Calling myself out
You know your UPS driver. Maybe not by name, but you know them because you rely on them. You see them in your neighborhood every day, with their distinct brown package car, friendly face, and on-time service. Your UPS driver—plus hundreds of thousands of other UPS workers represented by the Teamsters—needs your support, understanding, and compassion. Because they're in a fight for their lives. Right now, more than 340,000 UPS Teamsters are negotiating a new contract with the world's biggest delivery company. These are human beings who work long hours in extremely demanding jobs to provide for their families. They take pride in their work, with UPS drivers consistently finishing at the top when Americans choose their most liked and trusted professions. They also sacrifice. UPS workers did not have the option to seek safe haven during the pandemic. As many Americans took advantage of work-from-home options, UPS Teamsters showed up for work without interruption. They made sure all of us, across the nation, got the goods and services we needed to survive. Toilet paper. Diapers. Groceries. Even vaccines, which UPSers delivered long before they were eligible to take them. UPS Teamsters made sure our supply chain kept running and our economy stayed afloat, sacrificing their own health to get the job done.
Since it's not mentioned here, the union contract is set to expire at the end of the month, July 31. That is when the union says it plans to strike, though I'm sure it's already affecting ship times.
This is a p big deal because alternative shipping companies cannot handle their usual work + the overflow from UPS. This upcoming strike is well documented, so it's likely companies will attempt to redirect their needs to places like FedEx and... not much else to say but it will be interesting to see how it all falls apart.
The thing with the writers strike and actors strike is that. You ALL have to start realizing that the cool creative jobs they paint as "glamorous" in the media are actually ALL struggling in a big way, and basically everyone below "Huge Household Name" is actually often having to spend THEIR OWN DAY JOB MONEY to keep trying and trying to "break into" that household name status.
Like, im a cartoonist. Just starting out, but already fairly successful! My comics are sold in a handful of states, i sell out of my works, and i even have been featured as a finalist in a couple awards shows AND have pieces bought by a cartooning museum. I still barely make a couple hundred per month off it IF IM LUCKY, and spend almost as much trying to print more. Oh yes, i have to print my own comics! And working for a big comic company, they generally require you to bring some level of your own equipment. Heck, even if you make it "big" as a cartoonist...you wanna know how much you get paid if your comic that you spent months of back-breaking labor on is adapted into a marvel movie? A one-time check for $5000. Out of the BILLIONS those movies make, in perpetuity for eternity, you are given $5k. Pre-tax. Pre-agent. Pre-lawyer. (Yes we have agents and lawyers too, quite often). There's hardly any cartoonists who can afford to quit their day jobs, and even those who do are never living above the lower middle class range.
Now obviously cartooning is not the same as acting or writing, but my point is that we NEED yall to stop thinking just because you see our work as cool that we are living some dream life!!! Basically the only people who are living these dream lives you think of are CEOs of major companies and the occasional celebrity. The rest of us are just out here, struggling to survive just like you, we just happen to have a side hustle which is Kinda Cool.
Ruby Bridges is 68. This is not ancient history. Not even close.
I know Ruby. She's a really nice person. The idea that they would try and write what she did as a girl out of history is shocking to me on so many levels, the simplest of which is just, but don't they know how lovely she is?
One of my favorite things is learning what words people used for this hand game—where you sit in a circle with your hands facing up, right hand on top of your neighbor's, left hand below your other neighbor's, and you sequentially go around slapping right hand into left— where they lived when they were kids. The regional variations are the best. It's in Wikipedia as "Stella Ella Ola," but for me (and many NE USAmericans) it's "Quack Diddly Oso."
The way these games are taught to younger kids by older kids and spread throughout regions is so fascinating; I want a visualization where you can see what happens when one random kid 50 years ago moved to a different state. I have no idea how widespread this game is, but I think it's all across the US and Canada, at a minimum. I haven't seen my kids play this—is it still a thing?
In my school in the 90s, it went like this—
Quack diddly oso, Quack, quack, quack, Señorita, Rita, rita, rita, Velour, velour, Velour, velour, velour, velour, 1, 2, 3, 4!
I especially appreciate the versions that include “your mother smells like pizza,” “the toilet over fulled,” and “the cat peed on the floor,” “potatoes on the floor-a”
What about you? Anyone play it outside of North America?
everyone who played “down by the banks,” I feel sorry for you that you had such a boring version
funnytwittertweets
same energy as that buffy episode where the big bad ‘can’t be hurt by any weapon forged’ and she’s like ‘it’s been a 500 years are you sure’ and annihilates it with a fuckin M136 rocket launcher
I could be wrong, but I don't think rocket launchers are made in forges.
Plant of the Day
Tuesday 18 July 2023
On a roadside verge by a cottage was this fine plant of Centaurea macrocephala (giant knapweed, Aremanian basket flower). This herbaceous perennial has stiff stems carrying large, shining buds of brown papery scales from which burst the yellow thread-like flower petals.
Jill Raggett
Hey. Why isn’t the moon landing a national holiday in the US. Isn’t that fucked up? Does anyone else think that’s absurd?
It was a huge milestone of scientific and technological advancement. (Plus, at the time, politically significant). Humanity went to space! We set foot on a celestial body that was not earth for the first time in human history! That’s a big deal! I’ve never thought about it before but now that I have, it’s ridiculous to me that that’s not part of our everyday lives and the public consciousness anymore. Why don’t we have a public holiday and a family barbecue about it. Why have I never seen the original broadcast of the moon landing? It should be all over the news every year!
It’s July 20th. That’s the day of the moon landing. Next year is going to be the 54th anniversary. I’m ordering astronaut shaped cookie cutters on Etsy and I’m going to have a goddamn potluck. You’re all invited.
Hey. Hey. Tumblr. Ides of March ppl. We can do this
This is a scheduled post for two days before the anniversary of the moon landing. Please get your moon themed items and foods sorted now in anticipation.
I’m a cis man sure but i also wanna opt out of the gender binary. None of that shit is my fault or my responsibility and i don’t want any part of it
Believing the gender binary is stupid horseshit doesn’t require me to change my gender actually
Yeaheyah you get it. Not trans but i believe in their beliefs. Sometimes i remember people form gender complexes around what alcoholic beverages or colors they like and i just wonder how they’re not fucking exhausted from keeping up this stupid fucking horseshit. Just do whatever you want forever
@nimagine i know u reblogged this from me but ur so correct 🙏 get peer reviewed