd jobs done byĀ āThe Magic Elfā at 8:17pm every day. It was a little slow to get started, but word has spread and these days you have a steady stream of clients.Ā
The money that comes in from the business is nice, but youāre mostly grateful that it gives you a clear list of things to do. You print off your updated list of clients, step outside, and start making your way through the neighborhood with your to-do list.Ā
Thereās the apartments down your street where several neighbors have hired you to tidy up, do the dishes, and mop the floors. You do the windows too, just to see if they notice. Thereās the large house across town that paid theĀ āMagic Elfā to clean out the gutters. After the first dozen jobs are done, you manage to stop looking at your pocket watch.Ā
As near as youāve been able to determine in the past, 20:17 seems to last for approximately one normal year. But itās not exact. For one thing, itās hard to keep track ofĀ ātimeā when everything but you has crawled to an almost total standstill. For another thing, time seems to move differently depending on howĀ āproductiveā your behavior is. One time you tried to spend all of 20:17 sitting at home in your pajamas, but that was getting you nowhere, so you eventually gave up and got busy. (Though you defiantly stayed in your pajamas the whole time.)Ā
During 20:17 your body doesnāt get tired, hungry, sick, or injured. Youāre essentially tireless and immortal for the duration of theĀ āminute.ā So sleeping or eating away your boredom has never really worked for you.Ā
One of the houses on your list forgot to follow the instructions and leave a key for you to get in. At first you figure youāll just send them an email telling them to pay more attention and that youāll do the job tomorrow. Then you decide to go home, get your locksmith tools, and come back.Ā
After finishing up all the jobs on your list, you go into several other homes and small businesses in the area, performing tasks you hope theyāll find helpful, and leaving a hand-painted business card at each one. (The business cards donāt contain your real name just in case somebody thinksĀ āThe Magic Elfā should be subject to breaking and entering laws.)Ā
Speaking of laws, you head down to the local police station to pick up your case file. Youāve been in contact with a detective whoās been investigating corruption within their department, and your ability to investigate unseen and get in almost anywhere between the ticks of the clock has proven invaluable. You see that theyāve also added five missing person cases to your file this evening, which certainly raises your interest in the job.Ā
You make your way through town gathering evidence, and start making your way to the outskirts of town. Since you happen to be out that way (and youāve already solved three of the five missing person cases) you decide to swing by the stone castle youāre building and do some more work there.Ā
The castle walls stand about 20 feet right now, but you know theyāll be much higher when youāre done. Youāre far from any roads and pretty safely tucked away, so for now itās your little secret. Youāve been excavating and moving all the rock yourself, which has been much easier than you first expected since your body doesnāt get tired or sore. Youāve also got a nice system of tunnels going underneath the castle, and you dig and build more of that network for a while.Ā
All that time spent underground has left you feeling rather lonely, so you walk back home to see the face of your sweetheart. Their facial expression has moved ever so slightly since you last saw them, which is a comfort to you. Looking at them gets your imagination going and makes you dream up a story youād like to tell, so you sit on your couch, plug in your laptop, and write a book.Ā
After you finish editing the last chapter for the third time, you finally allow yourself to look at your pocket watch again. Three seconds have officially passed so far.Ā
Itās gonna be a long 20:17.Ā
Wow, Dave. You managed to take a concept that seems nice on the exterior and make it into a real nightmare. This is some good stuff.
Which is EXACTLY why you should never trust a wish-granting djinn.Ā
i know its the mets, but this is the coolest shit iāve ever seen a human being do
Smoove with it tooĀ
This is the kind of shit you see in anime that shows that a certain character is stronger than other characters.Ā
āPathetic. Ā You canāt even hold the bat you dare step to the plate? Have you no respect for the sport?ā
reminds me of this gif
Baseball players are to be feared
@copperbadge Tis the seasonā¦
And then thereās poor Randy Johnson and his feathered friendā¦
I would die for her
why was it that the first thing that came to mind was the death of borimir
Oooooh, a nyckelharpa! My WoW followers will know this as that really cool instrument in the soundtracks for Howling Fjord and Grizzly Hills.
āIf autism isnāt caused by environmental factors and is natural why didnāt we ever see it in the past?ā
We did, except it wasnāt called autism it was called āLittle Jonathan is a r*tarded halfwit who bangs his head on things and canāt speak so weāre taking him into the middle of the cold dark forest and leaving him there to die.ā
Or ālittle Jonathan doesnāt talk but does a good job herding the sheep, contributes to the community in his own way, and is, all around, a decent guy.ā That happened a lot, too, especially before the 19th century.
Or, backing up FURTHER
and lots of people think this very likely,
āOh little Sionnat has obviously been taken by the fairies and theyāve left us a Changeling Child who knows too much, and asks strange questions, and uses words she shouldnāt know, and watches everything with her big dark eyes, clearly a Fairy Child and not a Human Like Us.ā
The Myth of the Changeling child, a human baby apparently replaced at a young age by a toddler who āsuddenlyā acts āstrange and feyā is an almost textbook depiction of autistic children.
To this day, āautism warrior mommiesā talk about autism āstealingā their āsweet normal childā and have this idea of āgetting their real baby backā which (in the face of modern science)Ā indicates how the human psyche actually does deal with finding out their kid acts unlike what they expected.
Given this evidence, and how common we now know autism actually is, the Changeling myth is almost definitely the result of peopleās confusion at the development of autistic children.
Weirdly enough, that legend is now comforting to me.
I think itās worth noting that many like me, who are diagnosed with ASD now, would probably have been seen as just a bit odd in centuries past. Iām only a little bit autistic; I can pass for neurotypical for short periods if I work really hard at it. I have a lack of talent in social situations, and Iām prone to sensory overload or you might notice me stimming.
But hereās the thing: life is louder, brighter and more intense and confusing than it has ever been. I live on the edge of London and I rarely go into the centre of town because itās too overwhelming. If I went back in time and lived on a farm somewhere, would anyone even notice there was anything odd about me? No police sirens, no crowded streets that go on for miles and miles, no flickery electric lights. Working on a farm has a clear routine. Iād be a badass at spinning cloth or churning butter because I find endless repetition soothing rather than boring.
Iām not trying to romanticise the past because I know it was hard, dirty work with a constant risk of premature death. I donāt actually want to be a 16th century farmer! What Iām saying is that disability exists in the context of the environment. Our environment isnāt making people autistic in the sense of some chemical causing brain damage. But we have created a modern environment which is hostile to autistic people in many ways, which effectively makes us more disabled. When you make people more disabled, you start to see more people struggling, failing at school because theyāre overwhelmed, freaking out at the sound of electric hand dryers and so on. And suddenly it looks like thereās millions more autistic people than existed before.
āā¦disability exists in the context of the environment.ā
Reblog for disability commentary.
So I was told that Human Planet had a segment about pigeons in the Cities episode that I might be interested in and I was honestly so underwhelmed. I havenāt finished the episode so maybe thereās more pigeon stuff but I feel like all I saw was more Birds Of Prey Are The Only Cool And Acceptable Birds and pigeons are Trespassers In Our Urban World Who Shit On Everything And Are Useless On Top Of It. Which isnāt true and Iām so tired of this being framed as some horrible burden that humanity must face. Pigeons are the victims here, not us.Ā
Hate of pigeons didnāt start until the 20th Century. Before that was about 9,900 years of loving them. The rock pigeon was domesticated 10,000 years ago and not only that, we took them freaking everywhere. Pigeons were the first domesticated bird and they were an all-around animal even though they were later bred into more specialised varieties. They were small but had a high feed conversion rate, in other words it didnāt cost a whole lot of money or space to keep and they provided a steady and reliable source of protein as eggs or meat. They home, so you could take them with you and then release them from wherever you were and theyād pretty reliably make their way back. Pigeons are actually among the fastest flyers andĀ they can home over some incredible distances (what fantastic navigators!). They were an incredibly important line of communication for multiple civilisations in human history. You know the first ever Olympics? PigeonsĀ were delivering that news around the Known World at the time. Also, their ability to breed any time of year regardless of temperature or photoperiod? That was us, we did that to them, back when people who couldnāt afford fancier animals could keep a pair or two for meat/eggs.Ā
Rooftop pigeon keeping isnāt new, itās been around for centuries and is/was important to a whole variety of cultures. Pigeons live with us in cities because we put them there, we madeĀ them into city birds. I get that there are problems with bird droppings and thereās implications for too-large flocks. By all means those are things we should look to control, but you donāt need to hateĀ pigeons with every fibre of your being. You donāt need to despise them or brush them off as stupid (they have been intelligence tested extensively as laboratory animals because guess what other setting theyāre pretty well-adapted to? LABORATORIES!) because they arenāt stupid. Theyāre soft intelligent creatures and I donāt have time to list everything I love about pigeons again. You donāt need to aggressively fight them or have a deep desire to kill them at all. Itās so unnecessary, especially if you realise that the majority of reasons pigeons are so ubiquitous is a direct result of human interference.
We havenāt always hated pigeons though, Darwinās pigeon chapter in The Origin of SpeciesĀ took so much of the spotlight that publishers at the time wanted him to make the book ONLY about pigeons and to hell with the rest because Victorianās were obsessed with pigeons (as much as I would enjoy a book solely on pigeons, itās probably best that he didnāt listen).Ā My point is, for millenia, we loved pigeons. We loved them so much we took them everywhere with us and shaped them into a bird very well adapted for living alongside us.
Itās only been very recently that we decided we hated them, that we decided to blame themĀ for ruining our cities. The language we use to describe pigeons is pretty awful. But it wasnāt always, and I wish we remembered that. I wish we would stop blaming them for being what we made them, what they are, and spent more time actually tackling the problems our cities face. Ā
I just have a lot of feelings about how complex and multidimensional hating pigeons actually is
ALL OF THIS
And also pigeon poop was a very valuable fertilizer before we had other options, people would hire guards to stop thieves from stealing their flockās poop.
#LovePigeonsAgain2016
Late night, reblogging, so bear with me hereā¦ Thank you for posting much of my thoughts over the past year and a half! I am known by many asĀ āthat guy who keeps the raptorsā. Yes this is true, I do keep and handle raptors for educational purposes, but what many fail to realize is, I am fascinated with pigeons. My interest with birds began with the obvious, the raptors, corvids, and parrots. Then I discovered pigeons. These wonderful little birds with big attitudes and the incredible ability to thrive among people.Ā The organization I work with got its first pigeon a little over a year ago. She was a rescue with nowhere else to go. I was quickly drawn to her character and attitude about life. We rarely handled her, but we did spend time with her. She grew attached to our volunteers very quickly because their were no other birds she could socialize with in our facility.Ā
We never intended to train her for educational programs. It was a job reserved for our raptors. It was our pigeon who decided she would be a part of what we were doing. One day, when we entered her enclosure to change water and food, she decided to fly to my hand and perch like our raptors do.Ā
No training, no treats, just the reward of being with us.Ā
What we hadnāt noticed for the couple months prior was her watching us. This brilliant little bird had been watching us every day as we trained and worked with our raptors. Finally she decided she didnāt want to be left out any longer. She made her place on our hands.
This occurred several times before we finally put her on a glove and brought her into the public. Needless to say, she was right at home. She fluffed up and preened the entire evening while people gawked and asked us why we had a pigeon on one glove and a hawk on another.Ā
Since then, weāve added 5 more rescued pigeons to our growing flock. And our pigeon (Tybalt) has become a mainstay ambassador for our programs. Each of our pigeons are incredibly fun to watch and interact with. Pigeons simply donāt get enough love. They are marvelous creatures incredibly suited to life alongside people both physically and mentally.Ā
Raptors my have been my introduction into birds, but pigeons opened my eyes to a new appreciation for them and the fascinating world of bird cognition.
NOT ONLY are pigeons very amazing, worth our respect, and INTERESTING (did you read any of that stuff above?), but they are beautiful too! Look how lovely:
Photo by .jocelyn.
They have a complex and fascinating social structure, both within a flock and with other individuals:
Photo by Ingrid Taylar
AND THEY ARE JUST SUPER CUTE, HONESTLY:
Photo by Musical Photo Man
Not chickens, but I feel compelled to spread this gospel.
hmmm. this is making me rethink my new york pigeon hate
and, AND, havenāt you ever wondered why city pigeons come in a magnificent rainbow of unusual colors?
Most wild animals all look alike within a species, with TINY, RARE individual variations in terms of rare color morphs, unusually big or small animals, different facial markings and other subtleties. But there is no evolutionary benefit to having species where everyone looks slightly different, and in fact, itās beneficial for species to be similar and consistent, with a distinctive aesthetic. Especially if youāre trying to blend into the environment - a black wolf is all very well, but it looks positively silly in the summer tundra, where its grey/brown/brindley cousins blend in. A white deer has a great aesthetic - and a very short lifespan in the forest. Distinctive Protagonist looks are rare in the wild, simply because natural selection usually comes down heavily on them.
To humans, most wild animals are visually indistinguishable from each other.
As a result, most wild animals are like
āOh itās obvious - you can tell the twins apart because Kara has a big nose.ā
Wild animals usually have a pretty consistent aesthetic within their species. Itās important to them!
SO WHAT IS GOING ON WITH PIGEONS?
Look, in one small picture youāve got a red color morph in the center, several melanistic dark morphs, a few solid black birds, a few variations on the wildtype wing pattern, a PIEBALD, a piebald copper color morphā¦
Like, there are LAYERS UPON LAYERS of pigeon diversity in most flocks you see. Pure white ones with black wingtips. Solid brown ones with pink iridescent patches. Pale pinkish pigeons.
WHY IS THAT? When other wild animals consider ābeing slightly fluffier than my brotherā to be dangerously distinctive in most circumstances? BECAUSE CITY PIGEONS ARENāT TRULY WILD.
MANY OF THEM (POSSIBLY MOST OR ALL) ARE FERAL MIXES.
THEY WERE ONCE BELOVED PETS, SPECIAL MESSENGERS, EXQUISITE SHOW-WINNERS, AND PRIZED LIVESTOCK.
THEIR PRETTY COLORS WERE DELIBERATELY INTRODUCED BY HUMANS.
AND NOW THEIR HUMANS DONāT LOVE THEM ANY MORE.
See, pigeon fanciers bred (and still breed!) a huge array of pigeons. And the resulting swarms of released/discarded/escaped/phased out āfancyā pigeons stayed around humans. What else were they going to do? They interbred with wildtype pigeons.
Lots of the pigeons you see in public are feral. Theyāre not wild animals. Theyāre citizen animals. Theyāre genetically engineered. And now thatās what ācityā pigeons are.
These āwildā horses are all different colors because theyāre actually feral. Mustangs in the American West are the descendants of imported European horses - theyāre an invasive domestic species that colonized an ecological niche, but they are domestic animals. Their distinctive patterns were deliberately bred by humans. A few generations of running around on the prairie isnāt going to erase that and turn them back into wildtypes. If you catch an adult mustang and train it for a short period, you can ride it and have it do tricks and make it love you. Itās a domestic animal. You canāt really do that with an adult zebra.
No matter how many generations these dogs stay on the street and interbreed with one another, they wonāt turn back into wolves. They canāt. Theyāre deliberately genetically engineered. If you catch one (even after generations of rough living, even as an adult) you can make it stare at your face, care about your body language, and love you.
City pigeons? Well, you donāt have to like them, but theyāre in the same boat. Theyāre tamed animals, bred on purpose, living in a human community. Their very bodies are marked with their former ownership and allegiance; they cannot really return to what they once were; if you caught one, you could make it love you (in a limited pigeon-y way.) They have gone to āthe wild,ā but not very far from us, and theyād be happy to come back.
So next time you see a flock of city pigeons, spare a moment to note their diversity. The wing patterns. The pied, mottled and brindled. The color types.
All of it was once meant to please you.
I am now on Team Pigeon. Ā Thank you.
Humans AreĀ Weird
So there has been a bit ofĀ āwhat if humans were the weird ones?ā going around tumblr at the moment and Earth Day got me thinking. Earth is a wonky place, the axis tilts, the orbit wobbles, and the ground spews molten rock for goodness sakes. What if what makes humans weird is just our capacity to survive? What if all the other life bearing planets are these mild, Mediterranean climates with no seasons, no tectonic plates, and no intense weather?Ā
What if several species (including humans) land on a world and the humans are allĀ āSCORE! Earth like world! Letās get exploring before we get out competed!ā And the planet starts offing the other aliens right and left, electric storms, hypothermia, tornadoes and the humans are just ā¦ thereā¦ counting seconds between flashes, having snowball fights, and just surviving.Ā
To paraphrase one of my favorite bits of aĀ āhumans are awesomeā fiction megapost:Ā āyou donāt know youāre from a Death World until you leave it.ā For a ton of reasons, I really like the idea of Earth being Space Australia.
Earth being Space Australia Words cannot express how much I love these posts
Alien: āIām sorry, whatĀ did you just say your comfortable temperature range is?ā
Human:Ā āHonestly we can tolerate anywhere from -40 to 50 Celcius, but we prefer the 0 to 30 range.ā
Alien:Ā āā¦ā¦. Iām sorry, did you just list temperatures below freezing?ā
Human:Ā āYeah, but most of us prefer to throw on scarves or jackets at those temperatures it can be a bit nippy.āĀ
Other human:Ā āNah mate, I knew this guy in college who refused to wear anything past his knees and elbows until it was -20 at least.ā
Human:Ā āHeh. Yeah everybody knows someone like that.ā
Alien:Ā āā¦ā¦. And did you also say 50 Celcius? As in, half way to boiling?ā
Human:Ā āEugh. Yes. It sucks, we sweat everywhere, and god help you if you touch a seatbelt buckle, but yes.āĀ
Alien:Ā āā¦ā¦. Weāve got like 50 uninhabitable planets we think you might enjoy.āĀ
āYouāre telling me that you haveā¦ settlements. On islands with active volcanism?ā āWell, yeah. Iām not about to tell Iceland and Hawaii how to live their lives. Actually, itās kind of a tourist attraction.ā āWhat, the molten rock?ā āWell, yeah! Itās not every day you see a mountain spew out liquid rocks! The best one is Yellowstone, though. All these hot springs and geysers from the supervolcanoāā āYou ACTIVELY SEEK OUT ACTIVE SUPERVOLCANOES?ā āShit, man, we swim in the groundwater near them.ā
Sounds like the āDamnedā trilogy by Alan Dean Foster.
āAnd you say the poles of your world would get as low as negative one hundred with wind chill?āĀ
āYup, with blizzards you cant see through every other day just about.ā
āAmazing! when did you manage to send drones that could survive such temperatures?ā
āā¦ well, actuallyā¦ā
āā¦ what?ā
āā¦we kindaā¦ā¦. sentā¦ā¦ā¦.. peopleā¦..ā
āā¦ā
āā¦ā
āā¦what?ā
āwe sent-ā
āno yeah I heard you I just- what? You sentā¦ HUMANSā¦ to a place one hundred degrees below freezing?ā
āy-yeahā
āand they didnātā¦ die?ā
āWell the first few didā
āPEOPLE DIED OF THE COLD AND YOUR SOLUTION WAS TO SEND MORE PEOPLE???!?!?!?ā
My new favorite Humans are Weird quote
āPEOPLE DIED OF THE COLD AND YOUR SOLUTION WAS TO SEND MORE PEOPLE?ā
aka The History of Russia
aka Arctic Exploration
aka The History of Alaska
Being from Alaska, this was sort of how I felt going to college in the lower 48ā²s and learned that no one else had been put through a literal survival camp as a regular part of their school curriculum, including but not limited to:
1. Learning to recognize all forms of animal tracks in the wild so you can avoid bears and moose and search out rabbits and other small animals to eat.
2. Extensive swimming and climbing on glacial pieces with competitions to see who could last the longest, followed by a group sit in the sauna so we wouldnāt get hypothermia (no, not kidding, I really did this many times as a kid!)
3. How to navigate using the stars to get back to civilization.
4. How to select the right type of moss from the trees to start a fire with damp wood (because, yāknow, youāre in a field of snow. Nothing is dry.)
5. How to carve out a small igloo-like space to sleep in the snow to preserve body heat and reduce the windchill so you wonāt freeze to death in the arctic.
āIām telling you, I donāt think we need to worry about territory conflicts with the humans. You know all those deathtrap hell-worlds in the Argoth Cluster?ā āThose worthless rocks? Yeah.ā ā80% of them are considered āresort destinationsā by those freaky little primates.ā
This would be an interesting read if this was a book.
Like, an alien invasion is about to start and the book is a chronicle of how the aliens couldnāt handle both humans in general and the range of environments and ended up being destroyed through the eyes of one of the aliens.
Like a caption from the book would be something like
āSo we sent a recon team to this place called Russia, but all weāve heard back thus far is about the temperatures, giant monsters with fur the humans call āBearsā, and that once again, we have been reminded of how heavily well armed almost ever human settlement is.
Thus far we have lost more than a good chunk of our forces through experiments gone wrong, unsuccessful fire fights, and above all else, the humans seem to be more worried about these strange variation of their species calling themselves āClownsā.
I donāt know what a Clown is, but sounds as if it is the dominant faction of this planet, and considering we only just found out humans practically poison themselves with this thing called beer and only get stronger and more violent, I donāt ever want to encounter such a being.
I believe this invasion was a mistake.ā
Iāve been reading a bunch of these and all I can think about now is aliens finding out about our insane ability to walk away from accidents.
āHuman Colony SDO435**, this is Gxanimi survey vessel 3489. We regret that we must inform you that the wreckage of your ship āGecko Flyerā has just been detected on planet F56=K=. We offer expressions of sympathy for this catastrophe.ā
āShit, thanks for telling us, weāll be right there.ā
āWhy?ā
āTo find our people, of course.ā
āā¦ you wish to retrieve the corpses for your traditional death rituals, of course, we understand. We have sent the coordinates.ā
āWhat do you mean, bodies? No survivors at all? There must be some.ā
āOfficial mouthpiece of Human Colony SDO435**, the ship has crashed. It has impacted the planetās surface at speed. Moreover, this might have happened as much as five vek ago. We do not understand why you speak of āsurvivorsā.ā
āOh, thereāll be survivors. There always are.ā
ā(closes hyperspace voicelink) How sad that they are unable to accept the reality of their loss.ā
*
āHey, Gxanimi survey vessel 3489, thanks for letting us know about the Gecko Flyer. More than half the crew made it!ā
āMade what?ā
āThey survived! A couple of lost limbs and so on, but theyāll be fine.ā
āā¦ but that vessel was destroyed! Images have been examined!ā
āOh, well, everyone in the fore-below compartment was crushed, obviously, but the others made it out.ā
āā¦ but the crash was vek ago! Excuse weā¦ at least eighty of your ādaysā! How could they survive without a ship? Without shelter and supplies?ā
āWell, the wreckage gave them some shelter, and of course the emergency supplies kept them going until they could start growing stuff. Itās actually a nice little planet, they said. Quite a lot of edible flora and fauna. T-shirt weather, in summer, too.ā
āWhat isā¦ t-shirt weather?ā
āOh, you know, when itās comfortable to go around with only modesty covering over the epidermis. Exposed limbs.ā
āThat planet is so cold that even water solidifies in its atmosphere!ā
āWell, in winter, obviously. But we like that. Listen, our people have been raising crops down there, and thatās usually how we rule a planet as ācolonizedāā¦. is anyone else using it, or can we call it?ā
āErā¦ we have claimed the warmer planets in the system, but we believe we could come to some arrangement.ā
*
It was really nice, the humans thought, how carefully most of the aliens kept an eye out for downed ships after that, once they found out that humans tended to survive anything less than explosive decompression orā¦ well, explosions generally. Theyād immediately inform the nearest outpost of a wreckās location, or even ship survivors back themselves. It was very thoughtful.
They didnāt find out until a long time later that the Gxanimi had put out the word to every species they were in contact with. It was vital that everyone knew the things they had learned about humans after that first encounter.
1. Humans can literally walk away from an impact that renders a space-worthy hull so much scrap and would have actually liquefied a Gxanimi.
2. Humans will eat just about anything not immediately fatal to them - including, in extremis, the corpses of their dead crewmates. In fact, most human vessels keep a list of those willing to be eaten and those whose socio-religious scruples forbid it. They have a ridiculously high tolerance for dangerous substances, and if they can breathe on a planet they can probably eat something on it too. They also have something they call the āWatney Protocolā, which requires them to carry live soil samples, seeds, and simple tools that will allow them to start farming their own native foodstuffs on any remotely habitable planet immediately in the event of an accident.
3. Once theyāve farmed a planet, they bond with it. Theyāll be polite, but itāll take significant effort to get rid of them even so.
Conclusion: If a human ship crashes on a planet you like and want to keep, get other humans to come and get them immediately. Remove them yourself if you have to. Even the worst crash can result in a thriving colony in a few vek.
And donāt, for the love of gravitational regularity, try to solve that problem by killing off the survivors. Just donāt. It wonāt work and it just makes all the rest of them mad.
This is the best one yet!Ā
if any humans spill on your planet, make sure to scrape them up real fast and repackage them or youāll never get them out.Ā
Sometimes I just start singing and my mom joins in
Whoaā¦
#donāt trust this #theyāre probably sirens
These two are singing āO magnum mysteriumā by Tomas Luis De Victoria! Itās a very pretty piece from the renaissance that has a lot of different voice parts singing totally different melodies that mesh well together. I sung tenor for a song of his as well. It sounds ethereal in cathedrals and bathrooms alike my opinion. Its the roomās ability to bounce sound and make it resonate, giving it itās āmermaid sirenā like quality. It sounds great. Congratulations, you both! Sounds very pretty and seems like a fun time to clean with things like that.
#definitely sirens
Gossamer Wings by William Dalton on Flickr.
Legends say that hummingbirds float free of time, carrying our hopes for love, joy and celebration. Like a hummingbird, we aspire to hover and savor each moment as it passes; embrace all that life has to offer and to celebrate the joy of every day. The hummingbirdās delicate grace reminds us that life is rich, beauty is everywhere, every personal connection has meaning and that laughter is lifeās sweetest creation. āPapyrus
Iā¦Ahā¦hmm.
Look, itās a great photo. The photographer kicked butt. They should be very proud of this photo.
But hummingbirds are not carrying your hopes for joy around. I am sorry. Have you met hummingbirds? Hummingbirds believe strongly that they should be eighteen feet tall and have flamethrowers. They are a half ton of pugnacious wrapped up in a half ounce of feathers. Given the choice, hummingbirds would fly around with āRide of the Valkyriesā blasting out of tiny speakers on their wings, putting the eyes out of their enemies.
They do not fear humans, but if they learn that humans will provide feeders, they will become very demanding. They are fiercely territorial. They areā¦kind of jerks, actually.
Also, there are papers indicating that female hummingbirds engage in what can only be termed ānectar-based prostitutionā where they trade sexual favors to males in return for access to particularly rich nectar sources.Ā
If your hopes for love involve nectar and your hopes for joy involve crushing your foes, seeing them driven before you, hearing the lamentations of their nestlings, etc, then possibly the hummingbird may carry them around, otherwiseā¦uhā¦have you considered vultures? Vultures are very pleasant, affectionate, and social birds. You should probably give them your hopes and dreams. They would be better at it.Ā
Did I mention itās a great photo?
VULTURES, NOW.
this is Jack.
Jack (full name: Jack Sparrow) lives at the Hawk Conservancy. (Heās missing some toes because he was rescued from Vulture Smugglers.)
When you interact with Jack, you can tell heās at about the level of ā¦ something between a ferret and a dog. Funny short little attention span, and a weird face to look at, but a human reads him as curious, friendly and interested in people.
When you meet a working vulture, you realize that they are definitely a wild predatory animal and very instinctive, but with a consciousness that extends to interest in their surroundings; like, heās very much focused on THE SNACK, but before and after the SNACKTIME he also wants to have a chat about your day and look at your face and peer into your camera and ask to look at the pictures you took and then say āhey now take one where Iām doing duckfaceā and youāre like āok Jack go aheadā
Contrast with owls, which are typically pretty, but which are basically as interactive as a pop-up ad. They exist to land on things and eat them. They are not complicated. Vultures are hey-whatcha-doin. Theyāre yeah Iām a psychopomp but my real hobby is DJ-ing. Theyād like to couchsurf next time theyāre in town. Youād let them.
I would give Jack my dreams to carry. He would hold them well, in his big black lovely inky eyes, in his broken gentle feet.
Why is the last line making me tear up?
What a sweet vulture.
This is the best thing I have read today tbh
I was just thinking about jack today and then someone was like āhey I liked jackā so letās have jack back again.
Vultures are so sweet and startlingly clever. They may not be ravens, but theyāre intelligent, playful, and affectionate.
Capoeira.
Thatās probably a superpower.
Fuck it up !
Disguised as dancing African slaves in Brazil would practice this capoeria as a fighting style
You see the way she practically floats midair when she flips? The amount of power and control it takes to make this look so effortless - hot dang this lady is good.
fun fact the west coast does not have cicadas so you can imagine my surprise when my LA ass moved to Philly for college when all the trees started screaming while theyāve been on fire plenty of times where Iām from they never screamed
25% of the people have a 4th cone and see colors as they are
Given the sudden interest for the color of dresses and vision, here some of the fascinating findings we did recently.
The color nuances we see depend on the number and distribution of cones (=color receptors) in our eye. You can check this rainbow: how many color nuances do you count?
You see less than 20 color nuances: you are a dichromats, like dogs, which means you have 2 types of cones only. You are likely to wear black, beige, and blue. 25% of the population is dichromat.
You see between 20 and 32 color nuances: you are a trichromat, you have 3 types of cones (in the purple/blue, green and red area). You enjoy different colors as you can appreciate them. 50% of the population is trichromat.
You see between 33 and 39 colors: you are a tetrachromat, like bees, and have 4 types of cones (in the purple/blue, green, red plus yellow area). You are irritated by yellow, so this color will be nowhere to be found in your wardrobe. 25% of the population is tetrachromat.
You see more than 39 color nuances: come on, you are making up things! there are only 39 different colors in the test and probably only 35 are properly translated by your computer screen anyway :)
It is highly probable that people who have an additional 4th cone do not get tricked by blue/black or white/gold dresses, no matter the background light ;)
(x)
I see 21 colors. I had no idea there are so many more.
I see 35-39 colours, and I hate the colour yellow. That was actually what made me curious enough to stop scrolling and count. Who knew there was a scientific reason behind my colour preferences? So the idea here is that what I see as annoyingly, garishly bright, most people donāt see as clearly, and thatās why itās ācheerful?ā (Iāve never understood that description of yellow.)
I barely saw 18 or 19. Dang :/
Im fucking colorblind
I saw 39 and Iām not making it up. the brighter greens/yellows were painful to look at, whereas the blues = heaven.Ā
I see 37. No wonder Iāve always hated yellow.
I saw 35 colors. Maybe itās everyone else who just canāt see the blue/green colors that people always tell me I see āwrong!āĀ
I also am not a huge fan of yellow, though itās ok in small amounts.
( I also never saw that damn dress as white and gold. So, thereās that.)
If I ever become a history teacher, Iām going to write āgullibleā on the ceiling. Then in the middle of class, Iāll announce, āThereās āgullibleā written on the ceiling.ā After the whole look vs. not look shenanigan occurs, I shall then slam my books on my desk, prop myself up, lean forward and say, āWelcome to history. Your first lesson? Check your facts for yourself.ā
chaotic evil
chaotic learning
What pre-lessons will you teach in the first half of class
Syllabus and schedule. Generally itās a good idea to talk about the upcoming school year before you throw them into the past, just for context.Ā
im just
the cherokee language has a verb tense that specifically notes the exclusion of a person in the conversation
so thereās iām going, youāre going, weāre going, and weāre going (but not you)Ā
i love it
This is called āclusivityā and itās found a bunch of languages, including Chechen, Vietnamese, Samoan, and Quechua.
Some languages just side-eye harder than others.
@dedalvs this is like in Trigedasleng too, right? Or is that a different term?
Oso vs. osir. It is so.
