Everything will be alright.

[everythingfox]

Hide and seek master

[milf-adjacent]

"Back during the pandemic" "when covid was still a thing"

Covid is killing over 1000 Americans each week. Covid is the 3rd leading cause of death in the US. Covid is still spreading and mutating. Only 16% of Americans have gotten their boosters in a "vaccine only" strategy to fight the disease (that doesn't work because vaccinated people can and do catch and spread covid). Covid is still a very real threat to you and those you love. Stop talking about it in the past tense. Stop living a lie. It's not 2019. You'll never live in a "post covid" world. Our wishes for "normal" have destroyed any chance of a true end to the pandemic unless we act. Mask up and stop the spread if you really want to past-tense covid.

[neil-gaiman]

I got COVID early in October and had to close down my life and recover. Yesterday afternoon i walked to my local drugstore and got this year's vaccine (I'd already had a flu vaccine late in October).

I'll be on a big stage in front of 1500 people on Monday and Tuesday, being Charles Dickens, and won't be able to wear a mask. I hope enough of the audience each night masks up to help stop the events becoming spreaders.

[penandinkprincess]

i do not at all mean this in a perjorative manner, but i do think it’s important to be able to consume a piece of media and go, “i’m not the audience for this” and be able to just walk away 

there doesn’t have to be something wrong or “problematic” about something for a person to not like it. personal taste is personal taste. but something not doing it for you doesn’t mean it automatically has to be wrong or bad. it’s just not for you. 

[sindri42]

There’s been several times when I’ve watched a thing and been like, they clearly did what they intended to do, and did it well, and I don’t want any part of it. This is a high quality and deeply unpleasant piece of art.

[queenclaudiabrown]

“This is a high quality and deeply unpleasant piece of art” is a wonderful line, I love it, I feel it in my soul

[saxifraga-x-urbium]

too good a take to be left in the tags

[obstinaterixatrix]

Recently, my son said to me after seeing a ballet on television: “It’s beautiful but I don’t like it.” And I thought, Are many grown-ups capable of such a distinction? It’s beautiful, but I don’t like it. Usually, our grown-up thinking is more along the lines of: I don’t like it, so it’s not beautiful. What would it meant to separate those two impressions for art making and for art criticism?

- Sarah Ruhl, 100 Essays I Don’t Have Time To Write

[everythingfox]

Best friends

[raptorific]

GLaDOS is literally the funniest character ever. Her arc culminates in her saying "I hate you so much it's not even worth the trouble of killing you, so just fucking LEAVE. And on your way out here's a full choir to sing 'Goodbye My Darling,' an Aria I wrote in Italian about how I love you and want you to be safe, which mentions you by name. Don't read into it. Get the fuck out. And here, something to remember me by: a box with a heart on it. Leave." to a woman who has literally never responded to anything she's ever said

[ampervadasz]

Kukac

[riverofdragons]

[the0dd0ne]

Caterpillar

[everythingfox]

It’s an illusion

[everythingfox]

Give him the stick

(via)

[everythingfox]

Capybara scritches

(via)

[everythingfox]

A lovely wise lady

(via)

[everythingfox]

He’s helping

(via)

[wormsical]

RATING: NOT CUTE

this girl does NOT want to work. she wants to go back to bed because she is sososososo tiredd. she wants no responsibilities either please.

[throwtime]

I’m about to have a fun afternoon.

So my trainer’s bf cheated on her. She broke up with him. He’s holding her stuff hostage until she agrees to talk with him. Which she refuses.

She trains; for free mind you; three college linebackers, a college wrestler, two martial artists, a body builder, and… wait for it…. a Navy seal. We’re gonna go get her shit for her.

This should make for an interesting story.

[throwtime]

So everyone who commented on this being like the avengers, you are absolutely right. That’s what all of us had in our heads as we were rolling over to dude’s house. But I’m very proud to say, this ended without violence.

Arrival:

So the super friends all jumped into one of the linebacker’s explorer and headed over to dude’s house. Ok the squad: you all know me, but the other martial artist is a little wirey hapkido guy, the linebackers are all giants (an estimated combined weight of I’d say 750-800lbs), the wrestler looks like an escaped gorilla, then the navy seal looks like your average guy but something about him is unsettling. Really unsettling. Unfortunately, the body builder had to work. Anyway, we send the Hapkido guy and the wrestler to the door first and dude answers, screams at them, and then slams the door in their face. Then the giant linebackers head over and they ring the door bell again. Lo and behold, he was much more polite, but still denied access. Finally, me and the seal join the fray. I casually make my way towards the front of the group, but the seal decides to CLIMB THE BANISTER. We all just turned and started at him completely shocked when dude answers the door. He looks at this weird mismatched group of relatively threatening individuals and one guy perched on his banister like batman. He was like “FINE. Go take what you’re looking for.”

Retrieval:

So we’re all walking through the house gathering what we think are her things and putting them into two boxes. Mind you. We are completely guessing. We didn’t even tell her we were coming, therefore we had no list of items.The only one really being productive was Hapkido, who was legitimately looking for stuff. The linebackers were just randomly picking up furniture, turning it over, and putting it back down. Just showing off how strong they were. In case the numbers game wasn’t enough, I guess they were letting him know they could break him if they wanted to. The seal was just shadowing dude in his own house. Walking behind him, not saying much, just being creepy. Then there’s me. Who was causing general mischief…. He said to take what I was looking for, that’s what I was looking for. Ahaha and the wrestler made a fricken sandwich. Because “you guys look like you have it under control, and I’m a sucker for egg salad.” We were in and out in 15 minutes.

Delivery:

So the autobots rolled out and headed towards homegirl’s spot. She was conveniently outside when we rolled up. We got out and she was like, how do you all even know each other. The truth is, we don’t. She sent us all an email once and didn’t blind copy us all. She vented to all of us about dude holding onto her stuff and we started emailing and that was that. We told her that we went to see her ex. “OMG what did you say to him?” Nothing. We’re not messenger boys. We’re delivery boys. And we gave her her boxes of stuff. She went through the first box and said that was most of her stuff. Then she got to my box and asked “Wtf is all that shit.” So I explained that I took all the batteries out of his remote controls, his deodorant, the light bulb out of his master closet, every pair of dress socks that I could find, the laces out of his running shoes, and all the toilet paper in the house. The guys just looked at me and kind of nodded like they were impressed. She then unexpectedly started CRYING and thanked us. So you have this group of meat heads all standing awkwardly with this weeping trainer. It was quiet for a second when the seal was like “So…. chipoltle?” And we all got burrito bowls.

What a great day.

[impling]

I was thinking about this story for no reason and decided I should grace you all with it again.

[guy-who-exists]

crybaby learns how to swim - subtitled

[fozmeadows]

ALWAYS REBLOG THE EGGSEAL

[fozmeadows]

in times of trouble, eggseal comes to me

speaking words of wisdom:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

egg

[vinceaddams]

best thing about tumblr is seeing pictures of Weird Creatures I’d never heard of before

[hermeticbridgetroll]

Tufted Pigmy Squirrel. I learned of it recently and was immediately delighted

[vinceaddams]

Oh my goodness!! I’d never heard of it either, and am also delighted!

[ilikeit-art]

Density of penguin feathers to protect from the cold.

Emperor penguins reputedly have the highest feather density of any bird, with around 100 feathers per square inch of skin (15 per square centimeter).

[rayneydayss]

It is my favorite thing in the world when I notice an author leaving sneaky little fun things in the text, especially when it relates to linguistics.

Terry Pratchett does this the most out of anyone I’ve read; I’ve just started The Fifth Elephant (reading the Guards series for the first time!) and there’s teeny little linguistic quips built into the very text itself.

“It’s one of the major towns in Überwald, sir,” said Carrot, balancing the umlaut perfectly.

…

“Klatch? But they’re even farther from Uberwald than we are!” -Sam Vimes

“A large country, Uberwald” [Vetinari]

Pratchett, in dialogue, only uses the umlauts when someone who knows how to pronounce it properly is speaking. And I think it’s doubly funny that Vetinari can’t pronounce it right.

Has anyone else noticed stuff like this in other Discworld books?

[imsorrymyusernameishardtotype]

I just finished 'maskerade' by Terry Pratchett and he does something very similar with punctuation; the ghost of the opera writes with many exclamation marks and when the person behind the ghost is revealed they also start to talk with many exclamation marks at the end.

Another character in the book always speaks in a way that sounds cheery and excited and so in most of the book she has '?!' at the end of her sentences. At some point Agnes tries to mimic her and also has those '?!' to convey the same thing.

But afterward, it isn't pronunciation ( like in the fifth elephant ) its more intonation for Maskerade and it follows the theme of theatrics in the oprea and how dramatic characters are naturally.

[rayneydayss]

That’s still a great example of Pratchett’s characterization through punctuation/spelling/linguistic bullshit!!

Like nothing will ever be more obvious than Death’s all caps font, or other big font decisions, but I looove finding little things like these that most people don’t notice, especially because it makes me feel like I’m sharing a joke with Pratchett, that even the characters in the novel don’t get.

I feel like the ‘?!’ definitely would make everything feel more dramatic, and especially when it’s only used for specific characters; I haven’t gotten to Maskerade yet but it sounds fitting.

[imsorrymyusernameishardtotype]

Yessssss the lil inside joke where you think to yourself damn that's smart but it was also smart of you to pick up on it

I really love the different ways of speaking of different people cause it genuinely gives the person a voice, especially in the witches' series ( it's the one I have read most ) where the spelling or grammar might not be correct but its consistent.

[rayneydayss]

Yes!!!! I’ve seen it most frequently with Sgt Colon and Nobby Nobbs, where Pratchett will write how the characters would if they were writing instead of speaking, or spelling things the way he wants it pronounced.

It honestly does wonders to saturate the reader in the socio-cultural setting, like, as modern readers we can forget literacy was up until very recently in history a high privilege, but the way Pratchett writes his dialogue immerses the reader in the very brine of Ankh Morpork. I love it

[imsorrymyusernameishardtotype]

I have only read one of the watch novels but I love the lil breadcrumbs of writing quirks in books, like in the witches series you can read some of the letters Nanny Ogg sends and the spelling is consistent but you physically need to sound out the words to understand sometimes because that's probably how she knows how to spell.