Ritz

Any Pronouns - Profile picture by @solsticesstuff, banner by yours truly. Semi-retired semi-professional cellist. Engineering student. Neurodivergent and physically disabled. Running on spite, sacrifice, shape note music, and the company of friends. See pinned post for more info about me! @thesilencedsovereign everywhere else I post art

[thesilencedsovereign]

Hello! I am Ritz. I use any pronouns, but I like he/him on the internet and she/her IRL. You can find me at this same username at most other art websites. You can find my motorsports sideblog at @ritz-watches-f1.

I am neurodivergent (autistic with hyperacusis) and identify as twice exceptional. I am also physically disabled (several invisible disabilities). I reclaim "differently abled" and use that terminology to refer to myself in specific contexts. For why, see this post. If you don't like that, leave.

I am a visual artist. I'm also a musician - I've played cello for most of my life, and have dabbled in other instruments such as violin (in elementary school) and piano (for a couple of years; I want to learn it again now). Somewhere along the way, I turned into an arranger for small ensembles of all kinds (e.g., cello choir, string quartets/small chamber groups, community ensembles) and a very beginner composer.

I am also an engineering student!

I post about my interests; for an introduction, feel free to read this post. I also post about my experiences with disability. I don't consider myself a formal advocate. I just talk about my life, and if that's something that relates to advocacy? Cool!

For the most part, the tag taxonomy of this blog: #shape note or #sacred harp = Self-explanatory. #actually autistic, #actually disabled, etc = Disability and autism, etc. If it's tagged with a health condition, the post will be about that condition or how it interfaces with parts of my life. #music = Everything that is NOT shape note and sacred harp, but still music. #music monday = My weekly series where I take a song and I talk about it. Inspired by an IRL friend whom I hold dear. #planeposting = Aviation. #my art = Also self-explanatory. #life update = Personal posts that don't necessarily mention anything else here #ritz answers = Asks.

I also reblog fandom content and try my best to tag it with the fandom.

[longislandairpower]

[solsticesstuff]

@thesilencedsovereign

[thedailyfasola]

He leadeth me, He leadeth me,

By His own hand He leadeth me;

His faithful foll'wer I would be,

For by His hand He leadeth me

[moderntunesmith]

Pennsylvania (Shumway)

Kicking things off here with a bit of a bang. Those who sing regularly from the Shenandoah Harmony or perhaps the Northern Harmony are probably more familiar with the Jeremiah Ingalls tune (ShH 254) of the same name ('The trumpet sounds, hell trembles, heaven rejoices/Lift up ye saints with cheeeerful voices!'), but I'd argue this one (ShH 282) is the more musically interesting of the two. Shumway doesn't quite get enough love I reckon, despite 192 Schenectady and 217 Ballstown in the Sacred Harp being both popular and bangers.

Visit Original Link

[saxifrage-wreath]

as it's that time of year again, I just want to say quite unironically that these lines from Francis Scott Key's greatest hit go very hard:

And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;

like, the Americans are being continuously bombarded by enemy artillery and they're finding something positive about it - it's providing illumination so they can see their flag still flying and that gives them hope and courage. It's kinda like the line attributed to Leonidas of Sparta about massed Persian arrows providing pleasant shade for fighting the battle of Thermopylae.

God bless America, and happy birthday Uncle Sam

[thesilencedsovereign]

The rocket's red glare is the phrase on the NASA America 250 commemorative patch/lapel pin, which I have a pin on its way!! YAY!

But I think that the phrase is not just about the War of 1812 now. It's about the people launching rockets into space, and there's proof now our Flag is still there (on the moon, in the space station, hell, on satellites probably).

[ralfmaximus]

Adobe quietly injects AI content into user’s files, hikes prices

Adobe Creative Cloud quietly rewrites users' files with AI, hikes prices, sparking outrage.

Evil Hat Productions, a TTRPG and board game company, announced on Bluesky that the latest PDF files for their Umdaar game had injected autogenerated AI alt text, without warning. Other users are reporting that not only does alt text generate for undefined images, it also overwrites previously existing alt text.

Adobe raised their subscription fees from $59.99 to $69.99 a month, citing advanced AI features as the reason, while simultaneously injecting AI generated text into users' PDF files without permission.

Consider this reason #59,999 to dump adobe.

If you haven't already.

[phae-touched]

Adobe alternatives from XdanielArt (as of 2024, there is probably an updated collection by now).

[intheimpalawithdean]

[thesilencedsovereign]

I am fucking DIZZY! It is a fucking AAAAAAHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH I hate this. Y’all, never let me use my phone.

[spanielanabelart]

Everything that I've drawn for Creative Clash, a Discord art event, so far! Since Art Fight has started, I do not know how well I'll juggle them both, but I'll try!

[crazysodomite]

what would be fair for stuff like this?

me person ally im greedy as fuck so i canbt judge properly. be honest. you think a million dollars is too much?

[bebsi-cola]

"nothing about us without us" needs to extend to different autistic people within the community as well as between autistic and allistic groups. including autistic people with different symptoms or severity of autism is essential. you can't use any old autistic person to represent the whole spectrum. for example, if your group of autistic people are all speaking then they shouldn't be making statements on the non verbal experience, even if they are also autistic, because it's not about them, and it is without the people they're pretending to represent.

[drachenmagier]

scanned. :)

[mr-quinnvee-arts]

This is gonna really ruffle some feathers yall

But im so sick of people percieving autism as being so linear. It either goes from "aspergers savant genius young Sheldon Caucasian boy" or "nonverbal unproductive caucasian boy who we deliberately erase" do not forget the people who exist in the middle. Please don't forget about the people who you don't see speaking out about their personal lives. Im a girl, mixed race with fluctuating and medium support needs autistic. I also have an IEP for other things besides autism that significantly impact me and my life in school and my abiltiies to work, drive, leave the house, and socialize.

Don't forget about us who can't enjoy the same benefits you do. Make space for everyone, including DISABLED autistics. Yes you may be level one autistic. You ARE still autistic and I am not erasing your experience. But not everyone who's autistic will be disabled by it. And that's okay, you will always still be apart of the community. I know plenty of autistic adults in my life who can function the same as everyone else with some quirks and a different experience with socializing, school life, and their romantic life. They are still autistic, but not disabled.

If you can drive/have learned to drive with ease and have your license, you will not understand how humiliating and embarrassing it is for someone like me to struggle for YEARS to drive. I am now only permitted to drive with limitations on time duration, who I'm with, I cannot hold conversation or listen to music or anything honestly when I drive. And I don't even have my license yet. I don't have a job either and haven't been able to find one at all (the job market doesn't help at all with that either). I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to work full time as anything besides my special interest. Im lucky my Special interest is profitable and is designed so I don't have to work every day. Most of the people I know who work in my field only work 3 or 4 days a week and it's with assignments, not a 9 to 5 schedule. If I wasn't so lucky that my SI just so happened to be accommodating for me in the work space, I wouldn't be able to work full time.

I'm capable enough to be able to afford and see university and community college in my future. But it would not be possible if I wasn't enrolled in special education right now and if I wouldn't be able to get accessible housing in the dorms (we're STILL up for debate whether I will be able to handle moving away from home and living on campus. Thankfully there is an online version of my major if i am not able to). I take SpEd classes and I have support workers at school in order to be able to function better. But the reality nondisabled people dont see, is this system is so messed up. I still struggle even WITH reasonable accommodations. I still struggle with advocacy and I often do not get the support i need because I am unable to ask for it. Most of the support teachers I had this semester didn't know what the hell they were doing. And some of them treat us like actual vermin, especially the intellectually and cognitively disabled kids and kids with chromosomal disorders. They are the most vulnerable in the community and the people, the adults that are SUPPOSED to help us: dont!!!

Wish me luck this fall guys 🙏🏼😭 please support legislation in favor of medium and high support needs disabled folks. Please support legislation for physically disabled folks in school. Support disabled kids. The 'ugly laws' never really went away in my opinion. I'm still treated like a second class citizen because I can't mask at school 50 percent of the time. Imagine how it feels to be unable to mask 100% of the time. And I'm lucky because I have the ability to type this message out to you right now and post it and organize my thoughts.

Make space for the most vulnerable in our community and stop whining about how prioritizing severely and moderately disabled people "erases" your own experience. USE your privileges.

[thesilencedsovereign]

Reblogging on main instead of on @thisis--ableism if only because I want to add my own personal commentary to this post, and this may be a hot take.

But increasing support and accessibility for the more severely disabled amongst us will benefit us all. We may not all need a 1:1 volunteer notetaker in our class, but the student notetaker posts notes to our class Canvas so ALL of us can benefit from that extra set of eyes (as an example of a university accommodation). I argue that if it’s done by volunteer students, that type of service could be available in every class, not just where a disabled student requests it. (There are rare cases when the university must pay a fellow student to take notes for the disabled student. Still, my ideal applies)

I am fortunate that I’m able to be at university full time, but that’s because I have the privilege of being financially and physically stable, as well as having disabilities that can be managed fairly well considering all things. Not many of us have that privilege.

If you are able and willing to provide accommodations for others — please, do so! Make image descriptions and plain text available in your posts. Use simple language on posts regarding the intellectual disability community. Use camel case for hashtags on sites outside of Tumblr. There are plenty of ways to create accessibility and choose to be a better ally both within and outside of the disability community.

If you’re willing and able to help advocate for other disabled students, workers, or any other member of society who needs adjustments or accommodations in order to participate fully — do so! Let us take the examples of Kitty Cone, the 504 Sit-ins, the disabled folks who crawled up the stairs of the Capitol to ensure Americans with disabilities have, at least, a basic set of rights, . Let us take the examples of accessibility advocates who are unrelenting in their efforts to make the Web accessible for all, and ensure websites conform to WCAG guidelines. We cannot just conform to thoughts and prayers, as gun violence activists have said for years, if not the better part of two decades. The Long COVID and ME advocates — who are often the sickest of us all — still using what’s left of their energy to remind us of the millions missing whose lives will never be the same again.

In summary; Fight for your fucking rights because our lives, all of our lives, depend on it. And accommodate others because what comes around goes around. A more accommodating world is one that more disabled people will be able to participate in.

[thesilencedsovereign]

I am always surprised when my chronic pain is chronic and not ignorable. Like, wow, my legs DO actually hurt when I'm forced to drive errands for my grandma for hours.

[thenatsdorf]

Sharp-tailed Grouse

[d4rk-vigil4nt]

[datasoong47]

@the-black-dragons-den

[shamebats]

The whole concept of migraine triggers is just perfectly suited for making disabled people who are already suffering waste time & energy obsessing over every single thing they do every day, especially their diets, and to then blame themselves for their attack like their problem is a lack of discipline & willpower and not the fact that they have a chronic illness. If you get migraines, that isn't because your lifestyle & diet isn't sufficiently optimized, it's because you have a migraine disorder.

[shamebats]

My neurologist didn't waste any time trying to get me to identify triggers and just got me on the right meds as soon as she could and I'm so glad she never made me feel like it was somehow my fault.

I'm now finally on a preventative that works for me & I literally don't do anything differently but I went from having daily migraines to sometimes not having a single one for over a week. I could do & consume every supposed trigger & still not get a migraine, when before the medication, I could do everything "right" every day for a week & still get a migraine every single day.

It's always like it's a medical disorder that causes your body to react badly to certain normal daily things & the goal should be to make it do that less, not to find ways to totally avoid all those normal daily things.

[shamebats]

Yeah...they're caused by migraine disorders. Because people without them don't get migraines on a regular basis.

The chocolate advice is probably bullshit too. Unless you specifically identify it as something that makes your migraines worse (unlikely), it's way more likely to just be a common craving people have during the prodrome phase before the pain starts. If it's your body signaling you that it wants chocolate, there's no reason not to eat it.

Also, my neurologist said if you take triptans, take them during the headache phase immediately when it starts, not during the aura.

[shamebats]

This isn't just my opinion btw, it's the current state of migraine research that shows that a) evidence for the belief that specific foods can trigger an entire migraine in someone who would've otherwise not had it is just not there and b) people are prone to misidentifying "triggers" and c) some "common triggers" have been shown in research to have protective qualities against migraines in some people and finally, d) the most up to date approach is to, instead of chasing possible triggers, raise your migraine threshold, which for some people can be achieved only with medication, but stuff like exercise & a nutritious diet could possibly also help you become more resistant too, once your threshold has been raised enough that you have the spoons for it, that is.

The Science Behind Migraine Triggers: Are Migraine Triggers Real or Part of the Prodrome Phase? | American Migraine Foundation

Learn more about how “triggers” may actually be signs of migraine prodrome and why identifying migraine triggers is not always easy.

Sometimes when people attempt to carefully track and avoid all their triggers, it creates a sense of guilt. When we think about it this way, the burden is on the person with migraine to avoid their triggers, and people may feel that if they experience an attack, it’s because of their own behavior. “Many times it is just the disease,” says Dr. Halker Singh. “This is the unpredictable nature of migraine. I think we carry enough on our shoulders as it is without the added stigma or guilt [around triggers].” Instead, we can shift to a healthier conversation about awareness in migraine management by learning to recognize prodrome symptoms and early signs of a migraine attack. This puts the focus on a deeper, more personalized understanding of each individual’s own unique experience with migraine. “I think making that shift is a little bit freeing and allows us to separate ourselves from migraine,” says Dr. Halker Singh. “My personal relationship with my migraine changes a little bit—I can separate from my own guilt and say, ‘OK, this is happening, what can I do about it?’” This kind of shift enables someone with migraine to focus more on self-care and addressing what their body needs in the moment during an attack.

The Migraine Trigger Myth: Why We're Often Wrong About What Causes Our – Cerebral Torque

New research reveals that 82% of suspected migraine triggers may be false. Learn how science is challenging traditional beliefs about migrai

Diet and Headache Control | American Migraine Foundation

Your diet can sometimes impact your migraine. Learn which foods are suspected triggers and how to adjust what you eat to help prevent or rel

One study compared headache activity between two groups of people living with migraine while they followed different diets. One diet eliminated foods commonly thought to trigger migraine attacks, and the other diet required patients to eat those same foods. Interestingly, headache frequency improved on both diets. This suggests that particular foods are not likely to trigger an attack, but rather that following a consistent, healthy diet may itself be therapeutic. In other words, feeling that you have control over your headaches may improve your headache symptoms. It also suggests that no single food is a trigger for all people living with migraine.

[shamebats]

There's lots of people in the tags going well my dad's uncles grandma cut X out of her diet & it cured her migraines.

If you're a chronic migraine haver please please learn to ignore all of that. There's always going to be people claiming that doing keto/paleo/gluten-free or cutting out seed oils/sugar/MSG and taking 15 different supplements cured their chronic illness and migraine is much the same. I'm not saying they're lying, they can absolutely believe that's what happened but it doesn't mean any of that is going to work for you nor do you have to try it.

[shamebats]

I had some of my worst most painful headaches while on strong painkillers, at the hospital, eating only bland low sodium vegan hospital food and getting fluids straight into my veins because apparently, the stress of surgery & recovery made my migraine disorder worse. Despite me being on Emgality. That's just what being chronically ill is like sometimes, there's not much you can do. Some of us can't self-optimize ourselves out of it, despite what every armchair neurologist & dietitian seems to think.

[shamebats]

Sometimes the stress of constant headaches & migraines is what's causing your migraines because it's an evil disorder.

[vampbanshee]

friendly reminder that disabled people make up 16% of the population. don't make us an afterthought or an "exception" to your argument.