I’d update my blog description but I suffer from incredible laziness. Anyways I’m not a girl anymore and I use all pronouns. Okay peace out ✌️ 

oops update. im transmasc now 

Officially 6 months post-COVID today and still have symptoms. I think, I hope, it's very slowly getting better, but it's been the worst time.

At the beginning, medical professionals reassured me (despite me being high risk) that most people with PACS/ long COVID are back to normal in just 3 months at the most! Nope!

I'm now about 10 months post-COVID and only recently have I felt significant changes for the better--and I'm still significantly more sick than I was before.

It's been about 14 months since COVID and since then I have been able to drive my car a max of 3 times, I can't even work part time outside the home without a lot of assistance, and I rarely have days (maybe a couple per month, if it's not a particularly bad month) when I'm not actively fatigued and in pain. Same with actually getting sleep. I had to completely abandon many of my routines that previously kept me healthy and sane; I can no longer run, I can't even do much walking to get outside, I haven't been able to touch my bicycle at all, and I have completely lost all of the muscle mass I'd built up when I was weightlifting. In the past year+ I have been more depressed than ever. I can count the times I've gone out to an event or seen friends on one hand. And this is the improved version of my life since. This is far better than I was in the first few months. I don't know if I'll ever get my life back.

Up to 41% of adults develop long COVID.

Over a million USAmericans have died.

And the country is pretending it's over.

53% of my county is fully vaccinated, which is nowhere near herd immunity. And I'm trapped in this hellhole because oh look, I can't work enough to afford moving somewhere else.

BREAKING:

AL SHIFA MEDICAL COMPLEX.

At least 140 Palestinians were executed among them are children

The building that the Israeli occupation blew up this morning in Al-Shifa Medical Complex is the nerve center of the health sector in Gaza City and its north.

All the heart devices, X-ray imaging, and magnetic resonance imaging equipment in Gaza were destroyed after the specialized building was bombed today.

The specialized building destroyed by the occupation contained the largest drug store in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli burned homes last night that were sheltering civilians.

There are families trapped and starving in Al-Shifa Medical Complex since the occupation army entered it days ago.

“Israel bombing targets any moving object inside and around Al-Shifa Medical

Complex.

Communications are still cut off with everyone inside Al-Shifa Medical Complex.

There is no truth to the claims about the israli army withdrawing from Al-Shifa

Medical Complex.

Source - Quds Network

it's cool how these cost almost as much as my house

I feel like I should make a post about this because it’s not something that’s very well-known, and that Americans in particular may need to know about given the uncertain state of our healthcare system at the moment. I’ve wanted to write this out for a while, It’s kind of a long post, so sorry about that!

If you have an emergency and have to go to the hospital, you’ll owe the hospital a lot of money. (I got into a car wreck and broke my ankle and my arm. My hospital bill was around $20,000)

You’ll also owe the ambulance provider, if you need one. (My ambulance bill was about $800)

You may get separate bills from the anesthesiologist or surgeon. (My anesthesiologist bill was $1,700)

You may need follow-up appointments. (My orthopedic surgeon billed me for the appointments and his surgery together and it was about $1,000)

You’ve also got to pay for medical equipment you need afterward, like crutches or a walking boot. (Mine cost about $75)

Altogether, I ended up with almost $24,000 in medical debt from one car accident. That’s a really scary number for someone like me who makes $10/hr at a 12 hour a week job.

I got my debt down to $1075 by making some phone calls and submitting some paperwork.

The first thing I did was contact the hospital. They don’t make it easy to find, but many hospitals (perhaps most hospitals?) have financial assistance programs for people who can’t afford medical bills. I don’t make a lot of money, and I have bills to pay, so they were able to help me. I called the billing department and asked if they had any assistance programs for low income people who can’t pay their bills. I had to call multiple times, and I got transferred in circles by people who didn’t know what I was talking about. Finally, I got an appointment with someone in “Eligibility Services” (I don’t know what other hospitals call it, if it’s something different). I had to bring my pay stubs and copies of all of my bills. When I got to the hospital for the appointment, nobody knew what I was talking about so I had to wander a little to find where I needed to go. I spoke with the guy in Eligibility Services, and I waited for a decision on how much of the bill they would forgive. A month later, I got a call telling me it was totally forgiven.

I did the same thing for my ambulance bill and my anesthesiologist, but the process was a LOT easier. I just had to mail some paperwork and it was totally forgiven.

I didn’t bother with the medical equipment suppliers, since the bills came from separate companies and I didn’t feel like going through the process twice for $75. I was assured at the hospital that they had similar programs for debt forgiveness, so I could have probably avoided paying that too.

The only thing I couldn’t get taken care of was the surgeon/follow-up appointment cost, but they were able to put me on a no-interest payment plan.

Medical debt is scary because it’s something that can come from stuff that’s already really scary. I didn’t need the burden of $24,000 in debt on top of trying to get around on a crutch with a broken arm (it’s not easy, believe me!).. but I can’t imagine what it would be like with a bigger debt or a more severe medical emergency. I see lots of people in even worse trouble than I was in, both financially and medically. Please know that there are options for you when that GoFundMe doesn’t do enough. Even if your income is higher than mine, it’s worth a shot even for partial debt forgiveness.

I am about 900% sure there are people who don`the know this. 

PLEASE READ THIS IF YOU LIVE IN AMERICA AND HAVE MEDICAL BILLS

I had to do this once as well and I can ABSOLUTELY confirm that this is true.

Get in contact with the hospital. Don’t just…sit there and let the anxiety grow and panic and then ignore it in an effort to find peace.

Reblogging this because they don’t teach us this in school

people need to specify it's not just that the US government wants bytedance to sell tiktok, they want it to be sold to a company the US government approves of. the implication being the end goal, if not a ban, is for the US government to gain control over content on the app.

however, this is not the only reason for the tiktok ban. notice how all "national security concerns" are directed specifically at companies from china? the US government doesn't want tech from china to compete with tech monopolies in the US. this has been ongoing

no, buddy, it's not about competition, it's about security. Russia and china are actively trying to influence the western people to vote for anti-western ideals. every Chinese company is owned by their government. all the US does it get this company to a us-approved one so it'll poison our minds LESS

the fact that "eco" and "ethical" are two separate concerns in the global north, and that "eco" is a much more popular concern, with many "eco" products being made in actual sweatshops, is a big part of why i am The Joker

if you think this is an exaggeration or splitting hairs where it doesn't matter:

i used to work at a Local Organic Produce store that's popular with the lefties in my city who are interested in food justice. i quit for a lot of reasons, mostly the boss, but something i will always remember is one of our suppliers coming in to drop off produce, being told her check wasn't ready, and her laughing and responding it didn't matter -- even a low bank account was more than enough to pay the migrants who picked her produce. i am not filling in any blanks here. she said this.

after quitting, this was a common story i told people about my time there. some then became annoyed at me, acting like i was a wokescold trying to undermine the store's "eco" mission with unrelated "ethical" concerns. but, like -- if food justice isn't for the people making food, who the fuck is it for?

like, don't get me wrong. my contention here is that the things go hand in hand, and that something which is unethical isn't actually eco. after all, humans are a part of the fucking ecosystem, and if a product can only be made by unsustainably exploiting humans, then it's unsustainable. doesn't matter which chemicals were used in making it, or whether or not animals were factory farmed.

they *cannot* be separated. a product cannot be either eco or ethical — it must be both. a product that is made through human suffering cannot be eco for the reasons you said; a product that causes human suffering by contributing to the destruction of the ecosystem cannot be ethical. it must be both and we must insist on both

SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP!!! ISRAEL WANTS TO KILL EVERY SINGLE PALESTINIAN IN GAZA!!! STOP SAYING THEYRE DEFENDING THEMSELVES!!! DEFENDING THEMSELVES FROM WHAT! FROM WHAT!!! SHUT UP YOU FUCKING GENOCIDAL CUNTS!!!!!!!!!!!

so surreal going through legislative voting records from even just a few years ago, but especially 10+ years ago. in virginia's GA in 2024, you can generally assume that dems will vote in favor of LGBT rights while republicans will vote against, so currently the "game" is mostly just keeping a dem lead in all ur comittees and strategizing which bills to pass through while we still have a republican governor (vs which bills to save for future years where they won't get vetoed). but when you go through GA records from within my lifetime there's bills that were like "gay sex is a crime against nature" or "tell congress to ban gay marriage nationally" and not only did these kinds of bills pass but a number of dems were supportive of them. a lot of these lawmakers (both dem and republican) are still in office

Guys, it's time to drop Google.

Google isn't the only search engine in the whole internet, there are others! And we need to diversify our search engine usage or we're gonna end up where we were a decade and change ago with the Internet Explorer issue. We can't let a single brand monopolize everything! This is why Google Search can afford to suck so hard: because people use it regardless! And there are alternatives.

A little bit about search engines, there are 3 types: crawlers, which work by scraping the web and developing their own indexes; metas, which get their results from the crawler-type search engines and therefore depend entirely upon them; and mixed, those which have their own (small) index but also pull results from the crawlers.

Right now, there are a couple of independant crawlers apart from Google, Bing (from Mycrosoft) and Yandex (the Russian one): this are Mojeek and Wiby.

Supporting independant crawlers is the easiest way to fight the shittyfication of the internet.

Mojeek.com is an independant british search engine with its own growing index commited to fighting internet censorship. It's small, and therefore it's usability isn't as good as that of the Big Three, but it doesn't censor, it's fairly respectful of people's privacy, and it doesn't drown you in adds. For those old enough to remember, it's a lot like early 2000s Google: you can find what you need, but if you write "dig shelter" instead of "dog shelter", that's what it's gonna search for. That said, please try to use it and support it as much as you can before we end up entirely dependant on Google, Bing and big corps adds. [click here to go to Mojeek]

Wiby.me is a new indie project that is literally dedicated to bringing back the old-school web. It's goal is to index as many personalized websites as possible, and NOT commercial sites. So, for those of you who can't find any answers to technical questions beyond highschool level because Google buries them under a gazillion commercial sites and other meaningless shit, keep an eye on this project! It has a lot of potential. And, if you know of any personal websites that have great stuff but have been murdered by Google, you can go over to Wiby and submit it to their index. [click here to go to Wiby]

Aside from those, there are also meta search engines you can use to ween yourself off Google and search for random, day to day stuff.

Qwant.com is my go-to here—it has its own index and pulls from Bing, has relatively little censorship, and is fairly private. This is the one I use on my phone for everyday stuff. [click here to go to Qwant].

Historically, DuckDuckGo has always been a go-to for those who want a search engine that respects your privacy and doesn't censor. Personally, I've never been a fan, and there have been a LOT of scandals in recent years. It supposedly has its own index and pulls from Bing, much like Qwant, but I don't know. I just don't like it. Still, I've added it here for completeness' sake.

If you have Firefox Mobile browser, you can set any of these search engines as your default search engine and you can also add the others as secondary search engines and switch quicky from the navigation bar. If you don't have firefox mobile though, what are you doing with your life??? Go get it!! It is So. Much. Better. You can have add blockers and watch YouTube add free, for free! You can have reader mode and dark mode add-ons! You can have the world oh my goshhhh, drop Chrome!!

4get.ca is my last recommendation: it works a lot like SearX, but honestly better. It doesn't have its own index, but pulls from many others. I think it's the best for reaserch, since it allows you to search for answers from different indexes, is easy to configure, add free, and avoids censorship as much as it can. It's also very privacy conscious, so that's an other plus, and it has that late 90s / early 2000s vibe that I totally dig. [click here to go to 4get]

If you wanna learn more about the topic, you can over to the Search Engine Map [click here] which shows you a bunch of Search Engines and how they relate to each other. Or you can also go over to this one dude's personal website whose done A Lot of reaserch into the topic (way more than me) and seems to be pretty legit, if a little extra. [click here to go to digdeeper.neocities.org] Hope this infodump is useful to someone =D

PS: here's to hoping all the links work!

EDIT: eliminated the "read more". Figured there are enough mega long posts in tumblr, one more won't make no difference lol (tho the version w the read more has been reblogged already, in case you'd rather)

Reminder that pizza hut also laid off hundreds of workers just so they wouldnt have to pay them better wages

Seen in a local pizza hut. Prices were not reduced.

Leverage had a lot of well-researched things to say about the real world, but the one I always come back to, from The Double Blind Job:

Sophie: These are not small fines. Last year, my department handled a case where the company had to pay out $2.5 billion.

Hoffman: Oh, yeah. Everybody heard about that. But what the news didn’t tell you is that that company made $16 billion on the same drug. That fine was 14% of the profit. 14%. That’s like tipping your waiter.

“A fine is a price” – John Rogers, creator of “Leverage”

In some countries the fines associated with things like parking tickets are defined in terms of the offender’s income, so that a ticket that might cost an average person $20 would cost a billionaire millions. I think we should do the same with corporate fines - if a company does something that breaks the law, it should be fined in proportion to how much it made from breaking the law, so that a company that makes 16B through illegal means gets fined, say, 18B for doing so.

“Commander Vimes didn’t like the phrase ‘The innocent have nothing to fear’, believing the innocent had everything to fear, mostly from the guilty but in the longer term even more from those who say things like ‘The innocent have nothing to fear’.”

–Terry Pratchett, Snuff

This is actually already in place in many countries around the world. Students get $900 a month to attend college in Denmark.

I don’t know what it’s like now because it’s been a while since I was in school and the government keeps cutting benefits, but when I went to university the government had a system for paying students. It’s like being on the dole except you don’t have to look for work, you’re studying. The government also gives you a loan to pay for your entire university course, and repayment comes out of income tax once you hit a certain minimum income threshold. So you don’t start paying for university until you’ve finished university and are making a living wage; if you stop making enough money, you stop paying for uni until you’re making enough money again.

It’s a barely livable amount of money (both the government allowance and the repayment threshold) but it keeps a roof over your head and food on your table.

It kills me how everyday the posts and content about Palestine decrease because of how many people are getting killed everyday.

It also kills me how many stopped boycotting or has never even tried to boycott.

Somethings are so small to do and easy yet people don't even bother when it's a genocide that has been going and going and going not since October 7th but for decades.

> open audible

> find new book about nuclear war

> ask the author if the book is plausible or North Korea

> she doesn’t understand

> pull out illustrated diagram showing what’s plausible and what’s North Korea

> she laughs “it’s a good scenario, anon”

> download the book

> it’s North Korea

This sort of thing is as disappointing as it is unsurprising.

The #1 question I get from people when I tell them I read this stuff is “how scary do you think DPRK is” and the answer is that the UK and France both keep me up at night more than North Korea.

Insular, autocratic powers with no colonial influence will always behave in a more predictable and self-interested way than major colonial states.

Books like the one mentioned above (Nuclear War: A Scenario, by Annie Jacobsen) draw their plausibility and gravitas from a well of knowledge sourced from the United States’ military-industrial complex. Historically speaking, the US Nuclear War apparatus has been among the most aggressive and reckless. In doctrine the US president retains absolute authority, but in practice, as early as the Eisenhower administration, nuclear use authority fell de facto on field grade commanders, who were empowered to use nuclear weapons to repel conventional attacks if communication with Washington failed.

The makers of one of the most famous anti-nuclear films of all time, The Day After, took great pains to not reveal who drew first blood in their fictional conflict. Director Nicholas Meyer maintains that it doesn’t matter. But it does matter, because the US was always the one ready to obliterate the USSR.

ADDENDUM: hit post by accident fml

Those who participated in the US nuclear command will never admit that we pose the greatest threat to the world because doing so would be contrary to their stated purpose.

The narrative for 80 years has been then deterrence is the price we pay to keep the peace, but the reality is that nuclear weapons exist to provide the American Empire with the means to commit summary genocide on anyone who threatens to oppose its imperial activities, a final and defiant kick in the teeth to a world already brought to heel under Uncle Sam’s boot.

A few notes after reading about 25% of the book tonight

All of this is handwaved through a combination of asserting the book is about the step-by-step events of a nuclear war, and of people in the fictional scenario commenting on how implausible it is.

More thoughts will come as I continue this book that i paid money for and am angrily complaining about.

I know that the reason most of you follow me is either that i write really good shitposts or really good horror/smut, but you have to understand that If I could have supported myself by studying brinksmanship and cold war nuclear policy without selling my soul to the imperial war machine, I would have, and this is what i do with that interest instead.

More notes after some more reading